Out There
Solaris was speaking, but Eris wasn't listening. The words on the page that he was constantly pointing to started to blur and blend together. She couldn't make sense of the squiggly and round symbols already. Shiny's explanation of them wasn't helping at all. Eris tilted her head every which way to make them seem less boring, but it wasn't working that well. She wanted nothing more than to snap her fingers and have the book flap its pages and fly away. Before she could do just that, Shiny's voice broke through. "Are you listening, Eris?" he asked.
Eris looked up and blinked. "Yes, of course I'm listening!" she protested.
"Oh? Then how do you say this word?" he asked and pointed his hoof at a word.
Eris looked down and her brow furrowed in concentration, slowly turning into a look of frustration. "Uuummm," she hummed and her ears turned down in embarrassment.
Shiny rolled his eyes. "Come on, Eris!" he groaned. "I just said it a few seconds ago!"
Eris pouted in defeat and let her hands drop her head where it flopped unceremoniously to the ground. "This is boooorring!" she cried. "I don't like reading!"
"It's not that hard," Shiny encouraged. "I bet once you get the hang of it you'll be a natural."
"Puh, yeah, a wonder to behold," she drawled sarcastically. "A draconneques that can read."
She propped her head back up on her claw and used her paw to draw little circles in the dust. “If you just try-,” Solaris started.
“I thought teachers were supposed to make learning fun!” Eris interrupted. “You’re a terrible teacher!”
Solaris blinked, but before he could get a word in, Eris spoke up again. “I think you need to be disciplined, young colt!” she said and snapped her fingers.
Suddenly Solaris was sitting on a wooden stool with a cone-shaped hat on his head with the letter ‘D’ in the center blaring bright red. “Hey!” he shouted and shook off the hat furiously.
He climbed off the stool and looked at his difficult pupil who was laughing and cackling away on the ground. Eris rolled around on her back, holding her stomach and didn’t notice Solaris’ glare. Then he looked down at the hat and stool and wondered how she had known about that kind of punishment. “You can speak perfectly, know about social norms, but you can’t read or write,” he grumbled and waited for her to stop laughing.
“Ha, ha, ha, hhoooo!” Eris breathed as she got herself under control. “What?”
Solaris looked at her with an exasperated look. “How do even know about that?” he asked pointing to the hat.
Eris shrugged. “You said you’ve rarely been outside your cave, how do you know about school punishments?” he asked again.
Eris rolled her eyes. “I said ‘rarely’ not ‘never’,” she explained. “I’ve hidden around enough to see a lot of things. I’ve spied on homes, businesses, and yes even schools. I do like the way that the foals are punished, the hat is really funny.”
It was true. When she was hiding she would often poke her head out to spy through a school window. Speaking was easier to learn there considering the teachers were actually teaching young foals how to speak correctly anyway. It was also easier to learn how ponies functioned in society, she knew about bullies, friends, elders, students, almost every social status that came with their society. Eris had to admit she didn’t like it that much and knowing about bullies only made far too eager to keep hiding herself. Solaris smirked at her taste in humor. Then he sat down and looked at her thoughtfully. “Why don’t you go out more often or at least during the day?” he asked. “Why didn’t you show yourself to the ponies?”
Eris frowned and looked at the ground. “Well, from what I can remember when I was little, I noticed how… different I was from the other ponies,” she explained and looked at her claw as if examining it for an imperfection. “I mean it doesn’t take a genius to know that ‘one of these things just doesn’t belong here’!”
Solaris frowned at that. Even as a baby she had known that her presence would’ve disturbed others and/or she knew she wouldn’t have been welcomed warmly at least. At a young age she had been very intelligent and was more so still. Eris remembered coming down from the mountain, still not having a full grip on her powers and having very weak wings at that, she had stumbled and clawed her way down only to find that she was very strange. The ponies all looked the same and their bodies made sense. It wasn’t a nice feeling to have to know that you are very different from everyone else. “When I came down I noticed that there was no one else like me, no one I could talk to anyway,” she continued then she chuckled lightly. “Heh, I even remember trying to converse with a manticore once, it didn’t end well.”
