Chapter 7: I'm sorry!
I had been watching my traveling companion pretty closely since the train started moving. It was REALLY tough to stay quiet, but she had been so fixated on the scenery going by that I figured she wanted to be left alone for a while.
This must all be so new and exciting to Cheery! It's just like when I first got to the Hive, except in reverse!
But I noticed now that she had stopped watching what was going by, and had leaned back, staring out of the window without really looking at it. It's funny how ponies (and changelings!) don't close their eyes but they're not really using them, either, sometimes!
“Cheery?”
“Hmm..? Yes?”
“Whatcha thinkin' about?”
“Oh... I guess I zoned out. I was just going over... er, I was just thinking about Chrysalis.”
“Chrysalis? What about her? Oh! Were you thinking it's weird she's named Chrysalis but the Hive is Hive Chrysalis? Because I thought that was kind of confusing!”
“No, I... I'm just worrying about her, is all.”
“You're worried about miss queen meanie extraordinaire?”
I was shocked! I was incredulous! It's like being incredible, except you think what the other person said is incredible!
Like, hard to believe incredible, not super-duper fantastic incredible.
“Queen meanie...?”
“Yeah! Chrysalis is a big 'ol meaniepants, and she calls herself a queen! I once thought somepony else might go by that name, but it turned out they didn't, so-”
“Don't call Chryssi mean!”
Cheery suddenly seemed really upset, though I had no idea why. She was giving me this intense, pleading look, and it took me a second to figure out what it was.
“Pinkie, please don't think that way about Chryssi!”
It was anguish. When you see two of your friends fighting...
I didn't even speak. I had a big apologetic frowny face on, but I'm no good with words when I do something wrong. What's the point of saying, 'I'm sorry', when you do something like that?
It won't make it hurt less. I opened my mouth to say... something, but I couldn't. I couldn't believe I had just stepped all over Cheery's feelings like that! I was still reeling from realizing how bad it was.
I just got up and walked over to her, quietly and slowly, and nuzzled her as gently as I could. It was my way of saying, “I'm sorry” and “I want you to feel better”, all in one. I finally did manage to say something.
“I won't say stuff like that again. I didn't know you two were friends, and I didn't think about her feelings, either.”
Cheery quietly nuzzled back. I felt her calm down after a minute.
There's a broad range to bringing a smile to someone's face, you know? When someone's sad, they don't want to party or jump around. Ponies and buggies... people need to know that everything is okay, before they try to smile.
I can understand. Smiling is what you do when something is good. If you smile all the time, even when things aren't good, then your smiles lose any meaning.
And then you don't have any smiles at all.
“Pinkie... thank you. I know Chryssi has been bad to ponies. I know about the... invasion, and all. But she's not really so bad. She's... I know you won't believe me, but...”
“I'll believe you. I'm your friend! And if you say that Chryssi – hee, I like that name, it makes her seem nicer – isn't so bad, then I'll give her another chance! Everyp... everybody makes mistakes!”
Cheery chuckled lightly. I live for that feeling of cheering someone up. Sorry, when things are sad I get contemplative, y'know?
“She's not so bad, she's... she's stressed. She works a lot, and the Hive has a lot of expectations for her, and she has a lot of expectations for herself...”
“Oh, I get it. It's complicated, right? Like, somepony or somebuggy doesn't want to be all bad, but then they're told 'you've got to be tough because reasons' and then they're all torn between how they want to be...”
“And how everyone else wants them to be.”
We sat there, quietly. We were still touching, a little, and I think that made Cheery relax.
“Hey, Pinkie? How do you get your mane to stay all poofy like that?”
“Ooh! I'll show you!”
-
We had decided to style each others' manes. I had tried a dozen times to style Cheery's, but her hair is all weird and silky and it kept fighting to go back the way it was and it was really hard to get it to POOF like my hair. We settled on giving her a rough-and-tumble sort of look, and it kinda reminded me of Dashie, though I didn't say so.
Now she was styling my mane, which I thought would be super hard, but Cheery apparently REALLY likes manes, so she was actually doing a great job.
I wonder if she doesn't get a chance to ever play with manes at the hive! That would-
“Pinkie... can you keep a secret?”
“Can I! Why, I'm the bestest secretest secret keeper in-”
“Hold still!”
