The First Word is Always the Hardest
Adagio Dazzle stared at the blank document that was currently open on her computer screen. She felt the burning urge to create, even though she had lost her powers. Scratch that, especially since she had lost her powers. The drive to influence others’ perception of oneself didn’t disappear just because one had lost the easiest means to do so. In her desperation, she had turned to the next best thing to mind-controlling the entire world: publishing Daring Do fanfiction online.
The night that she and her two friends had lost their powers, they ran away in shame, eventually taking shelter in a bookstore where Adagio laid her eyes upon a worn-out copy of Daring Do and the Quest for the Sapphire Statue. Having heard positive reviews of the series, she bought the book on a lark, reading it when the three of them had returned home.
She finished it that night. The next day she ordered the entire series online—next day shipping. It had indeed arrived the day after, much to her delight.
Experiencing the series was ecstasy to her, another form of creation. A creation in her mind of what A.K. Yearling transcribed onto the page. A world all her own to distract her from the fact that the Dazzlings weren’t the most popular students at Canterlot High. She devoured the series whenever she could—before school, between periods, sometimes even ditching classes to read a chapter in the bathroom. She served a series of detentions in order to feed her new obsession, which just gave her more time to read.
Finally, after a few weeks, she had finished the entire series to date. She still wanted more. Needed more. Her soul screamed for more Daring Do. In her stewing desire, she had turned to the internet in an attempt to sate her yearnings.
She wasn’t expecting the absolute glut of Daring Do content that existed online.
There were literary theses, videos dissecting the themes in the books, even entire libraries of music and art dedicated to certain scenes and characters from the novels. Adagio Dazzle proceeded to get drunk on the heady fumes of Daring Do fan content as she perused each section of the fandom until she finally landed on the motherlode: fanfiction.
Fanfiction was the release that she craved. Here, there were entire sections of canon that were explained, plot holes that were plugged, alternate paths chosen that she could drink in to her heart's content. They even had a website specifically created to post Daring Do fanfiction, where people were recognized for their works. Where they were adored. She immediately signed up for an account and got to work on writing her contribution to the Daring Do fanverse.
And that’s where she was right now. Staring at a blank text document, unable to scrounge up any ideas. Her mind and body ached to form words, but her fingers couldn’t come up with anything. Wouldn’t come up with anything. It was as if there was some disconnect between wanting to create and the act of creating that she hadn’t somehow noticed. Before, she would just open up her mouth and beauteous melodies would emerge. Adagio groaned in frustration that she couldn’t even lift a finger to transcribe her ideas onto the page.
It then hit her that she had no ideas.
It seemed that in her drive to want to create something, she had forgotten that she needed something to actually create. She closed her eyes to try to come up with an idea, but all that filled her mind was the hot fuzz of vexation. She snarled, furious with herself that she couldn’t salvage anything with which to construct a narrative to share with the world. She opened her eyes, typed something, then deleted it. She typed something else, then deleted it again. She slammed her fist on the desk, shaking the monitor and keyboard.
She needed this! She craved this more than anything in the world, and she wasn’t going to let something dumb like writer’s block stand in her way!
Then, from the recesses of her mind, inspiration hit her like a freight train. She chuckled, the chuckle turning into a chortle which morphed into a raucous laughter at the insane impossibility of the premise she had just come up with. The spark shot from her eyes straight into her fingers, the clacking of keys veritable music to her ears. The symphony of creation was pulsing vibrantly in her mind as she transcribed her thoughts into information and light.
Adagio’s eyelids laid heavy as she pressed the final keys on what was to be her first submission to the website. She then noticed a sliver of sunlight dancing on the desk next to the keyboard and looked outside, surprised to see that the sun was rising. It certainly didn’t feel like she had been typing for that long. Nevertheless, she somewhat accepted that everything worth something took time—she had understood that when she arranged the events that allowed her and her friends to absorb the boundless Equestrian magic that existed within those five humans, and she guessed that that determination applied equally to writing fanfiction.
Now to publish.
She opened up the Daring Do fanfiction website, logged into her username Fortissimo Flare, and created a new story page in which to post her freshly hewn masterpiece. Her mind drew a blank when she had to think of a title. She had just titled it Awesome Idea in the document.
She racked her brain on what to title her new work of fiction. Should she go for the mystery aspect, letting readers find out what they’re getting into only when they open the story? Maybe she should subtly hint at the events inside cleverly.
No. Adagio decided that the best way to handle this was to tell the reader exactly what they were getting into—the surprise wasn’t in what happens, but in how the characters involved dealt with it, after all. On that note, she decided to title the fic Dr. Dariballerozhotl and submit it.
