Born On A Rock Farm

by Aragon

Dead Bird

Inkie realized that morning that she hadn’t been free until she was away from her parents. She also realized that freedom was a word with a beautiful sound, but its meaning wasn’t exactly as pretty.

For her, freedom meant nopony to rebel against. She had always disobeyed her parents, and after purchasing the guitar, she had rebelled against herself for Quartz. But now, no matter what she did, she would not crush anypony’s desires. Inkie did not like that, but there was nothing she could do about it.

She knew that staying on the farm had never really been an option, but that didn’t mean that she had a place to go in mind. She had hit the road without thinking about it, and now the road threatened to return the hit twice as hard. So Inkie chose to walk, ignoring the burning in her hooves and the pain in her back and never looked behind.

Playing the guitar was still a mystery for her, and the money would run out at some point. She had no shelter, she had little food, and she wouldn’t survive without a home for too long. For the first time in her life, Inkie was free to do whatever she wanted, which meant that she was free to die, and nopony would stop her or take care of her if she collapsed.

And then she realized that she didn’t want to die. Even though she had always thought that she was so used to pain that she could not feel a thing, she found out that she still took life for granted, that she still was afraid of dying. She had not told her story, she had not lived her life, she had just started, and she was already in danger. But she couldn’t go back to the farm, to safety. Quartz had let her go, and she had to let herself go too.

She didn’t know if she wanted to do so anymore.

So for three days and three nights, Inkie Pie wandered the land without a clear direction in mind. She couldn’t walk all day, or else she would collapse, but she would always push herself to the limits. She would only sleep a couple hours every night, too afraid to stop and rest for real.

For three days and three nights, Inkie Pie did not dare to look up or down, to gaze at the sun and clouds or the moon and stars, to look to her sides and look at the land. She could only look forward, trying to see a goal she could reach, trying to guess where the end of the road was.

For three days and three nights, Inkie Pie forgot everything she knew about the guitar that hung behind her back. The instrument was not a tool for her to use anymore; it had become a simple weight, a load that was slowing her down, that did nothing but weaken her and force her to walk slower. She hated the guitar. She hated her father for buying it. She hated her mother for allowing her to go.

She never ran in circles, her hoofsteps acting as a guide for her to know the way back home at any moment, but she was not sure she could make it. She hadn’t seen a single building, a single pony since the hour she had left the farm, and her food was running low. She had money, yes, but money was useless on its own. Going back meant dying, and going forward meant diving into a mystery.

Inkie Pie had never felt so scared.

And finally, at the dawn of the fourth day, when she thought she had gone too far, when she had chosen to leave the guitar behind and run until she would fall and die, when her food ran out and realized she couldn’t make it, she found a little thing that blocked her path.

A dead bird on the road.

It was an adult red bird, with big and beautiful wings and a peaceful expression on its face. There was no blood around it, and he did not look injured. Inkie Pie, with her bloody hooves and her weak body, looked more dead than it did.

So she sat by the bird’s side and looked at it. It was not the first time she had seen a dead animal, but it sure was the first time she tried to understand what it meant.

And it meant nothing. There was nothing to understand. That bird had died because eventually everything has to die, and that was not a bad thing, she thought. Even the healthiest, happiest pony will be gone at some point, and eventually he will be forgotten.

And that wasn’t bad either.

That bird looked happy, or at least satisfied. Inkie thought of all the things it could have done with its life. Maybe that bird had a family, maybe it had a bunch of little children that didn’t need it anymore. Maybe it had done incredible things for a bird, or maybe it had done nothing too exceptional. But it still looked satisfied.

Maybe that bird had tried to achieve some kind of goal during its life, or maybe it hadn’t. And it didn’t matter at all, because the bird had died anyway.

Inkie Pie accepted the fact that she would die that day. And once acceptance came, the fear was gone. Only then she realized that she hadn’t been looking forward because she was looking for a goal. She had looked forward because she was too afraid to look behind, because she had thought that death was chasing after her.

But that wasn’t the case. Death didn’t chase after anything. Death was an absolute, something that would always come, and running from it made no sense.

She hadn’t seen any goal because there was no goal to pursue. Inkie just needed to live, to forget about death and to never think about it, because she was going to die anyway. And it didn’t matter when. Her time would come whenever it needed to.

And just then, once she finally accepted that she was going to die, once she gave up all fears, once Inkie Pie finished her three days and three nights of grieving, she truly looked forward for the first time.

And she saw the lights of a city in the close distance.

Comments

[Chaotic Note]

This chapter speaks to me a little.
Okay, a lot.

[Neko Majin C]

Chapter six: Dead Bird:

She knew that staying in the farm had never really been an option, but that didn’t mean that she had a place to go in mind.

"In" should be "on."

I imagine this what it was like for Hank Williams when he traveled across America.

[Aragon]

3869901

The fic was actually based on Bob Dylan's usual storytelling, actually : P

Also, send me a PM if you see any more mistake, please~~

[SIGAWESOME]

3869901

I imagine this what it was like for Hank Williams when he traveled across America.

Since Inky is a rock musician, how about a hard rock/Danish metal cover of I'm so Lonesome?

On a somewhat related musical note, Inky's story reminds me of Everette by Slaid Cleaves: