Breakdown
Chapter 15: Dr. Nathan Franklin vs. the Totally-Not-Racist Yellow Terror
I was standing on a copper platform, floating motionless above a landscape of moving clouds. It was impeccably designed, machined out of a single ingot of metal, and reinforced to support any imaginable weight. Nevertheless, here I was, with no way to go but...?
From the platform grew a vertical growth of copper, shaped like a grapevine. One wide metal leaf was spread out before me, and embedded within its surface was a liquid crystal display. “The sky is the chance of failure,” the screen informed me, “ever present but not a threat. To grow you must fail. Jump.”
Well, how convenient—a self-analyzing dream!
That was sarcasm, by the way. I hate amateur psychologists.
Now I suppose that Erishy actually meant this to be a challenge, like I would be tricked into thinking that real world physics actually applied here.
Instead, I calmly leaned way over the edge of the platform to see dimly through the clouds the sphere of green that is meant to be my destination. In doing so, I deliberately leaned far more than would be possible in the waking world without falling. And then, with an inviting smile, I skydived off the platform.
I fell gently through the clouds, the winds cushioning my fall and leaving my hair un-mussed.
The green sphere resolved into a floating garden, supported by a structure of green-painted metal shaped like a colander. I was entering the mind of a merged pony-human hybrid, and she envisioned herself as a salad.
Lovely. I suppose it could have been worse—it could have been a salad spinner instead of merely a colander.
I made my landing near one edge of the strainer. As befitting a pony salad, the greens I saw were more flowers than the traditional lettuce, tomatoes, cucumbers, and what have you. Also, there were various electronic devices growing up among the flowers: voltmeters and photometers and iPhones. The metaphor was getting a tad mixed at this point.
Now I should note that time is nearly non-existent in a dream, so I had no reason not to take my time, and so I did. Eventually I reached another grape-leaf display. “It is not a maze, but a path to self-discovery. You are the only one that decides where it takes you. Though really, a maze is no different.”
Amateur psychologist, and amateur philosopher. God, I’m beginning to hate this place. But of course, I know far better than to show anything but a glad face at this. Oh joy, you truly understand the true purpose of mazes, wise Fluttershy! That you’re supposed to wander where you will instead of buying into The Man’s insistence that you find an exit. That’s why I like to spend seven weeks in the local corn maze every autumn...not.
Let’s see, what’s the most-pretentious possible way to respond to this? Oh, I know. “Well said, well said,” I comment out loud with an accompanying golf clap. “I’m tempted to search out the digital guestbook app on this device. ‘Having a lovely time, considering the circumstances. Nate Franklin. October Threeday, 2011 1:35 am.’”
So at this point the massively passive Erishy was leaving my next destination up to me. “I have no intention of going where you do not wish me to go,” I say out loud. As if that will do her any good in the end. As I’ve established, I pride myself on that maxim—I never go anywhere where I’m not invited.
...It occurs to me that this is something I have in common with Dracula. I am not pleased by this comparison.
I know: why don’t I tell her exactly what I’m going to do, under guise of disobeying my orders and not doing precisely that? “I...well normally I would be seeking out sources of conflict in the two personalities,” I told her, “making them think they were under threat from outside, in order to force them into an amalgam too self-obsessed to resist being controlled. But I see no signs of that here.” (Because the merge was already complete.) “I don’t think I could mess you up even if I wanted to.” (Said in order to inflate her sense of false security.) “Ah...let’s see...what sort of place answers to ‘home’ for you? That should be fairly harmless...and a good deal more pleasant than the world outside.” (That was two lies for the price of one: Your mental “home”, while hard to attack, would be the most devastating point if said attack manages to be successful, and I had a good feeling that Erishy’s problems stemmed from her home, making her particularly vulnerable.)
Let me stop a moment to note that, unless you’re a true visionary, the imagery of one’s imagination is limited by the world you’re living in. Just like how visions of the future from the 60’s stored all of their data in reel-to-reel tape, because that was the most compact form that anybody had imagined to that point. The idea of having a “data stick” back then would be absurd. The 90’s introduced “morphing” effects, so now the dreams of those who grew up in that decade are dominated by that effect. Hence it should be no surprise that the path before me “morphed” into the walkway to Erishy’s home.
The entrance to her home was nothing less than a door set in a wall of leaves. Set where a house number should be was the single word “Peace”.
How dare you! The sheer gall of taking that word, and claiming as your address, to effectively tell the world that you’re the only being in the universe who deserves to have “Peace” as her sole address, physically sickened me. And the door in the wall of leaves—she might as well have had a mailbox with “Mother Nature” next to that door, because she was pretty much claiming that title to herself with that setup.
“I...I don’t know if I have the right to pass through that door,” I said, in character as the weak-willed Nate. Internally, of course, I was seething. “I hope intentions count for something,” I added meekly.
The door opened, revealing the young Fluttershy model from “The Cutie Mark Crusaders” episode of the series. “Hello, my name’s Fluttershy,” she told me with a gentle smile. “Welcome home.”
