Ponies on Ponies

by Ravenmane

19 - Heart-to-Hearts for Eggheads

It took days to pry Twilight away from faxing her mentor her theories about returning home. I managed to get her away on Monday though.

“Why did you want to talk Alex,” she asked me after I closed the study’s door.

“I spoke with Dash already. She’s already told me everything from how she feels to why she’s so adamant about everything. I… I want to hear your side of things.” I closed the shades to obscure the sunlight and any possible onlookers’ view.

“There’s not much to tell you,” she replied dryly.

I gave her a skeptical look. “Twi don’t try to think I’m stupid. Speak up or stop being jealous, you don’t get middle ground.” I sighed. “Dash told me her feelings, and don’t make me pry yours out with a friend or two.”

Her eyes widened as her face blanched, she knew I meant business. “You wouldn’t!”

“I’ll be right back with Rarity and Fluttershy,” I said calmly as I went for the door. Rarity would spill everything she knew if Twilight couldn’t say it. Fluttershy’s no slouch when it comes to romantic things either, she could spill everything with the right application of pressure.

“Please stop,” she squealed before the door was enveloped in a purple aura. “I’ll tell you Alex. Just… just don’t get Rarity involved! She… she was talking about how happy Rainbow was sounding the past few days and I resigned to the fact that she was too close to you for anything to matter.”

“Twi, I want to hear both of you out before I really think about it too much. Tell me how you feel.”

She released the door from her magic and took in a deep breath. “Okay, you’ve been a big help to me. You’ve always been so kind and quick to help anypony if you could. You’ve even been so honest about if you couldn’t but still tried your hardest to figure it out.”

“But that’s not all is it?”

She quickly shook her head. “You’re so much like me. Granted you don’t understand magic and I can hardly grasp the computers of your world, but we’re still so similar don’t you think?”

“I’ve noticed that Twi.”

“Then you must understand why this is so hard for me to say!”

“Twi, you can go off on a huge explanation about something on the fly but you can’t say three little words?”

Her flushed face was twitching a little, telling me I hit a nerve. “Alex, I really like you.” She shook her head a little. “No I think it’s more like a crush.” The walls were finally coming down, a refreshing thing to see from her right now. She practically skipped to me and brushed up against my side. “I need to spend more time with you. I just wish I was as brave as Rainbow, saying that all my friends could go without me but I miss the library. I miss Owlowiscious. I even miss that charred smell of Princess Celestia’s letters once I receive them. I would want to abduct you if I could.”

As much as thinking about telling Scootaloo the ‘epic’ story of my abduction by Rainbow would be awesome, a version about Twilight felt like it would be like a bad romance story. “I could write a sappy story built around you abducting me and I swear that every filly would read it sooner or later.”

Twilight looked pleadingly at me. “I’m trying to be serious here Alex. I’d want to stay but there’s just so much I have to do. On the other hoof, I don’t think Princess Celestia would like it if I brought an unknown species into Equestria. Especially after I factor in the volatile way you humans live.” I opened my mouth to object but Twilight cut me off. “I know you, personally, aren’t dangerous, in fact I think you would just react by going ‘wow, so this is Ponyville. Are you sure it’s okay that I live here Twi?’ I don’t know for sure if aggression is in human biology. I mean there’s nothing conclusive in anything I’ve read so I still don’t know for sure.”

“Can’t you just take a leap of faith Twilight?”

“I know you don’t want to hear me say this but, I’m afraid to.”

“Not even for your own happiness?”

She simply replied by staring at the floor and shaking her head.

I sighed. “Thank you for sharing with me Twilight.” I considered the matter closed now, I knew the two sides of the triangle I couldn’t fathom without help.

She finally decided to look up at me once more. “If you had to, could you choose?”

I turned away, refusing to meet her gaze. “The better question is how could I live with the choice?” The separation is inevitable, I silently added. I could tell, they’d all leave and I’d be sad for a while. They were all so close now, it would be like losing family all over again. Well, no it would be stranger than that but that was the best way to put it.

*****

I knew why they both wanted to be with me now, but I was genuinely afraid to know what I wanted. If I was with Twilight then when they left I would be separated from her thanks to her uncertainty. If I sided with Dash, then I’d have to live with never seeing her again once the others inevitably dragged her home. Both seemed painful in that case. Would the time together be worth it?

