Chapter 30
“Do you think he is capable?”
Holly did not reply to Princess Luna right away. Instead, she sat silently and carefully considered her thoughts, trying to gauge Noctilucent's abilities. The mare thought carefully about the pegasus that she was slowly growing to love; he was after all just another one of her foals, her wayward strays that she kept watch over. Holly watched as Princess Luna waited patiently for a reply, and the unicorn mare wondered what sort of answer Luna wanted to hear.
“Yes and no,” Holly finally replied. “Yes, he is capable of being a good caretaker. However, he is not capable of doing it alone. At least I don't think so. That is my opinion since you asked. There are moments where he is remarkably foal like himself. He is emotionally fragile. His moods shift occasionally. His own foal like behaviour makes him fantastic with foals. Surely you have seen how he dotes over the two tiny ones. Fatherhood comes naturally to him. And there is another issue I wish to discuss since we have brought all of this up,” Holly added.
“And that is?” Princess Luna replied as settled herself against the table and rested her forelegs upon the table's surface.
“I have long guarded my heart against getting too close to these foals. I have always held myself away from them knowing how much it would hurt to let them go. If you are going to establish a therapeutic foster home for our current residents, then I want to be a part of it. Noctilucent is going to need me if he is going to be doing this. I love these foals. I have grown very fond of this current batch... call me selfish if you will, but I do not wish to let them go,” Holly said, unable to look Princess Luna in the eye as she spoke.
“I hadn't planned on taking them away from you,” Princess Luna replied, trying to reassure Holly. “My intention was to have you in place as a director. My sister and I have spoke a great deal on this issue and there are going to be some reforms taking place on long term foal care for troubled foals... such as our current group of foals. Placing them into a family situation might be problematic due to some of the issues some of them currently have. The politicians are reluctant to spend more money, but for the time being I am funding this project from my own finances. I know you get a stipend now, which is not much, but it is my intention to move you into a salaried position as director,” Princess Luna explained.
The two mares regarded one another, Holly looking into the Princess' eyes now. There was a moment of unspoken understanding between the two, and Holly gave a faint nod.
“You know, I really don't care about the money. It has never been an issue for me. So long as my needs are met, I have a warm bed, a roof over my head, and something to eat, I am a content pony and will do whatever is required of me,” Holly admitted.
“I am relieved to hear you are on board with this project and that you believe that Noctilucent is capable,” Princess Luna said, restlessly tapping on the table top with the tip of her ornamental shoe.
“And what of Quirky?” Holly asked.
“What about her?” Luna replied with her own question.
“You do know that she and Noctilucent are engaged, right?” Holly asked.
“What?” Princess Luna said, her eyelids blinking rapidly.
“You didn't know?” Holly inquired.
“I knew they were dating and I knew it was serious, but nopony told me anything about them getting engaged... when did this happen?” Princess Luna queried, sitting up straighter and raising her head, her posture becoming one of interest and concern.
“Just a few nights ago. They plan to spend some time talking with Dr. Lethe before doing anything though. Which is probably wise, seeing as how they are both somewhat troubled,” Holly explained as a smile broadened across her features.
“I cannot believe he did it... he was the one who did it, right? This was not a case of Quirky roping him in?” Princess Luna asked.
Holly shook her head and continued to beam.
“Moon and stars, I was hoping this would happen. Well this is happy news. What do the foals think? Do they seem happy?” Princess Luna asked, now leaning forward excitedly over the table.
“The foals are ecstatic. I think they will be very happy to know that they are all going to be in a 'real' family soon. When do we tell them that we are keeping them together?” Holly replied, brushing a bit of her forelock out of her eyes as she did so.
“Oh, not yet. Not for a while. There are other things that need to happen before we can do that. Before I do anything or allow anything to happen, more needs to happen with Noctilucent first,” Princess Luna paused for a moment, looking very apprehensive. “There are a few things you need to know about Noctilucent before all of this takes place, but I cannot be the one to tell you… but you need to speak to him and ask him about why he is here,” Princess Luna finished.
“Look, I know what he did,” Holly said in a very low voice.