Solaris tried not to chuckle himself, but it was rather hard. After all the thought of a young Eris trying to speak to a fearsome beast like that seemed actually rather cute and terrifying at the same time. Eris also thought about that time and how she had run through the Everfree forest, screaming at the top of her lungs with the manticore right on her tail. A climb up a very tall tree was what saved her in the end and then she made even rarer trips to the Everfree afterward. Solaris looked at her thoughtful face and felt rather sad for her, she could easily make friends. Her personality was very likeable, but he knew that ponies weren’t the most accepting creatures in Equestria and knew that it would take a while for them and her to adjust. The only thought that pervaded his mind was ‘what a sad existence she must have’. “Oh well, past is past and I have benefitted from what I did anyway,” she said trying to keep positive.
“Is that why you started causing so much chaos?” Solaris asked.
Eris blinked in confusion. “Did you start to feel lonely?” he asked.
Eris snorted. “Lonely?” she asked. “Well, if I was, that’s certainly a long time for me to feel it.”
Solaris could see that she was putting on a brave face, but he didn’t buy it. At some point everyone feels lonely, even if it takes years for it to sink in. Eris probably didn’t know how loneliness even felt. All she had ever known was being alone. “I just wanted to have some fun,” she said simply.
“Alright,” Solaris said, letting the subject drop for now. “But I feel like you should get to know more ponies, so that it’s not just me being your friend.”
Eris didn’t like the sound of that it had taken awhile for her to get used to Shiny’s daily visits and now there would be someone else poking around? It all just sounded very tedious to her. “Say don’t you get tired of the atmosphere around here?” Solaris asked suddenly looking around her cave. “I mean couldn’t you add a few… homey touches?”
Eris looked around as well and knew that it wasn’t much to look at, basically a cave with a fire pit and a straw nest to sleep in. “Yeah, I must admit it is kind of bare-bones,” she said and snapped her fingers. “Guess I didn’t really notice, oh well, if I’m going to have more company might as well.”
A bed popped up where the nest had been, a table and two chairs set up on the right side of the cave and a kitchen on the left. “That’s a start,” she said and smiled up at Solaris.
He nodded and picked up the book with his magic. “I think one day you’ll be able to enter the world of ponies, Eris,” he said. “I know that once they see past the exterior they’ll see a funny and fun… uh, female who is also a great home decorator.”
Eris giggled at that and watched Solaris leave. “We’ll pick up the lesson later and I’ll find a way to make it more fun for you,” he said. “Good-bye Eris.”
She watched him fly away, back to his castle and watched as the sun started to set. “Good-bye Shiny,” she said, knowing he couldn’t hear her.
She sighed and looked down at Canterlot and all the ponies meandering around the streets, talking and laughing with each other. She hadn’t felt lonely before, but now it seemed to be the only thing on her mind. “Enter the world of ponies,” she said to herself. “Safe behind the tall heights and these colossal stones,
gazing at the ponies down below me.
All my life I watch them as I hide around alone,
hungry for the histories they’ve shown me.
All my life I look upon their faces,
seeing them as they will never see me.
All my life I’ve wondered how it feels to pass a day
not above them,
but part of them.
Eris floated further down the mountain to get a better look. All the ponies didn’t see her and continued with their errands. They didn’t see Eris, twirling and singing and waving her arm over them.
“And out there living in the sun!
Give me one day out there.
All I ask is one
to hold forever.
Out there where they all live unaware
of what I’d give,
what I’d dare,
just to live one day out there!
Out there among the unicorns,
earth ones,
and pegasi.
Through the shadows and clouds I see them.
Every day they cheer and play and go about their lives.
Not knowing what a gift it is to do that.
If I was in their skin I’d treasure every second
out there flying through the skies.
Not being shunned out there
and never asking why
am I strange?”
Eris then started to fly straight up to the very top of the mountain where she belted out the last line with all her heart.
“I’ll be out there
just one day and then
I swear I’ll be content
with my share.
Won’t resent,
won’t despair,
old and bent
I won’t care
I’ll have spent one day out there!”
The sun set with glorious colors reflecting on the mountain and the last rays seem to stand perfectly still just for her as if to give her some hope that, yes, someday it will happen.