“Oh, right. Yeah! I take keeping secrets super-duper important! After all, losing a friend's trust-”
“-is the... fastest way to lose a friend-”
~
“forever”
“FOR, EV, ERRR!”
~
“Wow, Cheery! You already knew my secret-keeping mantra! You must be a super duper secret keeper too!”
“Confidant. Er.. not really... that was odd...”
“What was odd?”
“Nothing. I just feel a little strange. Pinkie, I have a secret to tell you, but you absotively...”
“posolutely must not EVER tell ANYpony, right? Or anybuggy. Or any dragon. Or-”
“Anyone at all.”
“Right! Wait, it's not going to be something that hurts my friends, is it?”
“... No, but they'll be really upset if they find out.”
“Well, as long as it's not something that hurts my friends, go for it!”
“Pinkie... I'm not a real person.”
“Oooh! You mean you're just a figment of my imagination?! That would explain-”
“No, no! I mean... I'm a clone. I'm a magical cl-”
“OH! I know all about magical clones! Ever since I madeabunchofclonesandeveryonewaslike-”
“Pinkie, this is serious! The law strictly... forbids... did you say you made magical clones?”
“Yeah! It was really weird! But then they all had to go away...”
Oh NO!
“Cheery, you're not going to have to go away, are you?!”
Cheery paused in doing my hair. That's never good!
“I don't know. Maybe. Not if no one finds out! That's why it's so important!”
“Ooh! I won't tell anyone, Cheery! And I won't let anyone send you away! They can't! You're my bestest bugbuddy ever!”
“Thank you, Pinkie... that means a lot to me. If I ever do get... sent away, I'll be really glad to have met you! You're just... the best.”
I just sat in silence for a while. The thought of Cheery getting sent away was so sad I felt like I might deflate like a popped balloon. It was even worse that she seemed almost okay with it!
Nobody should be okay with that! Nobody!
Who would have the right to send her away anyway, huh?! Like my old granny pie used to say, 'That's just not acceptable!'
“Pinkie, calm down! Don't worry on my account. You said all your friends are great, right? I'm sure things will be just fine!”
“Oh... sorry. I guess changelings can feel stuff like that, huh?”
“I'm actually a little unclear on that... changelings can kind of vaguely 'communicate' with each other with emotions, but we usually rely on body language and buzz our wings to show our feelings. You're the only pony I've ever met, but... I can definitely tell when you're sad.”
“I'll try not to be sad, then! I want you-”
“If you're sad, Pinkie, you can come to me. Don't just hide it.”
“Hey! I was going to say that!”
We both giggled again, and she resumed doing my hair.
“... Pinkie, how did you know how to sing along with my song back at the Hive?”
“I dunno! It was weird, like you were singing the stuff before you were singing it, or like I had heard the lyrics before! I just kind of went with it!”
“Wow. I didn't know ponies could do that. Maybe you're part changeling, Pinkie!”
“Oo! Does that mean that I get a pair of cool fangs?! Because I have a fake pair but it'sjustnotthesame-”
We spent the rest of that train ride goofing off like that. Clone or not, Cheery was every bit as real to me as I was, and I wanted her to know it!
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So is the rest going to be published as two other distinct stories?
5036362 That would be the plan, yes.
Wow...ok, me like this series WAY MUCH!! Well done, and i'm now very invested in Cheery and Chrissy...best of luck in writing and in your character's stories!!
5071963 Hey, thanks. Book 2 is already complete, but I was trying to write the Book 1 sidefics before publishing it. Kinda got held up, but now that I'm writing again, hopefully I'll be able to fix that.
5219114 The previous queen ran things a bit differently, but you could see it that way.
Ahh. One of the Great Mysteries of the Universe, revealed... between scenes. Dammit.
They mixed Pinkie's essence into that spell somehow, didn't they?
I'm instantly reminded of this rather chilling humanized representation of the Too Many Pinkie Pies episode
I thought all ponies had that Musical Herd Instinct?
5219203
Small note: people don't get reply notifications if the reply isn't made in the same chapter as the comment that's replied on. So in other words, never reply on the fic's main index page, since that puts it on the last chapter. Always go into the chapter first.
I only saw this now I reached the last chapter
5583152 The two people speaking are high-ranking members of Chrysalis' administration.
5583314
But how did they know! At the end of the last book nopony/noling but Chryssie knew. So, did Chryssie tell them her little secret? That stands to reason, but I would've liked them to mention it were that the case. ^^
NO FAIR! I SHOULD HAVE KNOWN THIS FIC EXISTED!
