There Is A Light That Never Goes Out

by CJOfLandsUnknown

Chapter 2: Fiesta

I was slightly shocked, I won’t deny that. She had kinda dropped this one on me. You know, just tell the person you’ve been working with for around five years that your leaving at breakfast. It seemed oddly rude. I expected more from her, maybe something involving fireworks. But I realised that was never her style. Dignified and proper to the end, it seemed. I didn’t really know what to say at this point. It’s not like I’d really expected this day to ever come around. She seemed to be the kind who’d never leave her job, the “be here until she left us on a more permanent basis” kind of pony. I finally found some words after we had walked back to the room, although they didn’t really mean much when jumbled together. I felt like a foal left alone for the first time. I didn’t know what to do, or what to say, so I let my base instinct pull me though. Cynicism.

“Really? You? Elements of Harmony? Seems they’ll recruit anyone these days”. I responded to the news that I was gonna losing one of only Ponies I actually cared about with the same sarcastic vitriol as normal.

There was no response. She just stared at me. Did she really expect anything different? Did she expect some form of grand change over a period of a few seconds? She was far too expectant of me if that was the case. That stare wasn’t moving on however. She continued to look. I didn’t know how to react. Was I in the wrong? No, this was how we worked. It’s not like this was such a massive change. Was it? Did this really change so much? I didn’t really know, and I never really would. She just stared.

After what felt like an eternity, she stopped, looking down at the ground. She didn’t look up for a while, which gave me time to mull over everything she had told me, and her reaction. I didn’t really know what was going to happen. I was somewhat adverse to the time they had changed the design of my helmet. Imagine how I felt about this. Even the smallest changes and now one of the only ponies I had a slightest inkling of respect for was walking out on me. But, something I hadn’t considered at the time, it wasn’t like she had much of a choice in the matter. Its how things worked around here. You moved up in the ranks, until you were guarding “them”. We couldn’t say no, it just happened. But her reaction was what confused me most. I didn’t understand it. The steely coldness in that stare wasn’t usual. Even when we glared at one another in true anger and contempt, it was a fiery passion that burned in her eyes. When she thought she was right, she would go in full hilt, no half measures with her. But that stare. It was almost dead. It was almost like she couldn’t care anymore, even if she wanted to. She seemed to have given up the ghost as it were.

We stood there for a good long while, neither of us saying a word. The only interruption was the constant whirring of the ceiling fan above our heads, which provided greatly to the cold distance that was suddenly growing between us. I continued mulling all these thoughts over and over and over again in my head, exploring every possible permutation of events, every possible change that could occur, everything ran through my head like wild animals, each thought nibbling at the others, trying to reach the forefront of my crowded mind.

“Where the heck have you two been?!” A familiar cracked voice called to the pair of us from the door. We both looked up, not realising who was speaking and how long we had been standing there. It was Rusted Sun. He looked strangely tired for someone who had just started his shift, or so I thought. “We’ve been waiting for you guys. You’re late!”

“Oh go on, pull the other one. I’ve got four, so you can lie three times. What you doing off shift for anyways?” I questioned him, actually curious for once. He looked back at me with a confused and almost gleeful expression of knowing, or contempt of my unknowing. “Well, it doesn’t matter anyways; you’re not working tonight”. I was still slightly confused, what in Equestria was he talking about?

“What” I retorted to my brother, who still standing in the doorway. He moved cooley towards the pair of us, his eyes locked on mine with that same look of gleeful knowing. He placed his hoof on my front right hand shoulder, and stated in a sarcastically mocking tone “Your shift started over 20 minutes ago, we’ve all been looking for you, and I thought you might be in here after hearing what happened at breakfast”. Strangely, he was right. I looked up at the clock on the wall, and realised that to be the truth. Looking around, I made a grab for my helmet and was about to pace it out the door before the hoof on my shoulder pressed against me slightly harder.

“You did hear me right?” He stated with a warm heat in his voice. It was an odd change to his familiar cold demeanour. We were both icy to one another on the rare occasion we were in the same room. This was odd. “You’re not working today”
.

This confused me even more. Why not? Was today such a massively different day? Was it a holiday? Had I been fired for not getting to my shift on time? I secretly hoped for the latter of all these options. Being fired would have made things so much simpler, or at least I thought it would. But no, this was not to be, not today at least. “Why am I not working today, pray tell dear brother?” I asked the yellow maned pony.

