//------------------------------// // LII: Transient // Story: Memoirs of a Magic Earth Pony // by The Lunar Samurai //------------------------------// My duty to get the mail the next day was the same as it had always been. Every time I opened the door I was always met with a new sight. Sometimes Amethyst would be curled up by the fire, sometimes Evenstar would be meddling over his equations, and many times they would be caught up in a brief conversation about the nature of their research. However, today, as I stepped through the door, I heard something I hadn’t heard before: arguing. “Come on, Evenstar! That’s not possible!” “Maybe not to the untrained eye, but the proof is right there.” Evenstar was using that voice of his, the same one he used whenever he had made a breakthrough. What worried me was how he addressed Amethyst. “Untrained eye?! You’ve got to be out of your mind! With your equation I could prove one equals two!” Amethyst angrily drew up a piece of chalk and began scribbling. “Watch, you’re not making any sense!” As she stepped through her proof, I turned my attention to Evenstar. I couldn’t help but notice how tired he seemed. I searched his eyes but found no trace of that usual fire of determination in the vacant expression he wore. It was almost as though he were only taking place as a spectator to the research he had driven for decades. The more I watched him, the more unsettled I became. His eyes were drooping, his attention as fleeting as a candle in the wind. He was trying to focus, but his gaze looked as if he was seeing through the board rather than what was written on top of it. “And there you have it!” she proclaimed, drawing my attention to the board before her once more. “And after I cancel out the ‘x,’ one is equal to two.” She let the chalk drop to the tray as she spun to Evenstar. Her gaze held a triumphant air as she looked to Evenstar for his response, but it gave way to disbelief as he tried to scan the board once more. The room grew silent as his gaze drifted over the proof again and again, his mind trying desperately to parse the information presented so clearly to him. The proof wasn’t difficult to comprehend, but something was holding him back. He strained to follow its logic, but despite his best efforts understanding eluded him. “Evenstar?” Amethyst started. “Are you alright?” “I believe so,” he grumbled without removing his gaze from the board. “You… You do see how I got that answer, right?” “I… well of course I do,” he muttered. “I still don’t see how it applies to my original equa-” he stopped before he could incriminate himself further, but my mind picked up where his statement left off. “Are you sure you’re alright?” I asked as I took a step toward him. “I’m fine,” Evenstar said dismissively as he held up a hoof to stop my approach. “I’m fine.” Not knowing what to do, I glanced to Amethyst. I had never seen him like this before, and the worried confusion on her face told the same story. Something was wrong, but neither of us knew what to make of it. “M-Maybe you should get some rest.” “I’ll have time for rest when I’m dead.” I’m not sure if it was a poorly timed joke, but the mention of death did not sit well with me. “Maybe you should take a break for now,” Amethyst offered as she stepped away from the board. “It’s a nice day outside, maybe you could take a walk around campus. You know, to clear your mind?” “I don’t need to clear my mind, Amethyst. I need to keep working.” “Evenstar,” I started as I looked to the board once more, “You can’t force something like this. You’re close, I can feel it, but…” I glanced to Amethyst. Her face bore the same concern and confusion that I felt. I didn’t want to let my mind follow its grim train of thought, and much to my relief, Evenstar spoke before I could follow its path. “I’m going to my office. There’s too many distractions down here and I need to focus.” Before we could protest, the door shut behind him and we were bathed in an oppressive silence that begged our minds to wonder. “Do you think he’s okay?” I asked, trying to bring life back to the room. “I don’t know… I’ve never seen him like this before…” She looked to me, and before she could hide behind her façade once more, her eyes told me the truth. Amethyst was afraid. Something was amiss, something we couldn’t control. We could only sit idly by as our mentor walked a path we couldn’t take. “I- I’m sure he’ll be fine. He gets this way every now and again, it’ll pass.” Her reassurance sound more like she was trying to convince herself rather than me. “I hope