Sombra Dislikes Crystals

by The Apologetic Pony


Snarling Produces No Topaz

Regardless of his previous experience, it turned out he was proficient in magic in an especially unusual way. When Sombra used or performed it, ponies or just about anyone didn’t know what to make of it. The magic of a unicorn (or aura as it was called) wasn’t supposed to be dark. While those skilled enough could temporarily alter the colour of their aura, it was draining to do so, just like every other spell. Sombra’s aura didn’t just look naturally black, but other unicorns skilled in magic told him it “felt” different and they were scared by it. He thought of the apparent difference as frivolous. Their magic didn’t feel different to him and neither did his, so why did they think it did?

Sombra made several good friends in school, who helped to stop him distancing himself from others, including himself. It wasn’t very hard for him to make friends, even less so after he’d gotten suspended. That’d earned him a lot of respect. When he could afford to, Sombra thought upon the ancient questions in simple terms. ‘Do I exist? Do my friends exist? What’s the point in living? Why is my father so mean?’ But when he asked his friends about them, they shrugged, saying ‘I don’t know’ and that was the end of the conversation. He didn’t like that very much. His friends didn’t seem to care about those sort of things.

He finally dropped the piano when he was fourteen, when his mother failed to overrule his insistences. That was the start to him becoming independent. He was wise enough and old enough to easily refute, else shrug off the attempts of his father to build a more harmonious relationship between them. It was a matter of habit now, merely an instinctive reaction. He’d lost the reason as to why he continued to keep his father so far away, but Sombra wasn’t bothered by it, so he let go. When confronted by himself or others as to why it was so, Sombra honestly said it wasn’t a consideration.

Sombra had already gotten his cutiemark, but nopony including himself knew what it represented or even what it was exactly. Visually, it was made of up three purple, curved lines that joined at one end and that end blossomed out into a jagged, circular shape. At first he thought they looked like fireworks. But others had told him that they saw it as many different objects. Some said it was a flower, and some said it was a peculiar streamer. Most puzzling of all was that it’d shown up on his flank when he was doing a benign activity—eating! He wasn’t a glutton, or a culinary master, so what was it? Nopony knew.

Being unaware of the meaning of your own cuitemark was indeed odd, but not unprecedented. Ponies had come up with a name for it. They’d called it Undefined Talent Syndrome, or UTS for short. Once Sombra had discovered the label, he’d read about it. The text books went like this:

Undefined Talent Syndrome (UTS) is a rare occurrence when the foal is either unaware of what talent was being performed when the cutiemark was acquired, AND/OR performing multiple, indistinct actions at the time of acquisition. This event may result in a smudging in the perceived meaning of the cuitemark, or even complete removal. This is especially prominent in foals whose cuitemarks are representative of a talent in a symbolic, or abstract sense. If the foal is unaware of the meaning of their cuitemark more than a month after its acquisition, it is considered as having UTS. Usually the talent is rediscovered by adulthood, however there have been cases where the talent was never found. UTS is known to blah blah blah blah, words he didn’t understand and weren’t interesting.

In the intimate and awkward occasions where somepony asked him what those curvy lines were, he was honest about it. A lot of them didn’t believe him. They thought he was having a laugh. One of the more comical responses was that an a quixotic apology as if it was the recent loss of a loved one. Ponies are weird.

One day he was trying to encourage his friend to be a bit more assertive.

‘Snarl!’ he said, while snarling.

‘But snarling’s scary, Sombra...’

‘Snarl to get your way!’

‘Can’t I ask nicely?’

‘No, they refused!’

‘Can’t I give up?’

‘This is important to you!’

‘Snarling isn’t important to me...’

‘You know what I mean.’ he said, finally dropping his playful aggression.

Sombra didn’t confront his friend on it, but he struggled to think how anypony could get by if not with some anger. At the time, the thought of relying on the sympathy of others scared him. He thought that must be the only alternative, instead of burning motivation. But we do wild things as children, don’t we? He later learnt that motivation tied into aspects of the personality too, not merely the resolution to have motivation. It can be difficult, trying to get motivated, by motivating yourself to get motivation.

Alex and his son started to get on better terms with each other. The silences at the table weren’t so icey; they sometimes made small talk. It wasn’t exactly trust, but a mutual respect that harmony made both their lives easier. And for all Sombra’s stubbornness, he didn’t hate his father anymore.

A year later, when Sombra was fifteen, a unicorn transferred into Sombra’s class from another school. ‘Parent’s moved’ was all the unicorn told him, though they quickly became close friends. His name was Tinker Tailor. When Sombra was idly levitating a pencil and doodling with it in Lore class, his friend gasped in astonishment. But Tinker blushed when the teacher asked him if everything was quite alright.

‘Is everything quite alright, Tinker?’

‘You’re going to make me blush again, Sombra!’

‘Cute.’

‘Says you! It’s just I’ve never seen somepony with a black aura before.’

‘Neither have I.’

‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

‘I’ve never seen somepony else with a black aura.’

‘Oh.’

‘And that was enough to make you swoon? Are you that infatuated with me, Tinker Tailor?’

‘No, I’m not infatuated with you, I’m in love with you!’

‘Yuck.’

‘Does that mean I win?’

‘If you’re willing to go that far, Tinker, sure.’

‘So that means I get a prize.’

Sombra shuffled to the end of his chair furthest away from his friend.

‘I want to show my Dad your magic.’

‘...Is he a pedo?’