//------------------------------// // Marks, 2 (Interlude) // Story: Shears // by Antikythera //------------------------------// "Heya, Twilight! How's your day?" asks Twinkleshine, looming over Twilight's desk. "Uh, good! I'm just scratching out some more notes before I pack up my stuff. That was a great lecture!" I bet you could take an algebraic approach to this, since the Fourihay transform operator is four-periodic.... "Eh, I sorta tuned it out once he started talking about inner products or whatever. Integrals aren't my thing." Twilight puts down her quill. "Are you... serious? It was so fascinating! It's the fundamental grounding for the analysis and interpretation of—" "More like the fundamental grounding for snores," Twinkleshine giggles. You're more right than you know. "Twinkle! The Fourihay transform is the basis of all auditory magic! Without that technique, sound magic would still be sine waves! And Overtone is on the cutting edge of the field! I still can't believe he agreed to give a guest lecture, he must be so busy in Manehat—" "Eh." "...You even play the bass! Haven't you ever thought about incorporating magic into your playing? Backup chords? Harmonies? Reverb?" Twinkleshine frowns and puts a hoof on Twilight's desk, leaning in close. "All that stuff is just fancy tricks for ponies who can't actually play! All I need is the instrument and a pick. Are you saying I'm a bad bassist?" "No! But... imagine the possibilities, Twinkle. One day, ponies might give an entire concerts with nothing but their horns. Wouldn't that require skill, too?" She rolls her eyes. "Anypony can cast a spell that's written for them, so not really." "Uh, I'm saying they would write the spell too, obviously. And anyway, not anypony can cast any spell." "You're one to talk." "And I don't just mean it's a matter of capacity. It takes talent and practice, just like an instrument." "I guess, maybe. But it's just a hypothetical anyway. I don't think sound magic will ever get that advanced." "It certainly won't if ponies like you continue to not give a bit!" Twilight explodes. Twinkleshine's hoof slips off the table and she bangs a front knee into the desk's leg. "Ow! Mother bu—I mean, golly gracious," she corrects as Overtone passes their corner on the way out the door. "Twilight, what's the big deal?! Why are you so angry all of a sudden? It's just math—" "Leave me alone." "Twi—" "Go away! I have more to write down and I don't need any more distraction!" Her horn begins to glow the faintest magenta— "Okay, okay! Yeesh! Remind me not to ask you how you are tomorrow, why don'tcha..." Twinkleshine mutters as she wanders away. Twilight takes a deep breath. She breathes in the shuffling hooves on the ground, the faint scritch of chalk-on-chalkboard from the classroom on the other side of the wall, the winter wind whistling outside, the gentle scrape of her hoof along the cover of her notebook... How can you not feel the power in these laws? She shakes her head and reopens the book. I bet the transform operator has nice conjugacy properties. Let's see what its commutator with the complex conjugation operator is... She buries her head back in the parchment, and shuts the sounds back out. "'Integrals aren't my thing,'" she mutters to herself. "Oh, er, hi girls," fumbles Twilight. "Hey there!" greets Minuette. "Hi, Twilight! Whatcha doing?" asks Moon Dancer, eyes glancing down to the book between Twilight's hooves—which slams shut. "Oh, nothing! Just doing some independent research," offers Twilight. "Nifty! On what?" exclaims Moon Dancer, as she twists her head to peer at the cover—which gets shoved into Twilight's bag. "Ah, nothing interesting, eheh... just some... projection... problem sets." Sure. Minuette and Moon Dancer exchange odd looks with each other, while Lemon Hearts looks bemused. Minuette's gaze eventually returns to Twilight's, and she says, "Well, we were gonna ask you if you're coming to Twinkleshine's recital? It's the big night!" That's... tonight? But... "I, ah, have something to do. Sorry." "That's what you always say!" Moon Dancer blurts. "You never make time for us!" It is what she always says. But for once, it's true: Willing Hooves is leaving for a conference tomorrow, so they moved her second appointment to today. "You know, that's a pretty weak lie. You could at least add some detail so we might believe it," pricks Minuette. "I bet she just wants to read, like usual," states Moon Dancer. "It's not a lie! It's just... personal, okay?" "What, exactly, is so personal you can't tell your friends?" asks Moon Dancer. Just lie, Twilight! Just lie! "It's, uh, a doctor's appointment." Euphemism works, too. "Oh yeah? And what's so sick about you that we don't know about, huh? You never coughed or asked to leave class or anything today," points out Minuette. There are lots of ways to be sick. "It's... personal... I'm sor—" "What a load of bits! I'm so sick of dealing with you and your flakiness! Why can't you just be honest with us?" Minuette yells. Same reason one might not do anything else: consequences. "I am being honest with you! I just don't wanna talk about it, okay?" Minuette rolls her eyes and scoffs, then storms back out into the courtyard. Moon Dancer doesn't seem to know what to do, so she just trots along after her, leaving Lemon Hearts and Twilight each staring silently at the other. Finally, the yellow filly turns to the door as well. "I'm sorry, Twilight. I don't hold it against you. They... might. But I