6377907 How did you even find it after so long? It's not exactly on the front page.
6379973 Well the Cheersalis author told me.
6380062 Prane really is awesome like that, heh. I'll be posting Book 3 soon, since it's finished now; I'm just waiting on cover art. After that, I really suggest checking out Dichromatic - it's another of Prane's stories. In the meantime, have you read Snowboardling?
6380317 Yes. All of them.
Hmm. It makes sense that hive and queen share a name, much as the caste clusters share a name with the caste designators. Same concept on a larger scale. Of course, I say that without knowing if every queen of that hive bore the name Chrysalis.
And now each confronts the other's perspective on their biggest incongruity. Pinkie cedes, as she should. Cheery definitely knows Chrysalis better than she does. If the queen were as bad as Pinkie thought she was, she never would've opened the hive's borders.
Whoa. Way to call Pinkie's suspicions in the Season 5 premiere. And to appreciate the deeper aspects of her in general.
Hmm. There's something deeper going on here. Between Cheery knowing the secret-keeping mantra and their compatibility in the musical number... I'm actually not sure what to conclude.
More data is required. Good thing you've provided it.
6838748 Oh I see. Thanks!
6839056 I don't know... changelings seem to be too enthusiastic about the interaction tbh.
Got the story in the faves for a while now but I didn't realise it was that nice. Fave because it's part of the iqquelverse but now I see it's nice.
Okay, I can really see why you felt Cheersalis needed a sequel. Full of interesting ideas, with what seems like a sequel-bait stinger at the end, and then . . . that's it?
This, right here, is one of the first signs that I'm going to like this: one of my questions coming out of Cheersalis was what exactly led to a species without separate sexes having male and female genders. I can buy it happening, certainly, but it's not something I see as an obvious or necessary development.
Okay, liked the song in chapter six. I was able to go through the whole thing imagining a melody and rhythm as it went, and even on the first try only broke flow once up to the speaking break. That said, I have trouble getting "It IS a place of so many wonders!" to work. I think it's the "It IS" at the start that's throwing me off, but with "It's" I can find a tune.
I've enjoyed how the tight perspectives and sparing non-dialog non-internal-thoughts text give such an immediacy to everything, and speed along characterization by filtering everything so directly through the concerns of the viewpoint character for the chapter. And I've been surprised by the degree to which I find myself accepting not only Cheersalis but Pinkie: normally I have trouble with that. I think that part of what's going on there is that 1) there's something below the surface there, they aren't just bubbly and enthusiastic, and in Pinkie's case doesn't fall into the (Season 4, was it?) problem of saying obviously stupid and hurtful things and never picking up on the fact, and 2) they're put in a context where they aren't just disrupting everything going on (in a sense, yes, but since that's also the plot, and actually provides the current motivations for the other characters, that's not how it comes off) or imposing themselves on characters who have more relevant-to-the-story things going on. I wish I saw her exhibited on this model more often.
7393874 Aww yeah, fridge-logic buddies! We both saw the same oddities. The entire fic was motivated by a need to answer questions like that!
I'm utterly flattered by your lengthy and in-depth analysis. It's especially nice to hear the song worked, since I'm writing a story with more songs right now!
I wish this was a little more of a standalone story. I mean, it says "Book 1", but you don't expect that to literally mean "chapters 1-8, and book 2 will be chapters 9-16". I found Iqqel's devotion to Chrysalis far more appealing than anything Pinkie and Cheery were doing, but everything felt thin and unfocused.
8498288
The "Book" breakpoints are based on theming. Each book has something a bit different to say in the context of the overall story's themes. It's sort of like a three-part argument.
The story does hop around a lot, so I can see how you would feel it is unfocused. That indicates that the theme didn't convey strongly enough to make the structure clear yet - but hopefully it will be more obvious as you go forward. Thanks for giving it a look, at any rate.
This is remarkably unfocused. This isn't a book, this is chapters 1, 3 and 7 of a 20+ chapter story.
Well it was fun!
Well since Twilight know about Cheerys origin and in fact even mod the Spell with Celestia blessing before Chrysalis got the hoofs upon it i dont see any problems with the secret