//------------------------------// // Chapter Eleven // Story: Human Relations - HR // by LucidTech //------------------------------//         Trixie tilted her head slightly, she steadied the rose with care. It rested in a blue vase and rested against the lip as if tired from some unknown journey. The vase itself rested on a small wooden stool, and trifling worry rested on Trixie’s mind. Trixie knew the feeling of wanting nothing more than to lean languidly against something solid. She straightened it up. “Come now,” Came the pony’s voice, a touch of annoyance lacing and tracing each syllable. “If Trixie can do it so can you. Stand up straighter.” The words seemed to help, the rose moved just as Trixie wanted it to, the stem of the flower holding it up, letting the petals face upwards in the light. She loosened her magic slowly, making sure the rose was going to stay, and it did. “Thank you.” Trixie said simply, the words were kind but the tone was loose and she walked away, closing her eyes briefly and nodding as she went.         When her eyes opened she saw the rose and its blue vase in front of her, sitting on a table. She glanced back to the stool, only to find it empty. When she looked to the table again she found the entire table was gone, the stool was there now, flower perched on top of it. Trixie felt a waft of magic on her senses and she built a small protective spell in her horn. “Is anyone there?” She asked carefully. The shadows seemed to shift slightly, she wasn’t sure if she imagined it. “Anyone?” The spell in her horn built stronger.         “I’ve come to ssssee a lady about a memory.” Hissed a voice from the dark. Trixie let loose her spell, a blinding flash, but the darkness didn’t budge. It was like a vast dark wall and it stood resolute against her attack. “Now now, let’ssss not get fidgety. Ledger sssent me to chat.”         “Ledger? How…” Trixie’s face faltered briefly, but she brought up a stern expression when she noticed she’d slipped. “Trixie knows nothing of why this ‘Ledger’ sent you to talk with me, he is naught but a rude servant of the queen!”         “Oh pleasssse, cut the ploy. I know you’re worried about showing compasssion for sssomeone but there really isss no need for all thisss cloak and dagger businessss.” “Trixie seems to lack both a cloak and a dagger, while you might as well have both. Hard to trust someone Trixie can’t even see.”   “It’s far better that you don’t sssee me, if you can believe that. But that’sss bessside the point. I thought I’d tell you ssssomething important about Ledger that you might want to know. Heavensss know that knowledge about Ledger ssseemsss to be a preciousss commodity. I don’t have very much mysssself.” The shadows seemed to shift again, now the speaker was standing in the dark directly across from the flower. Silence crippled sound as Trixie thought, she kept a neutral look about her, not wanting to betray herself more than she already had. She was, in fact, very interested about what this stranger might now about Ledger. However, she was far more interested in why it was so intent on telling her of all ponies. “What’s in it for you?” Trixie posed to the empty room. “Why do you want to tell me about Ledger?” “Well, firssstly, I imagine that itsss driving you up the wall. All thossse little shardsss in your head from when you were trying to find the one memory he wanted. All of them nothing but little broken puzzle piecesss and no way for you to put them together. I’m not claiming that thisss will sssolve any of them, but I do think it’ll help with the closssure.” “And Secondly?” Trixie responded, not waiting for silence to take it’s place again while she thought. She regretted it but out of all the memories she’d dived through, Ledger’s made the least sense. It was like… a lot of different puzzles that somehow all fit into one. When she’d seen his memory of the element, she wasn’t even sure he was experiancing it. It was like a… like a photo he’d seen. But… not…. And there were other ones too. Different kinds. Different photos… and none of them real. “Sssecondly, asss I sssaid, I’ve come to sssee a lady about a memory.” There was a moment of caution before the voice continued. “There’sss a memory that’sss been ssslipping away, as memoriesss are wont to do. I’m ssssad to sssay I think I need a refresher.” “So you’re using this knowledge of Ledger as a form of payment? Don’t you have any money?” “I have plenty of money. I have more money than I know what to do with, despite my bessst effortsss. I can certainly pay you if that’sss what you want. But… well… what’sss really of more value to you? I am fine with the transssaction either way.” Trixie paused, she glanced around the room. The darkness was oppressive but it only seemed to linger wherever the speaker stood. The rest of the room was bright, the candles had been untouched. She wasn’t sure if she could trust whoever it was, what she did know is that whatever stood in that darkness held immense magical potential, and it was being more or less unused. It almost seemed more like a monster hiding away than any thinking thing. She glanced at it, as best she could. There was darkness, there was magic, there slyness, but there was no malevolence in that cloud of suffocating black, and though