“How? Did he tell you?” Princess Luna returned.
“No, but he talks in his sleep. And Cactus Blossom isn’t the only one with sensitive hearing. I suspect several of the foals know. Graves and Cactus Blossom in particular. I don’t know everything, but I know enough. He cries about not having a mother in his sleep, did you know that? I suppose it is part of the reason I feel so fond of him,” Holly said, once again pushing her forelock out of her eyes where it had fallen again.
Princess Luna remained silent, unsure of what to say or how to even say anything. Her mouth opened several times as she started to speak, but then she fell silent and no words came out.
“Look, I don’t think any less of him,” Holly whispered softly. “He’s a pony. He has a few problems. We all do. When I was a filly on the verge of adulthood, I thought about doing it myself… even made a halfhearted attempt. The pain became a bit too much, and I stole some sleeping pills and a bottle of wine. I slept for several days. I woke up with a terrible headache and I was horribly dehydrated. I felt really stupid. It straightened me out though and I have done right ever since. I still think about what I did and the memory keeps me on the straight and narrow. It was learning experience for me and I think that it was the moment that I actually grew up,” Holly confessed.
“Thank you for telling me that,” Princess Luna replied weakly, unable to come up with anything else to say.
“We all have moments where we stumble, I think it is just as much a part of living as anything else. I haven’t taken part in many of the things common to most ponies. I have never married. I can’t have foals of my own. I didn’t grow up with a family. But I have tried to kill myself. Like it or not, that makes me belong. It is something quite a few of us have in common I suspect, even if we refuse to admit it,” Holly said as she looked Princess Luna in the eye.
Princess Luna slumped slightly in her seat, leaning on the table with her forelegs. Her ears splayed out sideways and her eyes narrowed.
“Sometimes, being close to death or having a brush with death helps us reaffirm life,” Holly said.
“Do you really believe that?” Princess Luna asked the mare sitting across the table from her.
“Yes. Yes I do,” Holly replied.
“I am not sure what I believe,” Princess Luna admitted.
“What we believe determines what we do,” Holly quipped. “I believe that everything has right to be happy and to be loved. Now, I can’t make everything better, but I can change the life of a few foals. And then I hope that the love I showed them affects them in a positive way, and they go out into whatever life they have and love others. Like ripples in a pond. Life hasn’t been kind to me. I was an orphan. I am barren. I suppose I have plenty of reasons to be unhappy. And for a long time, I was unhappy. I didn’t believe in anything. But then, a few things happened that changed my point of view, I matured, I figured out what I need to believe in to make life work, and over time, I found a bit of happiness,” Holly explained, pausing several times while speaking to blow her forelock out of her eyes.
“I believe that life is to be preserved at all costs,” Princess Luna announced in a low voice. “Everything else, I am not sure of. The world has changed much in my absence. Suicide was almost unheard of a thousand years ago. Ponies sort of stoically plodded on. Of course, lives were shorter too. Most were lucky to live for twenty or thirty years. Now they live for a hundred. I suppose back then ponies were too busy working, trying to survive, there was no time to stop and ponder if you were happy or if you were miserable, or to allow your thoughts to run roughshod through your mind. Now, now there is so much time spent idle. So much time spent navel gazing or staring down at your own hooves. And everypony is caught up in trying to be happy. And they are miserable trying to do it. Keeping up with their neighbors, purchasing goods they do not need, this obsession with staying young looking forever, so many thoughts and concepts have been introduced into society about what we need to be happy, but the pursuit of these things cause so much unhappiness,” Princess Luna said, elucidating upon her internal thoughts and sharing them with Holly.
“What you say has a lot of truth, but there are still some very simple ponies. One only needs to look at Noctilucent. He spends hours doting over his two little foals. And one only need to look at him for a moment to know that he is happy now. He was a miserable wretch when he showed up here. Now, he has that big dopey grin of his. And the bigger foals, he is a perfectly content pony spending every waking hour of his day with them. I have never seen a stallion more suited to fatherhood than Noctilucent. He was meant to be a caretaker. Life has been cruel to him though, just like it has been to all of us. Some of us get strong, some of us are left crippled. He’s been left emotionally fragile I think. I have spent my entire life around foals, and I can read them like a book… and Noctilucent is, for all intents and purposes, still a foal in an adult body. He’s a scared little foal that wants his mother, something I see all the time,” said Holly as she rubbed her cheek with her fetlock.