“You seemed down after breakfast, and a friend of mine is throwing a little siesta” he continued to explain to me, but I still wasn’t really listening. I occasionally glanced over at Shinning Shield, who continued to fawn at the ground. I had never seen her like this. Had I really hit that much of a nerve? Was she as sad as I was? Did she really want to leave us, or leave just me, on my own? I thought I should try to make it up to her. In some small way. In anyway.

“…and yeah, you’re my plus one! So we’re going out as brothers in arms it seems”. Rusted Sun had finally finished his spiel. I looked up at him, his hoof still on my shoulder, and proceeded to ask him to let some alone time with his brother go. “Rusted Sun, we’re both kinda down. Can you maybe take Shinning Shield, she needs this more than I do” I lied to him quickly. He looked up with an almost disappointed expression, which quickly snapped into a quirky smile, as he proceeded to pat my on the back. “It’s alright man, I see the problem. I don’t think I need an excuse to drink at all, and besides, someone needs to cover you on your shift. Both of you go, I’ll hold the fort”. He was being strangely reasonable, but then again, one of us had to be. He was the reasonable one, I was the idiot, or at least that’s how we were according to popular opinion. I laid down my helmet, and looked over to Shinning Shield. She had finally stopped fawning at the ground, and looked up at me with the same steely gaze she normally used. It was strange, but I had almost missed it. Those perfect blue eyes piercing into my dirty brown ones. I smiled. It felt like an eternity since I had done that as well.

“What time does said gathering commence” I pondered aloud, not really asking Rusted Sun, more asking the room. “Well, in around forty five minutes, the address is around twenty away from here, so I’d set off soon” Rusted Sun responded to my question with a sense of true ambivalence to the answer. I thought, and still do think, that he planned for me and her to go without him. It was the kind of thing he’d do, something so unbelievable contrite and forced that it would make writers of filly books blush and tell him to slow down a little.

“Well, you guys have fun! I’m off to pull some strings” Rusted Sun stated with a turn, as he started to leave the room. I quickly matched his pace and soon outstripped it, turning to face him in the hallway outside the room. “You’re a contrite idiot, you know that?” I spoke with vitriol and love for my brother. I hated the boy sometimes. Boy? It shows you how I felt about him when I named him as my younger despite the fact we were brought into the world simultaneously. If it wasn’t for mane colours, you wouldn’t be able to tell us apart. His head twisted slightly as he looked up at me with a mock look of shock and hurt. He had picked that look up from me. I’d picked it up from dad, who used it on mum all the time, whenever she tried to guilt trip him. Our dad didn’t like that much, so just played with her until she backed down. “I don’t know what you mean, dear brother. If anything, I’m offended by your insinuations to my motives be false”. We picked up our vocabulary from Dad as well. He was somewhat of a scholar in his younger days. He spoke to us in grand sentences, and we’d spend days pouring over dictionaries in order to translate the familiar foreign language of his speech. It’s a shame that neither of us had followed in his footsteps. We could have easily, or I thought I could have. My brother seemingly lacked the knowledge; I lacked the drive and commitment. That seems big headed of me, but it’s not. I’m pretty amazing.

“You have strings to pull? I didn’t even know you had strings in the first place” I was still trying to figure out how; A, he was able to get off shift, and B, how he was able to get me and Shinning Shield off as well. “Yeah, I do have strings, and if you would be so kind, I have to go and pull them”. His response was somewhat sharp and strangely curt. I had come to expect that of him, but the seemingly warm tone of his voice up to this point had caught me off edge. The sudden change, it didn’t suit him. Snapping back and forth between emotions, feelings, thoughts and tones was a trait that solely belonged to me. I felt like he was stealing a key part of my personality, of my being, and I didn’t like it. He turned, and left me standing in the corridor. I was alone again, and for the first time, I didn’t like it. The walls of dullest grey surrounding me were seemingly closing in on me. I went to my happy place, back to Dad’s study. The room that smelt of old parchment, with the spikey quills that I would pick up and accidently prick myself on. As a filly, as a colt, and even now, I disliked pain. At this point I had yet to meet a pony who did. But when I pricked myself, she’d come to me. Not mum, she wasn’t around much, and even if she was, it wasn’t mum I wanted to come to me. I preferred her anyway. She wasn’t much older than us, but she had height. Our father’s assistant, a rapier wit and a quick mind. She always smelt like the study, and freshly cut grass. I don’t know why the second scent was on her, but I didn’t care. I still love that smell. I stayed there for a while, enjoying the moments past, but then I remembered. Had I youth and cause I would not stay. Not here at least. No more.

