Toph goes to Equestria

by MichelleTwistaloo

The expositional exposition

The one named Twilight wasn’t pleased, Toph could tell that much, not only by the tone of her voice (for the regal princess had confirmed it to her that it was a she, even if she couldn’t tell what made a he or a she in non human form), but also by her heart beat. Toph, standing at last, feeling everyone, sensed the mood. Besides this “Twilight”, the other ones, whose names Toph hadn’t bothered to learn, or weren’t told, were all nervous. From it, Toph sensed that they all deeply respected this princess. She was grinning, this was a fantastic change, now she had the power, she briefly felt the urge to screw them, twist the knife deeper, complain about their treatment, but that was the old her, the new her, forged in the battlefield, while still grumpy and eager to cheat someone, wasn’t malicious.

Well, except when you were a firelord willing to burn the entire continent, but that was an exception rather than the rule.

“My name is Toph Beifong and I’m blind”

She was sure, in her way of seeing, that someone rolled their eyes, of course she was blind, though she had never seen herself, she knew from descriptions of her, that her eyes were blank. Whatever that meant.

“...I come from a place with four nations and...” – Toph started narrating the exposition, explaining to the best of her abilities how her world worked, how the fire nation (the nation that had attacked them for 100 years) had been huge jerks, until they put Zuko in charge, how the princess fire-pants threw lighting at them (she didn’t like her very much), how she couldn’t see a thing in the air (and how she saw through vibrations, as learned via badger-mole), how animals were a mix of others and she had never seen a thing really, but more concretely, she had never heard of creatures like them, how she had fought with her friends (and her speech became impeded by the urge to think back to the dark, but still good moments she had with them), and how they had finally won the whole thing. She talked about Twinkle toes and the funny man Sokka who prized honor and his father, the gentle Katara, who kept them together as a kind of family, Zuko, and how he never got to go on a field trip with herself...she talked for hours, at times pausing, as her throat threatened to close and let her cry, though she avoided that.

When she, at last, stopped exposing her life and adventures, the whole room was silent. And not even her supernatural sense of sight (that replaced her faulty one) could tell her much more than what she already knew. There were ponies, they had hearts which beat, they had held their respiration at parts of her story, some have said some things that replaced curses, something she, with the potty mouth she had, would never do, but she couldn’t tell what they felt now.

The silence was uncomfortable, Toph spent that time shifting around the room, feeling, sensing, but there wasn’t much more information to learn.

“...I see”

The princess said after what felt like hours, she approached and once again Toph felt tense, unsure of how to act, as she had said, the rulers in her land were either completely useless, or completely, over the wall, crazy. She didn’t know how to react, maybe this princess would tell her some stuff about how things were in here? Tell her where she was? Maybe? Toph felt a tiny little bit of hope inside of her.

Though she couldn’t see it, Celestia was almost x-raying her with her vision, cocking her head sideways, like a big dog (an undignified comparison), wondering, what the creature, Toph, she reminded herself of the name, had told her had been terrible, much like what Twilight had been put through to test her, but the way Toph had acted, for she sensed it to be the truth, much like a child soldier....well she was impressed and kind of amazed. The tales about Earthbending – The strange magic that had make Twilight panicky, the bending and shifting of the ground. – Looked to be an intense magic, or, if not that, a skill. She shuddered when thinking of what Twilight had almost made the scared child do, while restraining the child had been simple enough (though she had told them of an old crazy king who could do with just facial expressions what she needed her body to do), if left to fight, they could have caused plenty of chaos, and destruction. Mutual peace was what she needed.

Celestia stood, finally rising, and Toph let out the breath she hadn’t even realized she was holding, this was it, Toph would hear her sentence now. She was glad to have her hands and feet unrestrained, she could fight them off if she were to need it. She had a particularly large chunk of worked stone with the name of “Twilight’s face” to deliver.

But it never came to that, Celestia looked at her, though she couldn’t see her and spoke.

“My child, Toph Beifong...” - Her voice raised itself and every fiber of the ponies who were there shuddered, as they all turned to face her, even if the words weren’t directed at them. – “You’ve appeared in our land, and, hostilities aside, you spoke of pain and triumph and all the challenges that you’ve faced.” – To Toph that felt kind of silly, she was basically recapping every single thing she had told her, as if she hadn’t been done speaking it not 5 minutes ago. She fought the urge to mouth the words “don’t you think I know that?”, deadpan was Sokka’s thing, not her, plus she felt that antagonizing her wasn’t a good idea. – “You need shelter. I would have thought you to need protection but you’re more than capable of that, as you so well proved” – Toph sensed some amusement on her words, like she had spoken them through a smile. – “Arrangements must be made. My little Ponies” – She turned to the mane 6, who were standing, and looking at her. – “Do you have an idea of whom to give this child to?”

Every single one of them crossed eyes, Twilight still bickered worded the words the other 5 had thought of immediately, almost as if telepathically communicating with her.

“Lyra” – She said.

Author's Note:

...Well, this took a while, and the quality didn't rise that much, and the word length didn't increase by thousands.

I'll admit I had the story sort of stuck in limbo, I didn't have the motivation, or inspiration to continue it, then I opened my g-doc folder with ideas and realized how to continue this.

Of course....I had to completely rework the story, but it'll work, I'm sure of it. Well, I hope you enjoyed reading it!

Comments

[mapu]

This chapter was terrible.

You might as well written "now main characters know everything,and like each other". This doesn't even benefit people who haven't seen the air bender, as all the important stuff was mentioned before this, and it's half-flashback to last 4 chapters.

Anyhow keep up the writing, and good luck, and I hope my criticism doesn't discourage you, but you need to split up the exposition. Hammering it for 1000 words straight is bit much. The flasbacking was step in right direction, but I really hate unneeded flashbacks.
Also telling not showing, and handwaving everything that happened.

[Anyne]

“Lyra” – She said.

Oh fuck no

[hs0003]

"Give this child to"
What is she? Property?

[MichelleTwistaloo]

5304107 When you are a royal, everyone is propriety, it's like, one of the rules of being a princess, or something

[MichelleTwistaloo]

5303826 You see, I have a conundrum, I'd like to "Show, not tell" but...she's blind, she can sense general motion, but a lot of small things, facial and the like, she doesn't sense. I'm not even sure on whose perspective I'm writing this on "3rd person?" "general 3rd person but with the pov of Toph?"

Edit: I'll figure it out, thank you!

[SP00KY NINJA-PON3]

I'm proud of you.

[Sylica telca]

Interesting