“And this is why you have endorsed him as a caretaker?” Princess Luna asked, leaning forward a bit more as she did so, looking at Holly intently.
“Yes,” Holly answered. “He knows what it feels like to be abandoned. To be alone. To be isolated. He understands the pain… the feeling. The hurt and shame of not being wanted. He makes those foals feel wanted. All of them. I would say this alone would make him uniquely suited to being a caretaker, but he has other qualities as well. I mean, sit down and watch him with Biscuit sometimes. He has conversations with Biscuit, even though Biscuit never says a word back. He spends so much effort trying to talk to Biscuit that he makes me feel guilty for not trying hard enough,” Holly said, her face forming a pained expression as she did so.
Princess Luna’s brows furrowed and her muzzle scrunched.
“Luna?” Holly asked, dropping any pretense of formality.
“Yes Holly?” Luna replied, her posture shifting slightly as she addressed Holly, looking more than a little surprised about being spoken to so casually.
“Would it be weird to want to adopt an adult?” Holly asked.
“What do you mean?” Luna replied, looking somewhat confused.
“Noctilucent is very much like the son I would have always wanted. I’ve entertained the notion several times now of claiming him as my own. I know this seems silly, it is one thing to say that you think of somepony as your own son… and while the words are nice and very touching, I feel there should be more somehow,” Holly admitted, looking down at the table, her mane spilling forward into her eyes.
“I think you should talk to Noctilucent about this… he would be very touched I do believe. I think you should tell him how you feel. Tell him you love him. I tell him that all the time. He didn’t believe me at first, but he has softened up a bit. When I tell him now, he gets the sweetest look in his eyes. If this is something you truly desire, and he is accepting of this idea, I will make it possible. I will give you the validation you so desire. You have asked for so little in return for all of your hard work,” replied Luna to Holly, who was hiding behind her mane. “Plus, I do believe it will be good for him to have a real family. He needs the support. I will say no more about his personal issues though, I do hope you will understand.”
Holly nodded, her eyes shiny with tears and barely visible from behind her mane. She wiped at her eyes with her foreleg and gave a trembling smile.
“So, this home we are planning will be very much like a real home I think,” Luna said in a voice thick with emotion. “A herd of ponies that have banded together to form a family. I wish every other venture I have had a hoof in turned out with as much promise as this has.”
“I think it would be nice for the foals,” Holly agreed. “They love Quirky. Quirky for all of her faults, is a good mare and has been nothing but good for Shady Patch and all of the orphans here. Lately, even more so. The foals are so happy watching two ponies that they love loving one another. It is changing them. Cactus Blossom hasn’t been so obnoxious as usual… she lives in constant fear of being adopted and taken away from Candy Corn. I suspect she hopes to have a place with Noctilucent and Quirky, and I can’t wait to tell her that she doesn’t need to worry anymore. She’s been remarkably well behaved lately. Well, remarkably well behaved by her usual standards.”
“Before Noctilucent came here I told him that he was going to fall in love with Cactus Blossom,” Luna stated.
“He has,” Holly replied, nodding slightly as she did so. “He loves her dearly and patiently deals with her antics. I think in time, she will level out and become a somewhat well behaved and well adjusted little filly. He’s already touched them all so much. Graves is becoming friends with Arroyo. Graves has been downright friendly by his previous standards. Sassy is content now and has her music, Arroyo shows a lot of promise with music as well, Candy Corn hasn’t been quite so shy, they have all changed already and I predict the changes will keep happening. It is like the foals have started to hope to again, even Biscuit has shown signs of improvement. It is though they just needed somepony to light their way.”
“Maybe somepony has,” Luna answered, thinking to herself about Noctilucent’s cutie mark. Only time will tell Luna thought privately to herself.