A sudden smack on the back of my head was what roused me from my nostalgic waking slumber. I don’t remember sitting down against the wall, but that’s where I found myself, slumped against it, my head between my legs. I looked up to see whose hoof had struck my dreaming mind with such a lack of ferocity. It was Shinning Shield. Had I really expected anyone else? I would have been either ignored or insulted by anyone else, but not her. She looked, for someone who never normally looked good, surprisingly so-so. She looked down at me, and finally spoke, and, once again, I found myself missing her voice. “Come on, let’s go” These words may not have meant much to her, but to me, they were forgiving eagles, swooping down on me and pulling me up from this mire of not knowing what I had done wrong.

The walk to the address didn’t take as long as Rusted Sun said it would. It’s probably because we didn’t really talk to one another on the way there. We just walked together, both bound in a web of awkward silence and cool night air. It was that night air that I missed so much whilst guarding The Light That Never Goes Out. The heat from the flame provided a warm glow within all of us, but it couldn’t replace the pure natural cool of the night. I missed it so. I knew she did too. We were much alike, although neither of us would admit it. The walk, whilst silent, is still one of the most memorable moments of my time in Canterlot. Nothing more encapsulated my feelings towards that place then my feelings towards the night air. There was something missing from any other moment of my time there. This one had it all, even that cool night breeze.

We finally reached our destination, a few minutes late. I must have been on the floor for a while, I had lost track of time swimming in memories. Reaching the door of the siesta, I was the one to knock. Neither of us had any idea if we knew anyone there. I don’t think either of us cared. I know I didn’t, I’m still not sure about her. Her feelings on the entire thing remain an enigma. She came with me, so I suppose she wanted something from that night, but what, that continues to remain a mystery. The door opened, but no one greeted us, the pony that had done so turning her back on us to walk back into the party. We walked through the cramped and crowded house, greeting ponies I couldn’t remember, some claiming to have met me at other events, some saying they had seen me at work, none of them producing as much as a word from me. I just shook hooves, with the occasional hoof-bump to those who were thusly inclined. I made my way through the dance floor, past the DJ and into the kitchen. Before I could wonder how rich the pony that organised this was, due to the fact that they had managed to pick up a passable DJ, I noticed something on one of the kitchen counters.

Canapés! I love canapés. It had become somewhat of a running joke amongst the night shift. Any official visit of the Princess, any gathering of the guards at one of the poorly put together castle parties, any display of the flame to any location in Ponyville, I was the first one to find, and consume each and every canapé I could. Many unknowing outside viewer had compared me to Soarin’ of the Wonderbolts. I was nothing like that meat-headed, any food consuming idiot in spandex. I made sure to thank every server, and made it my mission to thank the chef, if I could find them. And besides, I ate only the small things, the ones with cream cheese and lemon and freshly cracked black pepper; oh those ones were the best.

After a long period of pretending to dance, consuming canapés and drinking cider, the good kind that makes you walk funny after a while, I found myself outside. I stumbled a little, and made my way to a small decked area, surrounded by trellises entwined with vines. There were a set of chairs on the deck, but I chose to sit on the edge, eventually lying face down, my hooves hanging of the edge, allowing them to fiddle with the grass below them. I don’t remember how long I stayed there, just playing with the grass, but I do remember something, it was the smell of old parchment, and freshly cut grass. It came suddenly, and I thought nothing of it. At least, for a few seconds, my cynical narcissistic pessimistic ways took a hold of me fully. There was no point in looking up; she wasn’t standing there, was she? I finally looked up, and remained disappointed. There was no one there. Not even a whisper of someone standing, watching me at my most vulnerable. Had someone been there, I might have opened up to them, no matter who they were. I stayed there a little while longer, basking in the cool night air, and the crisp light from Luna’s pet. After a while, I decided to make my way back to the house. Maybe, just maybe, I could drink these feelings away, and they’d leave me through other means.