she thought about it for quite a bit longer, it was that knowledge that eventually led her to her answer. “Trixie accepts your deal. A reminder in exchange for this knowledge you have.” “Excellent. Now, what isss it you need me to do for this ssspell of yoursss? I haven’t had much dealing with unicorn magic. Isss there a blood circle involved, for example?” Trixie snorted in disdain. “Of course not, who do you think Trixie is? Some two bit sideshow? Trixie only needs to know what shes looking for in your memories, and if there’s anything I need to avoid in there.” “Sssimple enough… You’re looking for a bright day. Sssunny. There’sss not many of thossse memoriesss, it shouldn’t be too difficult to weed out. Asss for the latter… avoid anything crimssson… there have been dark daysss that I imagine you'd rather avoid.” Trixie nodded and closed her eyes, the spell was difficult to grasp. A large part of the spell could simply be conjured by her magic but there was another part that required a lot more trickery. Any spell that dealt with time was unstable, but Trixie had found a way to hold it together, it was simply time consuming to put it together. Eventually, she opened her eyes again and looked to the congealed darkness. “Are you ready?” There was a strange pause, Trixie wondered if she should ask again, and was about to do so when the voice responded. “Yesss. I’m ready.” The spell ripped out and cut through the darkness, searching for the mind it sought to read. The web widened as it went until at last it found what it was looking for. All the magic collected itself in a ball and flooded through the memories. Trixie was overcome with visions as the spell carved its way through memory after memory, bits and pieces floating around.  Darkness, darkness, stone, darkness, voices, darkness, statues, darkness, stone, Ledger, darkness. Wave after wave of shards fragmenting across her mind, Trixie waited for the spell to find its target. Darkness, stone, stone, stone, darkness, voices, crimson. Trixie felt the need to lurch and gag, though she didn’t know what it was she’d seen. luckily, it seemed a stand alone, and the spell continued on its way without another incident. The spell continued on and on for what felt like ages, looking and searching through countless memories. Trixie began to worry. She wondered if she should cancel the spell. It was taking a long time, a very long time. She was worried what might happen if she stayed here too long, what her mind might collect from these images of stone and darkness. Daylight burst so suddenly that Trixie felt blinded, and it took her a moment to recover from the faux flash of light. The spell stopped, recognizing its target. There was a pony in a field, the grass was impossibly green and the world seemed impossibly sharp. The pony looked familiar, but Trixie couldn’t place her. She was smiling and running, then she was looking at the grass, sharp blades poking out of the dirt. It took Trixie a moment to realize the owner of the memory had tripped. As the vision rose to look up towards the pony turned around worried. “Are you okay?” “Of course.” Came an unknown voice, childish and innocent and prideful. The pony smiled. “Well then, let’s go!” The memory collapsed and faded, the spell finding itself coming to an end. Trixie blinked in surprise at the brevity. “That was it?” “That wasss it.” The voice seemed… reflective in the darkness. “I’d almossst forgotten her coat color.” Even now, having just seen it, Trixie realized she couldn’t place it either. None of the colors she thought of matched what she’d seen, and she couldn’t remember what she’d seen to match it with a color. “But I do think I owe you your payment now. Don’t I?” Trixie snapped herself out of her daze to pay attention, in the interim her curiosity had only grown, after all, and she didn’t want to miss out on what she was about to be told. “Have you ever heard the sssaying ‘who sssavesss the sssavior?’” Trixie blinked in surprise. “No… Trixie doesn’t think she has.” “Ledger’s throwing a bit of a party for the queen’sss birthday coming up. I think you should go cccelebrate it with him. Though, I think he might have hisss handsss full.” “Trixie… doesn’t quite understand what you mean. Trixie thought you were going to tell her something about Ledger’s past or personality. Not about what Ledger was doing.” “Well I sssuppose you’re right… You know, dessspite the fact that Ledger ssseemsss quite the hero… All he really wantsss are some friendsss. Ledger hasss a lot on hisss mind and no one to share it with, and come the Queen’sss birthday he’ll have far more than mossst people have to deal with in their entire livesss. One way or the other. “Oh… I see…” “Besidesss, asss it turns out, you owe him. Mossst people he talksss to owe him for sssome period of time, of courssse, but I imagine thisss would make you both fair and sssquare.” A pause preceded the next few words as Trixie reflected on the idea of Ledger overthrowing the Queen.“It was never about debts.” Trixie said, her tone thoughtful. “Neither of us cared about who owed who.” “Then, perhapsss… you ought to tell him that in perssson. That way he can crosssss you out of the little book of hisss.” “Yea, that…. that doesn’t sound like that bad of an idea.”