get it. Some things are personal, and that's that. Some things, you don't get to know." "Lemon, I..." But she's gone. Buck me. Twilight's favorite tree is faring poorly this winter. Its branches are drooping under the weight of snow, and its leaves have long since vanished into the fall air. Nature's thin white blanket of slush is far inferior to her own, a tasteful gray; she nestles into the slight dip in the ground she's formed over her two years at the School and pulls a couple of pieces of fruit from her bag. She glances around and, seeing nopony, also retrieves and opens Psychopathology of Avoidant Personality Disorder. It's not written for the afflicted; it's for the mental health professionals in charge of their treatment. That's why she chose it. It lasted through a respectable chunk of the day, but her projection bookmark couldn't survive her burst of anger towards Twinkleshine. She flips through the slim volume, continually scanning the treeline for wayward nosy ponies. She skims for the section on a therapist's role in APD treatment where she recessed after breakfast. While she finds it, she thinks of Willing Hooves, and his peculiar overconfidence. In the week since, she's yet to come to a decision as to just how intentionally affected it was, but she firmly believes it was at least some. No one could put that much faith in her. Not someone who knows as much about her as Dr. Hooves does. She finds what she's looking for, this once. This passage has been on her mind for so many hours that a small trickle of pear juice dribbles out of her mouth as her she forgets to close it, devouring something else instead. An individual with APD may be pulled in diametric directions by her desire to establish close social connections and her completely inability to engage in them. If she manages any social contact at all, she often comes off as "flaky," or unreliable, or disinterested. Be wary of avoidant therapy-interfering behaviors, such as excuses and preeminent obligations. Indeed, emotional distancing is a primary shibboleth of APD, but it is not a product of apathy. It stems from both her fundamentally impaired self-esteem and her strong behavioral conditioning against setting up situations in which she might face criticism. This hypersensitivity to criticism leads her to develop natural defense mechanisms, often escaping the given social context, sometimes devaluing the opinions and motivations of others. It is sadly far from uncommon for an APD individual to have exactly one session with a given therapist. Refrain from direct criticism; place no blame on the pony, merely her disorder. Even within an emotionally intimate relationship, she may hold a distorted perception of her role. Often, minor slights escalate into major perceptions of rejection, or such perceived rejection is conjured from thin air. This implicit self-sabotage exacerbates the issues already posed by the difficulty of engaging in the relationship in the first place, leading many APD individuals to simply abstain from substantial contact altogether, by choice or by necessity. An APD individual seeking treatment in the first place is exceedingly rare, and almost exclusively happens upon the urging or pleading of her family or friends. This social aversion sometimes leads her to see other ponies as capricious or fickle, seemingly abandoning her at slightest provocation, and as such, she often feels at other ponies' mercy. On the other hoof, this means that, like with many other personality disorders, an APD individual often feels most comfortable in relationships and interactions of which she feels in control. Pragmatism is key: carefully manage the power dynamic in your relationship with your APD client, and cede control to whatever degree is necessary to maintain regular contact. The book slams shut. He... had that diagnosis in mind before he even met me, didn't he? He was so careful not to blame me for a single thing. And that must mean... he knows dad was my fault. He knows. "Hey, Twilie! Good to see you," says the well-kept stallion Twilight's found fussing with his locker. "Hey, Shine. Could you do me a favor tonight?" she asks. "Sure, anything. What's up?" The locker shuts, just barely. "Can you tell mom that I'll meet her at the train station this time? I wanna catch up with my friends for an hour or two after school." Twilight does her best to look him the eyes, as Shining Armor knows her tells. "...Sure, Twi. Just make sure you aren't late. The train leaves at 5:30, so that's only two and a half hours. Keep an eye on the sky," he says, stepping into the straps of his bag, then pulling it up with his magic. "I'll be careful. Thanks!" "No problem. See you when you get home." Thankfully, she finds them, and she doesn't have to spend two hours wandering around town by herself. "Uh, hey, girls," she says to the four fillies giggling on a blanket in the school yard. They hear her, and turn, and she doesn't let herself look at their expressions. "I, uh, I'm sorry for how I acted today. Towards Twinkle, and towards all of you." Lemon Hearts picks up the thread immediately. "Oh, it's okay, Twilight! It's nothing to worry about. We all forgive you. Right, girls?" "Yeah!" says Moon Dancer. "It's no problem." Minuette glances to the side, eyes down, but says, "It's... okay. We're cool." Twinkleshine says nothing. "I, um. I wanted to tell you... why I'm busy today," Twilight continues. "Was. Was busy." Let's see how it feels to take power I'm not given.