Adagio smiled as her head hit the desk, finally able to say she created something as she fell asleep.
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I know that feel all to well, Adagio
This was beautiful!
Oh no Adagio, what have you unleashed?
Dr. Dariballerozhotl
I can decipher the Daring Do and Ahuizotl in that, but not the rest, who are those?
Nice to see she found a hobby, Aria and Sonata's antics didn't really look like they left much room for a third player.
Wow. It's like staring into a mirror. That's next to another mirror. Hi, me!-me!-me!-me!-me!
Because echoes bounce off mirrors much better than they do off other materials. Obviously.
And that's about as far as my brain got after finishing. Good, Syeekoh. Is nice, light, self-reflecting.
5521445
Thank you, I appreciate it.
5521452
Dr. Caballeron.
The hardest part is often the beginning. To get those first words out... where do you begin? But give it time, and you'll get there eventually.
But maybe you shouldn't always pull all nighters.
5521456 Yeah, you hit the nail on the head there.
I'm glad you enjoyed it.
5521461 But all-nighters are the best nighters!
5521457 Oh my god, I'd so read that Daring Do fanfic.
The best kind of meta. I only wish there were more to read, here. As insane as it sounds, I'd totally read a 50k word story about Adagio being a fanfic writer. Maybe the other two get in on it as well. Aria would write the 2edgy downers, and Sonata could write the inane crackfics. Man, that could be a fun story. Only problem would be the potential for people to scream that the author needs to write the Daring Do fanfics within the Dazzling fanfic. Ah well, at least we have this fun little one-shot.
5521457 Welcome!
Wonder what the others will say about Adagio's new hobby... What if it turns out one of the hair 5 is a writer too?
Should I be afraid of how relatable this was?... because I'm absolutely terrified. xD Great job!
5521486 Well, I suppose you could put snippets of Daring Do fanfiction in the story.
And thank you.
5521513
Well, it's relatable to me. I'm glad that you found it relatable as well.
I want to see the story Adagio wrote at some point.
5521543 But I can't write Daring Do fanfiction.
5521469 Hi.
Just want to say.
Welcome to Fanficiton and I hope you have a great time :).
5521550
Hmm... Maybe Adagio can't either.
5521601
Um, thanks.
5521613
Who knows?
5521660 Thank you.
For jinxing it.
5521668 What have you done indeed?
You best think on that.
5521486
5521498
5521543
Well, Syeekoh, the people have spoken.
New chapter pl0x.
5521682
Just gonna say, the exchange between you two with your avatars is amusing.
This is literally the exact same thing that happened to me when i found it about MLP. Like there was no hole in how you described it. I craved content so bad. When i found out about the "absolute glut" on the internet... I was in bliss.
However, I'm, still, only staring at a blank page...
I know that feeling all too well.
And now for a sequel, Adagio's reaction weeks later when she spots an error in a story that people have been reading but never pointed out.
5521829 It seems we share the same experience.
And don't worry. You'll find your muse eventually.
5521860 Yeah, me too.
And that would be the worst!
5521461
Beginnings suck. I hate having to write a good beginning.
I genuinely can't stand when these words are uttered to me, Majin, so believe me, I get it, but I have no choice:
You're better than this.
I've seen you do better than this.
Yes, this is nicely "written" and all. I will give you that. Nice barely-disguised meta (wait, so are we allowing that again?), nice description of the emotions behind being a writer on Fimfi--I mean, uh, Daring Do Online or wherever. The execution is fantastic.
But it's an execution of nothing. I have no idea how this got approved. The main character here literally could have been anyone. This could have been Dash, for (Principal) Celestia's sake. This story is a half step up from a tumblr blog about how your day was today trying to write something to post up on AO3. There is nothing here that tells me that this is Adagio Dazzle as opposed to an expy of the author's choice (or even simply the author themselves).
Why is Adagio into Daring this hard? What speaks to her about the character? Adagio's a compulsive planner; how does this influence her writing style? How does her knowledge of the vastness of fandom affect her approach to human domination?
This isn't even getting into the fact that Sonata is in her life and would be a writer's utter nightmare. You actually passed up a scenario in which Sonata Dusk would have been genuinely hilarious. And this is coming from me. Think about that.
Come on, mang. You're one of the few people I depend on here for genuine Dagi goodness. This isn't Dagi. This is yet another 1000-word toss-up of which I see like three of every day.
Not gonna downvote. I've been harsh enough.
5522004 I mean it was fine to me, just learn to roll with it...
5522091
"Learn to..." You know what, not even gonna dignify with a response. We don't know each other.