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nice
I wish there was more stories as deep as this one, great work, i always wait inpatiently for the next chapter
Anyway, Holly actually tried to commit suicide as well? I should have known, but I didn't. I am so glad that this story was updated. I look forward to more.
4661599
In psych class, I learned that one of three people in the US have attempted suicide.
That number staggered me a bit.
Most suicides are unsuccessful, but it is a common problem to be found among people. As I stated in the story, it is one of those things that many of us have in common, something that could potentially bring us together as people... but as people we just drift farther and farther apart which is why suicide is so common.
One in three people. I think about it a lot as I write this story.
4661635 Sounds about right. I myself have had that thought lingering on the edges of my mind for a while, and I think the biggest reason I have never taken it seriously is because I wear someone's name on my wrist who actually did it. Also, keep in mind that some attempts are more...feeble than others, for lack of a better description. I once wanted to drive a car into a barricade. Does that count as an attempted suicide? Some people would say no, some people might say yes.
It's tough to talk about. First off, no one wants to talk about things like that. It's a dark and sad topic. You need something like this story to bring people out to admit it, to make people comfortable with it. I'm sure for a lot of the people who follow this story and comment on it, Noctilucent is a source of inspiration. Someone who made an attempt and is being forced to talk about it. Secondly, how do you explain it to someone? It's tenuous. You don't just say "I tried to kill myself once," or else you get a reaction like Quirky's to Noctilucent's confession. We fear that reaction. Which is why we drift apart, because we need to talk about things like this, but we are afraid of scaring people away, or getting them mad at us.
In any case, FINALLY AN UPDATE
I am extraordinarily curious. Please don't keep me waiting again
'With him' -> them
Another excellent chapter!
YES! YES! YES! YES! yes yes yes! HA HA! a new chapters, cactus bloom can stink up the room with her personal musk!
If Holly is going to take the mother role, then I wonder if Mr. "You're still a non-person to me" Night Guard is going to end up taking the father role.
4661837 omfg, that would a a really funny plot twist, and I can see that happening... it scares me.
taking place on long term foal care for troubled foals. This bit here bother anyone else, anyone? To me it sounds weird like the first "foal" shouldn't be there, but that's just me. Don't want to seem like an asshole with what is going on in your life recently but that just rolls about in my head a bit weirdly. Either way nice chapter.
Who cares about the delay? I don't, I'm just head over heels excited for Holly adopting Nocti. I am glad you're back though, I love this story and the characters and even if it takes a couple days or a couple months I will excitedly wait for the next installment. Future Merriweather is also exciting.
You stole mah story!
Just kidding... and the publishing dates speak against me anyway...
Still, this is an interesting premise, though I have to agree with some of the other commenters that the focus of the story isn't exactly in the right place from chapter two and onward. For one thing: the guy just tried to commit suicide. The mental implications, let alone the physical ones, of such an attempt have hardly been addressed after that. In fact, I don't think this fic has a very appropriate approach to those who attempt suicide at all. All we got so far was Luna basically pinning the blame on him for "being such a klutz and trying to throw such a valuable life away." I think those who reach such a point in their lives are going through something a lot more serious than that, and one can't just waltz up to them and give them a bonk on the head, then expect them to "wake up and realize how precious they are" or whatever...
Now, don't get me wrong: I welcome the idea of Luna using an unorthodox method to help the poor guy, but it would be nice to get a clearer picture of the stallion's inner turmoil and how they all try to deal with it. Better yet, it would be nice to see any sign of it at all. So far, it feels as though he's like: "Welp, I just tried to kill myself, now I'm stuck with babysitting a bunch of foals..." For a story bearing the "dark" label, that almost reads like a comedy premise...
Chapter four and onward finally starts dealing with the issue, but even then it's kinda iffy... Noctilucent still doesn't seem nearly worked up enough (I can chalk that up to subconscious denial, though), and all the kids have these giant monologues that border on forced and destroy every ounce of subtlety. In fact, I'm not even sure it was a necessary step to make them all orphans whose parents have killed themselves. Having him deal with "regular" orphans might have felt clever (or at the very least unexpected), but this way it's pretentious. Same goes for all the imagery and reveals about his life. If his the latter was so miserable, then why is it suddenly such a "sin" for him to try and throw it away?