so…” I said as I looked to the door. “Well, if he’s up in his office, I guess we can work on my shell spell. I haven’t done anything with it for a while, maybe we can make some progress.” Her offer was tempting. It was a chance to forget everything that had happened and focus on making progress once more. “Yeah, that sounds like a good idea,” I said as I walked to her table. “Where did we leave off?” “Well… where we started I guess,” Amethyst said as she looked over her previous work. “The last thing I tried didn’t work… shocking, isn’t it?” “Well, what did you try last?” “Making it bigger. I’ve been able to make it rather large, but I’m still using the same method that I’ve used since I developed the spell.” “So, if that’s not working, then what can you do?” “I don’t know… Everything seems so simple! It’s just a sphere. But the MMUs weren’t designed to be used with anything other than flat surfaces.” She let out a groan. “I don’t know what I can do, Starswirl. Every time I think about this I get caught in the same loop of how easy it should be.” “Well, what about a different approach?” I asked as I scrutinized her scribblings. “Maybe there’s another way.” “I’ve tried everything, Starswirl.” “Everything?” “Uh, yeah.” She looked at me as though I asked if she had breathed in the past hour. “I’ve tried shrinking the MMUs, aligning them normal to the origin, forcing them smaller than ever thought possible, but I always encounter the same instability as before.” “But, have you ever tried not using an MMU?” The question caught her so off guard that she actually pondered the idea for a moment. “Well, no, but there’s nothing else to use.” “Why not make one?” I offered as I looked over the countless failed attempts. “Make another magical mass unit standard? Are you insane?” “You wouldn’t be the first one to ask,” I snickered as I looked to her. “I mean, Evenstar did it, maybe we can use some of his research.” “Do you know how long that would take?” “No, but how long will it take you to figure it out a different way? If you’re limited by the MMU, why not change it?” She paused for a moment. “You know Starswirl, I think you actually are crazy.” “Hear me out,” I started as I stepped to her side and sifted through the papers on the table. “There’s a thousand different ways you’ve tried to make your spell work, but every time you’re hindered by the MMU. So why not take the concept and change it? If you need a curve, make them work with curves. If you need an infinitesimal, make one. Make another MMU, one that fits your needs rather than the one made to fit the needs of the past.” “And how do you expect to pull this off? You can’t just rewrite a spell like that, it takes time. Besides, even if you manage to get there, you still might be wrong.” “Well of course, but you’ll never know until you try!” I said as I stepped to the bookshelves. Of the hundreds of books before me, I knew what I needed might not lie in any of them. I scanned through the titles and flipped those that had any possible connection to my growing idea off of the shelf and onto the floor. “There’s got to be somepony who’s thought of this befo-” I froze. “Wait, Amethyst. Remember that one book? The one that talked about the issues of the magical mass unit?” “Oh yeah! The fundamental Problem with the MMU, I think.” “What was his conclusion?” “It’s not scalable,” she said, her voice gaining energy as she realized the point I was making. “Starswirl, do you think you could find that book?” “I’m already one step ahead of you,” I said as I scanned through the books. “Even if he didn’t have a reason to make another MMU, maybe we can get an idea of what to avoid when we make our own!” “It so crazy it just might work,” she whispered as she cleared the table. “Found it!” “Perfect! Bring it to the board and we can get to work.” As I looked to her eager gaze, my own alighted on the scribbling behind her. The painful confusion of what had happened bit into my soul. I didn’t want to think about what had happened, and my mind did its best to push away those thoughts. However, by the time I had reached the board and placed the book on the table, my face had fallen. I looked to Amethyst and then to the board. I didn’t voice my question, but she nodded in agreement all the same. We needed to move on, to press forward through hard times. We faced challenges and overcame them when. This was just the same thing, a challenge. I stepped toward the board and took an eraser. “I’m sure this will all blow over anyway,” I whispered as I smudged the proof on the board. “He’ll be fine”