And yes, I indeed usually just pass through with stories like this. Unfortunately for Majin, I happen to like the cut of his jib. So he gets the tough love.
Please note that I am not stopping your enjoyment of this story in any way. (Or am I? I now wonder!
)
5522127 This comment actually helped me collect my thoughts a bit.
First of all, this is not about the Adagio Dazzle in Rainbow Rocks. This is about the Adagio Dazzle post-Rainbow Rocks, where in the climax of the film, she lost an inherent part of herself, like how you or I would lose an arm or a leg. She lost her chance at human domination, and reading that book filled that void in her life. Adagio threw herself into Daring Do as a coping mechanism to deal with losing her siren powers and the negative reception that she was hinted at receiving in school. She signed up for that website for another chance at being loved, or adored.
And I would argue that Adagio Dazzle is more Indiana Jones than David Xanatos. Her plans to acquire negative energy were rather reactionary in nature for the most part and dependent on certain contingencies that she couldn't have planned for. I mean, what were the chances that a musical showcase would happen to be taking place when they showed up at school? What were the chances that the holders of the Equestrian magic would reveal themselves so brazenly?
You're absolutely right that I could have utilized Sonata in this; she would have been hilarious.
Oh well. Hindsight is 20/20, right?
5522127 Wow, just wow...welp you must pretty awesome, I mean yeah tough love but its a website calm down its not a fuckin book!
Nice.
5522256
This is a headcanon I find myself rather enjoying. I wish it had been in the story. You come quite close with this:
That's a kickass paragraph, dude. But it's also as far as we get, and it's an infodump at that that tells without showing anything. And outside of it being a distraction from her crappy post-Siren life, we still never find out what it is about Daring that appeals to Adagio enough that she'd devour her entire series and then start obsessing enough to head into the mouth of madness that is fanfiction. :3 Your Indiana analysis actually could have been something to tie into that, since Daring's Indiana Parallel #1.
I would semi-counter-argue that she's a little of both, actually. Jones's reactionary moxie combined with Xanatos's organizational skills. Even so, again, I could roll with the full Indiana route. You'd just have to sell it to me, the
pathetically Adagio-obsessedreader, because there is no post-canon representation of Adagio Dazzle. I've only got the movie to go on, And in that movie, while she's Got Nothing at the start, she's off to the mastermind races once she realizes Equestrian Magic Is In The House. She actively reacts to problems, as well as observes possible obstacles and squashes them from the shadows with the help of her comrades. Those traits are all actually quite conducive to being a fanfic writer. Poor girl.But hey, all this is why Dagi is best Dazzling. You already know. And I know you already know. Which is why this quickie threw me for a loop. Again, not usually this harsh. But the majority of this fic is lovingly crafted prose of the general act of writing fanfiction, with little of Adagio (be it movie version, your version, whoever) thrown into the mix. You gotta mix. That's my main critique. Actually you have to establish the Adagio you're working with first, then mix.
Gimme Adagio first. Then you can get to massaging the sympathies of the writers on the site.
But at least now I know you had a motive with this. I honestly think an extra thousand words would have done it justice, but otherwise, thanks for clearing things up. Best in the future.
5522259
I am kind of a big deal--wait, no I'm not. But you certainly seem to be letting me affect you quite a bit.
The masterpiece I have written shall be forever regarded as the best fiction e-- *story gets flagged and deleted* ...Celestia bucking damn it...
5522423 Not at all, my good man! I do enjoy head cannons but its just the problem with fans attavking other fans over small details.
5522256 I enjoyed your story! dont let whats his face tell you otherwise!
Is it a bad thing that I just read this in two and a half minutes?
Nice little meta piece. Have a like.
--Spade
Writer's block, the story of my life!
And as for Adagio: "One of us! One of us!"
I know that feeling, Dagi. Want to write SOMETHING but just don't have anything.
5521498
'Hair 5'?
5527073
A friend of mine calls them "hair five and Sunset", because mane six is when they're ponies, hair six when they're humans and Twilight is with them and hair five when Twilight isn't around...
5526802 What do you mean?
5527576
Ah, of course.
Have you ever considered submitting this story to Equestria Daily? You can find out how to do so here. This feels incomplete, but I loved it all the same. Will you be making a sequel?
5527576 Well yes, but where did the "hair" part come from?
5529697
Ponies have manes, humans have hair.
"I even write my own fanfiction"
I love it. And I want to see a sequel where her fanfiction is talked about in the halls of Canterlot High by its resident Daring Do fans. You know who they'll be.
Oh, my god. A fanfic where Adagio is 100% relatable? 80%, maybe, but 100? It's like you know exactly what all fanfiction authors go... through...
Right...