All That Glitters

by Sciver

Black

Trixie was now more interested than ever. After the first few sentences, she had skipped ahead. After a few pages she had become acutely aware that this ‘Aqua Regia’ pony was obviously on to something important. Trixie had no idea what the Philosopher’s Stone was supposed to do, but if the Princesses wanted it, it must be something amazing. She had to know. She had to see whether this pony had really found a clue about the Stone. Even if she didn’t know what it did, she had heard of it before. It was mythic. Just myth, she had thought, but Luna herself had ordered the Aqua pony to find it. It must be real, and that meant Trixie would have to finish this lengthy book.

The next several entries were mundane and uneventful, some things about chemicals and experiments—pure drivel. Rolling her eyes, she decided to skip ahead a few pages. This proved fruitless and she flipped a few more. Again there was no satisfaction, and she skipped several more pages, probably more than an entire chapter’s worth, if the book had had such divisions; which it didn’t. Her silvery blue curl of mane finally fell over something interesting once more.

“April 26: I was right, but I was wrong. It isn’t simply a stone, but it isn’t anything like I reasoned either”

Had she found it already?! Trixie flipped back a page and scanned the scrawl… No. No indication of success there, just more experimental nonsense. Returning to the entry she began to read, even more intensely now.

***

The days and weeks and months passed by irritatingly slowly for Aqua Regia as she tried experiment after experiment to find some result even resembling the Stone of legend. Mixtures and suspensions and powders and sometimes explosions, all things she created, but nothing with the properties she needed; nothing that bent the laws of science and nature as she knew them. She had come very close to a breakthrough on several occasions, but each time she found a promising lead, it ended in failure, or worse, something that was already commonly in use.

She was getting quite perturbed that her last 47 pages of journal entries were inconclusive, ineffectual, or otherwise inept experimental data. She scowled at her hide-covered mockery of her own life; that small-but-thick atlas of failure. The pages were filled with charts and graphs and hastily scratched notes and a few attempts to create new, better, more comprehensive circles. None of it produced the Stone.

“It’s no wonder they all gave up…” she sighed to herself in a moment of dejection, resting her tired and burning sulfur-hued eyes. Massaging her temples and the bridge of her snout weakly with her hooves, she simply tried to relax, to shut out the world for a moment. Breathing deep, she opened her eyes once more, brows furrowed in determination. “If my Lady asked me for it, I will find it. The goddess herself entrusted this task to me, so it exists—or can be created.” Ruffling her mane and stamping her fore-hoof firmly against the cobbles she affirmed, “I will begin again. The mark on my flank signifies my duty to complete this work after all.”

And so it was back to the library. ‘To know the Stone, one must know the philosopher,’ she mused silently as she wandered the musty halls filled with pages. She would start with an obvious choice, ‘A History of Alchemy and Occamy’ by the author after whom she herself was named, Aqua Fortis. It was an old book, but good for reference.

Flipping through the pages she gazed at the chronicles of her craft, beginning from the recent past and progressing slowly backward through time, finding the final pony of note. It was a name she recognized well: Wolken Von-Himmel. He was often cited as the father of modern transmutation. That was fine, but the Stone wasn’t likely something from modern times at all, but it was a start. In fact, Aqua knew she should continue tracing her craft back to its beginnings; back to its philosophy. It was such an obvious tactic that she wondered why she had bothered with all of her previous veins of thought at all.

So that’s exactly what she did. Looking up Wolken, she read page after page of his life, learning that his entire outlook on alchemy and occamy was heavily influenced by the writings of another, even older pony still. And so she went on to read about Nicolaus Coponycus, who built upon work done by the philosopher Aristrotle. Technically his work had been in contrast to the philosopher’s, but it was through that dichotomy that Wolken revolutionized the manipulation of base elements—more importantly, she had made a connection with a great philosopher now.

Aqua Regia was learning, with each new personage she was led to, that alchemy and occamy were in fact very much more philosophical than magical or scientific in nature. They were the end result of a series of very a-physical lines of thought. Rather than trying to manipulate the four base elements, the original purpose was to manipulate, no, to enrich ideas, and in doing so, to evolve oneself.

“That’s truly interesting… but not entirely helpful after all,” she mused to herself, noting a few scribbles of it on one of her failed experiments—no sense wasting a new page on more failure. She was certain of this, however: The Stone was definitely more than just a stone. It had to have some sort of ideological significance other than being a-thing-that-makes-things-into-other-things. She sort of felt like bucking herself square in the face for even considering the legendary Stone, just a thing at all in the first place.

At the same time…she was beginning to understand things long forgotten in her vocation; beginning to see the world as more than the sum of elements. Maybe, just maybe, that would be the key to finding or re-creating the Stone. If she was what was to be changed, she would have to first be destroyed, that is, her view of the world. That was step one in any occamical procedure: allowing the base materials to be burned away into ashes. She would have to force out her old views by replacing them with the teachings of old, now all but forgotten. That was something noteworthy, and note she did.

***

Trixie’s patience wore thin. She wanted to thrash and roll and scream in her own torture at being repeatedly denied any real progress toward her ultimate goal. She wanted the Stone and she wanted it now! Great and powerful though her impulses were, she refrained. She didn’t necessarily believe all of this foalishness about inner growth being the key to the Stone, and through it the key to her revenge, but she also knew that she wasn’t going to gain anything by wasting her energy.

She was living on in a cave, fed only on what she could find or sneak off others’ plates without being seen. She was getting by alright, but only because she didn’t allow herself any excesses. She couldn’t afford to waste her waking moments and energy on frivolous things like taking her stress out on the walls. She would just have to save it up and unleash it on that pony later, when she could afford to waste energy.

Of course, some of that was just her practiced dramatic flair; the truth is she was doing quite well for a homeless pony. No small credit for this goes to her talents in misdirection as a stage magician. While she did perform actual magic, many of her tricks were built upon classical performance art. Let nopony say her hoof was lacking in sleightability. The real trick was staying out of sight while she snuck away with just enough food off of several plates at a time to make a meal, and not go noticed. She would hide in alleys and carefully disguise herself by changing her color and mane, but a thief was still a thief, so she couldn’t afford to be seen eating any of the food, regardless of how great was her disguise.

“Once I have the Stone… I won’t have to hide anymore,” she grinned to herself. “No more sleeping under stolen towels or building shabby fires to keep warm.” Though she scoffed at the fact, she was pretty good at surviving in this dim hour of her life. In stark contrast to that feeling, she was elated at the prospect of the Stone and how it would allow her to change ordinary garbage into fantastic wealth…according to the journal at least.

But neither her elation nor her impatience could deny a simple fact: Trixie was mortal, and like any mortal, she hungered and tired. The day had worn thinner than her patience, and the sky was dark. She could read by the light of her horn or perhaps build a fire, but both such things were wasteful—either of energy, or of vital firewood. It was not a particularly cold night, and thus she would have to conserve her fire for another day, lest she get sick on a colder night when she had nary a splinter to burn. No. For now, she would have to rest. No doubt the Stone was safely hidden wherever this Aqua-pony had stashed it.

---

AN: My apologies to the likely only 2 people who actually care about this for the lateness of it... and probably pretentiousness or otherwise generally badness.
I'm afraid I've lost my muse on this one. I still know how this is to end, and many places in between here and there, but I just don't have the will to write that at this time.

I do plan on finishing it however. It just won't be for a while.

I hope somebody enjoys this in any case.

Comments

[KMCA]

This story is kind of interesting, I'm looking forward to more. Keep on writing.