I wonder how the air tastes when you’re really free…

The morning after. Oh god, the morning after. That bad taste in your mouth, the lack of memories, and the fact that the sun decides to be fifteen thousand percent brighter when you wake up, all of these facts make the morning after the worst thing ever. I tried, I truly tried to open my eyes, but they wouldn’t. Even if I managed to crack them open a little bit, the darkness would claim me once again, and I’d black out. This sleep was dreamless. There was just black nothingness, and the ever-changing smell of wherever I was. When I finally opened my eyes for a longer period of time then fifteen seconds, I saw I was in a place I did not recognize. The walls were a bare plain white, and I couldn’t tell who had brought me here. The door, the one that stood directly in front of me, suddenly swung open, and a pony stood in the frame, leaning against it, looking me up and down. Was it Shinning Shield? No. The colours were wrong. Her mane the colour of body and her body the colour of mane, everything was in opposites. Either this was my mind messing with me on a grand scale, or this wasn’t Shinning Shield. She hadn’t spoken, but she had moved, unseeingly sliding towards the other door in the room, before opening it and entering. She came back out with a pill bottle, throwing it on the bed I occupied, and leaving swiftly, not saying a word. To say I was confused would have been a slight understatement. I just picked up the bottle to check what the contents was, before cracking it open and sliding two pills down my throat. I realised too late I had no water to wash the bitter pills down with, so I pelted it into through the door she had brought the pills from towards a gratefully waiting sink, chugging down as much water from the life giving tap as I could.

Looking up for the first time, I noticed something around my muzzle. Stubble? I can’t grow a beard, believe me, I had tried on many occasions. But there was noticeable grime about me. There was a reason Mum told me to shave, and this was it. It looked terrible. Searching around the room, I found a packet of disposables, and proceeded to shear the face fuzz off. I did well for someone who had no need to shave much. Not one cut, I was impressed with myself. I made for the door, before something caught my eye. I looked back at myself in the mirror. I looked tired. I always looked tired. I should have slept more back then, but I didn’t think much of sleep in those days. Sleep when you’re dead, as they say.

It wasn’t hard to find my way back to the castle. It towered over everything in Canterlot, you just had to look up and you knew where you were in relation to it. I took the long way back. Wondering through the streets of Canterlot during the day was another thing I never got to do much anymore. It was nice, much better then sleeping during the day. I passed ponies selling overpriced trinkets to tourists; the temptation to pick one up would have been greater had I not seen the quality of the trinkets themselves back in my old days guarding these streets at night. Those days weren’t my favourite memories of the time I had spent in Canterlot. Too much petty work, I got bored. But, then again, was my transfer up to guarding the flame any more exciting. No, not really. But at this point, I didn’t care much. Work was work, was it not?

I continued to wonder through the back alleys and streets of Canterlot, making the occasional detour into old jaunts about the city. I remember one specifically. I used to frequent a little doughnut shop; nothing massive, no big company owned stuff for my country belly. I was used to the best back home, and I enjoyed retaining the little things, such as the doughnuts and the canapés. I swung in to the little old pace. I sauntered up to the counter with an air of cockiness that has long since surpassed me. I had lost the air, and found it hard to breathe without it. I rapped one of my hooves on the counter, expectant of familiar and friendly service. What I received was something quite different. Cold indifference to be exact. The server, who was much younger then I had imagined, came to counter with the same slow wander as I had exhibited upon entering the shop. I looked the colt up and down. He wasn’t the original, the one who served me a doughnut and a cup of coffee with a smile and a story. Maybe I was getting old. I decided, after much derision and diversion, to ask the young’un about it.

“What happened to…?” It took me a while, but I realized that I had never picked up his name. I’d been coming in and out of here with regular pomp for around two years, and yet, I had never picked up my servers name. It wasn’t like we’d never talked, we would get lost in one another’s words. He was a true raconteur, a master of the art. He complimented me as one true wordsmith to another, and I enjoyed his company for it. But how could I’ve not caught his name. Not once, in the proverbial tennis match of beautiful words and well-crafted stories, did he ever mention his name. I stood there for a while, my eyes nearly rolling back into my skull as I continued to search every corner and crevice of my cracking mind to try and remember a simple name. I never truly remembered it. Fortunately, he responded to my question before I had truly asked it.

“He Died”. It was short, it was blunt, and it was a powerful pair of words. Questions suddenly burst up and through the widening cracks in my head. Had he really died? Had I been off the beat for that long? The most haunting question, in remembrance, was one not of my times or his, but one of how he had gone. Had he gone peacefully? I had to look at myself long and hard after that question had been dredged up. Wandering out of the shop with a doughnut and a cup of coffee pressed into my hooves, I sat. I sat for a good while, just looking down at the ground, no longer hungry or thirsty. I stayed for a while.

And yet, there is still A Light That Never Goes Out.