*****

As the rest of the month wore on my thoughts began to affect my actions and I knew nearly, if not, everyone had taken notice. I think that once Rick saw how much I was dwelling on it, he began to move everything of his out of the house. Nobody tried to cheer me up, even Pinkie knew I wasn’t sad; I was lost in thought. Nobody even mentioned anything when Rainbow went off to my brother’s old room and took the top bunk while Twilight went to join Fluttershy and Applejack. I did appreciate the gesture, giving me time to decide something without waking to see either of them every morning, which would definitely skew my opinion.

While my guests enjoyed sunny days outside, I just stayed inside and thought a lot about things. Applejack started her little garden after I went out and got her the seeds. According to dinner table gossip, Fluttershy was also teaching the animals not to go after the garden.

Twilight had gone down to one message to the princess a day, a relief to me when I was working. Unfortunately, Twilight started to notice that…

“You need to get more sleep Alex,” she told me one day late in May.

While a very true statement, the massive bags under my eyes proving it, my dreams were chaotic at best. Each was clear enough to tell me that whatever option I could make regarding my relationship with anypony, even ‘just friends’, was going to cut deep into my heart. There were stranger ones though, complex dreams of Rainbow and Twilight.

~~~~~

A solid path, like a well-travelled trail through the woods, haunted my slumber. If I looked behind me, the trail stretched out to the horizon.

I’ve walked the path several times. Each time, regardless of which way I went, I reach a three-way fork with a sign at the divide. Every time I’ve gone to either the left or the right paths because of what they’ve said. The road to my left was labeled Everfree Forest while the right was Canterlot Gardens. The center road, marked as Normalcy, never felt right to me.

Whenever I went left, I would eventually arrive at the decrepit castle where everyone fought Nightmare Moon. While I was capable of wandering off in any direction I chose, a brilliant light in a tower always caught my eye. Once the light became noticeable, the castle seemed to reorient itself to make me travel to the light, regardless of where I actually wanted to go.

When I’d reach the source of the light I’d see Twilight confronting Nightmare Moon, losing badly every time. Everypony else, necklaces and all, were flung in every which direction but Twilight was still managing to hold her ground. If I tried to help Twi, Nightmare Moon would throw me around like a ragdoll and laugh manically. Every time, when I woke from the ‘dream’ covered in bruises and exhausted. One time I also swore I could taste blood but when I went into the bathroom to check there was no wound that would’ve caused it.

*****

The path to the right, leading to the Canterlot Gardens, always ended at the infamous hedge maze. Once I tried to step into the maze I always saw the same thing happen. My orientation always changed as I heard a familiar cackle. It never took long for the next thing to echo around me.

“Even you have to play by the rules. In your case though, you’ll have to be down on four hooves. That means no hands, human.”

“What’s to make me go through the maze besides your demented magic Discord?”

The draconequus would always appear when he heard me say his name and we’d exchange irritated glares. “Because there’s nothing behind you,” he’d always tell me. Once he noticed I wouldn’t be intimidated by his powers, he would give me a very cruel grin and vanish with a snap of his fingers.

There were times when I looked back, seeing an empty expanse of nothing behind me. I even tested it once, finding myself falling until I’d wake up in a cold sweat in the light of the sun. After that I concluded that I couldn’t escape there was only the twisting hedge maze before me. I’ve only reached the center once, finding a snoozing cyan pegasus on a cloud. That one time I tried to reach her and Discord appeared only to send me to the start of the maze, forcing me to do it all over again. I don’t recall how far I got the second time. When I got tired, I fell asleep and woke up in my room, my body back to normal.

~~~~~

After one troubling moment, waking from a time when I refused to choose, I woke and shambled to the mirror. “I gotta get it together,” I muttered to my reflection. “I choose Dashie and I’ll find myself on the wrong end of our inevitable forced separation. Side with Twilight and I'll have to come to terms with the love that can never come back. Still, I can’t just say ‘I’m sorry girls but it will never, ever work out.’ It has to resolve but I can’t decide.”

I turned to stare out to the moon through the window. “Princess Luna, I normally don’t openly ask for advice from anything I can’t see but I’m in deep. I can’t decide between three things, each will rip the hearts of three individuals out and tear them to pieces. I could use a helping hoof, is there anything you can do to help me?”

Comments

[High_Wind]

lowbird.com/data/images/2009/11/a-hard-place.gif

[the other sans]

If only Polygyny was an option... but then again, he would STILL be sad... Make up your mind Alex!

[starshine_dash]

1541208
Most Appropriate Gif

[Ravenmane]

1548298 More or less, next chapter in final formatting touches

[TheNextGamer]

1541889
Polygon?
What?

[Allstar13521]

1745546 He meant polygamy