I just managed to avoid projectile vomiting on her for that statement. “Thank you,” I managed to choke out, before pushing my way roughly inside.
There was a party going on inside. Typical for Fluttershy, it was a party with the volume turned down. I was surrounded by people, with the impression that they were all friendly, calm and safe, but I couldn’t see any of their faces. Again, this was to be expected for somebody who has a problem facing others, that her memories of them were faceless.
You’ll note, of course, that Fluttershy had a face. How hypocritical.
“My room is this way,” she said, leading me to a small room in the basement, about what you would expect from a college dorm. A small cloud formed the filly’s bed, while a few scattered tables held unfinished electronic and specifically computer components and tools.
She struggled to pull out a chair.
You’ll notice the display of weakness—the exaggerated smallness of her room, the lack of physical possessions representing anything other than work (it was obvious that Erica had repaired electronics for a living), and finally her absurd performance with the chair. In reality she was a full-sized mare; there was no reason why she had to have any trouble whatsoever maneuvering a lightwood piece of furniture.
I made myself comfortable, thereby exerting my will (and my mental soundtrack) upon the dream. “This is a nice place you have here,” I told young Fluttershy. “Cozy, friendly and safe. Reminds me of my brother George’s dorm room, before...”
“Before what?” young Fluttershy prompted me.
“Before he killed himself,” I said. I don’t know why I told her, George, honestly I don’t. “The signs were just so obvious, but nobody could see it coming,” I admitted. “It’s why I became a child psychologist, to make sure that nothing like that ever happens again.” I didn’t want to see her look of pity—I can’t stand that look, like I was the one hurt most by your loss. It was Mom and Dad who were destroyed by your death, not me. I’ve always been strong, always been cold, always pushed everyone away rather than let them get into my heart.
...I needed to think about something else. I looked over at the nearest project. A model rocket, with little pots of plants attached as cargo.
How absurd. Much more fitting if it were a lion’s cage, don’t you think?
I looked over at the nearest project. A little wire cage, with a pair of lions inside formed from cotton balls and pipe cleaners.
There was something wrong with that cage. It didn’t belong with the rest of the room, especially with the bits of pink plastic added inside the cage, lovingly carved into the intestines of various animals.
“How pathetic,” I thought I heard Fluttershy whisper. But I couldn’t have heard that, right?
“What was that?” I asked.
“Oh, nothing. So, see anything you like?”
“What are you doing with this?” I asked, holding the cage to her face.
“Oh...well that’s for practice,” Fluttershy said, with the voice of an adult woman instead of a young pony. “For after we take over the world. ”
& & &
“W...what?” I bluster.
“After we ponies take over the world,” Fluttershy says with a little smile. “The ones who could stop us, the children and teenagers, they’ve already been merged. There are no children left on Earth now, you know.”
I reel back in horror. “But...the children?” I demand. “Why the children?!”
“You have no idea how this reality works, do you?” she asks me, genuinely surprised. She walks toward me, growing bigger and bigger through a deliberate subversion of the laws of perspective. “Your world is exactly what you want it to be. You are by nature a perverted and self-loathing society, so of course your world is polluted near to death, the evil faceless things you call corporations are allowed to spread misery far and wide, and all the decent individuals commit suicide rather than betray their ideals by growing up, leaving worthless husks like yourself to make everything even worse. There’s only one thing to do: wipe you out, and replace you with ourselves.”
“And what makes you think you have the right—”
“Our Princess gives us the right!” the towering figure of Fluttershy proclaims for all to hear. “The glorious immortal Celestia, God-given ruler over all universes! Never wrong, never cruel, unlike your incomprehensible deity. Able to assume any form we wish, able to commit any act, and never be anything less than innocent, with our own goddess to forgive us anything! And now, with a world far more malleable to willpower than Equestria, we will use Planet Earth as our base, to conquer the universe! Harmony and order to all beings, forever, or death by torture, starting with you! Your time has come, puny human!” She raises one giant yellow hoof, to squish me out of existence.
“Never!” I cry, bringing a lance into existence as her hoof plunged downwards.
She jumps back more in surprise than in pain. But now I have my opening. I will myself to be as big as her, in the cloudy expanse where the dream began.
“I defy your goddess!” I cry, shaking my lance at the heavens. “I defy her right to take my or anybody’s free will without a fight! And we shall fight, you soulless monster! We shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills; we shall never surrender!” Shut...up!
“Die!” she screams, charging at me with yellow eyes and red pupils.
I catch her body with my lance, which sinks effortlessly through her entire torso, stopping only at the tilt, staining her butter hide with the delicate color of her blood.
I’ve done it! I’ve saved the world...from a cheesy half-ass take over the universe scheme straight out of The Conversion Bureau. And those eyes...
I am back in the makeshift interrogation room.
The medical practitioner pushes me aside to tend to the pony. “She’s...she’s dead,” he says.
“Daaamn!” General Walker exclaims. “Didn’t think you had it in you. Well congratulations, you just handed the planet over to Discord.”
Merde.