To sum up my problem: none of what I've read so far (I'm at chapter 7) seems to be the right way to deal with the situation, the same way you don't ask a guy who just broke his legs to provide therapy for people in wheelchairs, then maybe throw in a few "put your leg into it" jabs as well for good measure. You might want to heal the guy first...
The feels, kudzu why do you always make me shed tears with this story. Its so beautiful. I can just see Nocty and Holly with the little foals cuddled up in a nest of pillows.
Sassy is content now as has her music, as she.
First off, welcome back you coot, we missed ya.
Secondly, great chapter, showing things are finally getting better. Cannot wait to see more.
YAY another chapter, i hope everything is going fine for you now, i love reading this fanfic, it's FANtastic
i feel like everything will be going good. Until story logic kicks in and something terrible will happen. You know drama. Things are just too cheery to not have at least one more chunk of super depression before its over.
Upswing! Huzzah!
Loved this chapter. So much hope. So much happiness. Obviously, it's not going to be all sunshine and gumdrops from here on out, but still, it'll be a nice counterpoint to Bucky's Adventures on the Covered-in-Shit Archipelago.
Looking forward to more.
i always have high standards and they are always met by you
4662363
To be fair, the time window between his attempt and Luna's intervention and him going to this orphanage is a little skewed. It could have been a week or two or six months. It might say in the story, but if it did I have forgotten.
I think it's worth noting that mostly what Luna did was to make him dependent on her, or at least giving him a reason to not want to die. It might not be fair to place the blame on him, but the problem in the first place seems to have been, at least in part, that nobody cared about him. Luna is telling him that his life has value to her and blaming him for possibly taking that away.
It would be nice to see more of Noctilucent's point of view, but it seems a bit too subjective when we hear about it. Perhaps because his view on the world is a bit muddled at the moment. Also, it does seem like he is living in his head and the point of giving him a task was to try and stop that. Of course, it seems the problem is a bit deeper than that...
I think suicide is a little different than broken legs. In any case, someone with broken legs I would expect to be far more sympathetic to someone who is wheelchair bound than an able-bodied athlete. For the moment, they see the world through different eyes.
4661599 I second this gasp! Great job, sir!
4667988
Among all the wise things Jesus said, here's a good example: "Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother's eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye?"
Now, aside from teaching us about how one should not be a hypocrite, you could also interpret it this way: if you are currently sick and haven't found a way to heal yourself yet, then how do you expect to be able to heal anyone else with the same problem?
My main beef with this story is that Luna immediately throws Noctilucent into the deep end of the pool before he even has a chance to learn to swim. The part that I felt was right was her giving him a task to occupy his mind, thereby preventing him from trying to off himself again, since he doesn't have a good reason to live just yet. The task would then gradually build up such a grasp on life once more, and from there he could move on to solving his own issues, maybe through meeting others with the same problems.
Now, this "chore" or whatever you want to call it could have been anything: coal mining, street cleaning, shoe polishing, etc., but "babysitting in an orphanage where every foal's parents killed themselves" is overkill (from the tone's point of view). Leave out the suicide element in the last one, however, and it works just as well.
Of course, who knows? Maybe I'm wrong, and this method really could work. My bigger problem is the fact that we get an avalanche of suicide-tales and suicidal ponies in this story, to the point that I just become emotionally disconnected. If it was just Noctilucent struggling with the aftermath of his own attempt and learning to value life by starting over somewhere else, that would be okay. But this?
4668184
I agree with regard to Luna's actions, but it's worth nothing from the last bit of the most recent chapter that Luna is probably not as in control as she thinks she is. That conversation suggests that all of this maybe partly a coping mechanism for Luna to deal with her own issues. If Luna is found to not be a perfectly appropriate pony for this, then I think we can forgive her mistakes.
As to the orphaned ponies' background it shouldn't be surprising that they all have some suicide in their background. I mean, how else would they get orphaned? It might be more appropriate/reasonable if one or more had actually just been abandoned or their parents died as a result of something else (carriage accident, epidemic, etc). In the latter case, the orphaned ponies might be a bit too old for the context of the story though.
Hopefully any further ponies introduced to the story have a few less problems with their life/history or at least different problems. On that much I can wholly agree. Even Quirky seems to have abandonment issues, although their origin is unclear. Perhaps she should quit burning stallions who don't give her everything she wants.
4670877
I haven't read far enough to see those parts, since the chapters I've gone through so far simply didn't do it for me. This is not to say the story is inherently bad, or anything. Having written a fic about a very similar subject matter, I found it interesting at first.
Several other people here complained that, despite her being in the title, Luna is hardly the main focus of the story. She does show up frequently, but it's not really about how her methods work on various ponies that attempted suicide (or at the very least the first half-dozen chapters certainly don't give you that impression). In itself, I personally don't think that should be a problem, but it may indeed have been a more interesting story that way...
4671903
Well, it's hard to have an informed conversation without having read it all. Admittedly not a lot really seems to happen in 30 chapters. I think he should make his chapter 5k words each and reduce the number of chapters.
They have a point, I think with regard to the title. It seems that Princess Luna's solution to problem is to hope that placing ponies with other, sympathetic, ponies will solve the problem. For what it's worth, the beginning seems to imply that she's had a fair bit of experience with all this and yet later on it seems like she's been treading completely new ground a lot and her talk with Holly in the latest chapter makes her seem a tad naive/unobservant.I think it said somewhere that she split herself up, which seems like awful complicated when she rarely seems to have a need to be in more than one place in the story. To summarize, the ideas seem okay, but the execution is weak.
By the way, what happened to his cutie mark?
4676739
Noctilucent was the first.
Not sure where you come to the conclusion that you did.
4678928
Well there is this (from chapter 1):
This seems to suggest that Luna has been at this for a while. So, one might conclude that she is fairly experienced in dealing with these sorts of situations.
On the other hand we have this (from chapter 30):
Maybe I am being judgmental, but Luna's reaction there and elsewhere lead me to wonder how much experience with all this she really has. If she was really familiar with all this, why, among other things, would she need to put Noctilucent under an actual magical compulsion?
The story comes across as a little flat at times with regard to character's personalities. I don't know a better way to put it. Perhaps it is because Noctilucent is a little schizophrenic/multiple personality disordered and he's the main focus. The other characters seem a tad shallow, perhaps due, as noted, to the focus on Noctilucent
And the bigger foals, he is a perfectly content pony spending every waking hour of his day with him.
Them
This is a great paragraph, particularly the last half... The only thing I'd change is saying that suicide was ever 'almost unheard of'... rare maybe... seldom occurred yes, but although I'd believe modern western culture has more suicide than historical global average, but I doubt many cultures could have ever said it was suicide free.
So we have 9 + kids, daddy Noct and Mommy Quirk, Grandma Holly and Great Grandma Lethe. Could work.
Still hoping for a wedding ceremony.
4678681 Noctilucent's cutie mark (which was a “candle in a candlestick") was blown out by princess Luna
Here's the excerpt from chapter three:
I find it constantly hard to believe that one writer can have so many profound quotes spread over such an immense series of works. Kudos, good sir! (Take a bow. You deserve it.)
When is the Next chapter coming out? or was there a blog post I missed that talked about what he was doing with this story?
4769345
Working currently on rehashing the middle. I have the beginning, and the end, but I never did fully flesh out the middle and it is getting major reworking going on.
Sorry!
4769349 Its cool, I was just worried you stopped working on it. I'd rather have Quality over Quantity but it better be a LONG, Really Flipping Good Chapter!
can't wait! Have a good one Kudzuhaiku
4881840
Hmmmm.....
a-j-s-boom-boom-room.2299399.n4.nabble.com/file/n4662159/23637716.jpg
For me the term "Fall in Love" has always been associated with romance, but I see what you're saying.
"as she settled"
"everybody" or "everypony". I would think body due to Holly being around non-ponies regularly, but either is more personal than everything.
"has a right"