Putting on a Silver Robe and Wizard Hat

by David Silver

305 - As My Cutie Mark Predicts

A scroll was set before Silver. He picked it up in his magic, unfurling it. The writing had a familiar tilt to it. He was a pen pal with the writer for quite some time. "Twilight?"

Fetlock hiked a brow, which caused her mane to fall. She blew it out of the way. "How can you tell so easily?!"

"Her ha--hoof writing." His eyes swept left to right, taking in the spell bit by bit, mouthing as he worked out the instructions of that bit of arcane programming. It was, as promised, quite complex. It had to be. It reached into another world, sifted for a target, and made a copy. But... something didn't quite click. "If... If I'm... reading this..." Which he couldn't be entirely sure he was. "This looks like it was written for a specific purpose." Not a generic grab.

"It... was," confessed Fetlock, gesturing around the room. "I had to make quite a number of supporting elements, in the runes here. They alter it just enough to let me bend it to my ends."

Silver inclined his head. "I am honestly surprised you managed that." His eyes fell to her rump. "Perhaps it was by assistance of your cutie mark?" The power of the cutie mark was... murky, but it did allow for amazing feats of magic for sake of its role fulfillment. Much like Silver's own magic altering talent. "If I start on this, making it not need that will probably be the first thing I do. I can't imagine that not creating a huge amount of friction."

"Friction?" Fetlock brought up two hooves and rubbed them together. "What friction?"

"The energy, the magic..." Silver waved a hoof a bit impotently. "Flowing from the spell, into these runes." He tapped at the runes beneath them. "It isn't a natural fit. The spell wasn't made for that." He wandered away, muttering to himself.

Samantha leaned in, her colt riding atop her head. "He'll be like that for a while. The longer, the better, for your purposes."

"So..." Fetlock watched Silver wander about, speaking animatedly to himself. "What purpose is that, exactly?"

Samantha inclined her head, causing her child passenger to slide atop her head a little. "If I had to guess, which I do, he will try to figure out the part of the spell that reaches in a specific direction and change that, so you can decide where to reach. That's the most important part."

"Right..." Fetlock turned to Samantha fully, considering her and her new child. "You made a lot of... noise. What did you see, exactly? You and Silver seem so confident you understand what I've been doing, and you only saw it once. I've been living it. How do you get off saying you know better?"

Samantha's horn began to glow as she moved her sleepy child into her arms, cradled carefully. "A different perspective, from different eyes." She made her horn glow brighter and brighter until Fetlock seemed to notice it and look at her horn. "What if I told you my horn was already glowing?"

"It is glowing right now?" Fetlock shook her head. "So?"

Samantha dimmed the glow. "And now?"

"No?"

"Still glowing," assured Samantha with a smile. "Practice, or human eyes, allows you to see that." She pointed at Silver. "He has human eyes, and maybe I do too. My father was one of those." Samantha turned a hoof on her chin. "Curious matter that. Considering humans that are transfigured into Equestrian species retain that visual feature despite having equestrian standard eyes. How does that work? Worthy of investigation..."

Fetlock huffed. "How long should I--"

Silver suddenly drew out a book and was scribbling in it furiously. Samantha nodded at the act. "He's on the case. Shouldn't be too long once he gets there."

"No no, right..." The scribbling continued, comparing runes from other spells, stealing their syntax for use with the new one he was drafting. Copying from Twilight's spell in parts, stitching, binding, making something new. This was Silver's talent. Perfectly efficient spells, no, but he was getting better at it. "Which leads to..." He scowled, slowly pressing past a point. "Skip that. Did you know you were already forcing past this part?" And on he went without actually listening for an answer, grumbling and working.

The spell had, once, actually called people, it seemed. Physically hauling them. The energy involved was considerable. It had been crudely worked around with the runes in the room, as part of the same jury-rig that stopped it from making one very specific pony that Twilight had wanted.

Why had Twilight wanted a pony? That was a story to ask... later... "Through, plus..." The resulting spell would be no small thing, not at all. What it did was just as incredible, in a different way. To create life from pure magic was no small task. To impart on them a fully realized sapience, even copied, just as large a challenge to face. "Clay to the surface," he grumbled, sketching out rune to rune, forming the spell.

"How did you even manage this?!" he cried out in a burst of frustrated admiration. That she had clumsily managed a kitbash of her own, like his, with the runes, was nothing shy of a miracle in his eyes. "You should have exploded."

"I did a few times," muttered Fetlock with a scowl. "But I didn't give up."

"Oh. Oh.... Oh." Silver looked up from his notes. "Trial and error. Random chance?" And back into the writing he went. "You are luckier than you know." A bit too far one way or the other, the results...

Samantha rubbed her free hoof against one of her cheeks. "I do not believe he is wrong. That was not good scientific method."

"It worked," spat Fetlock. "I thought you were on my side!"

Samantha made a clapping motion, but one of her arms was pinned, leaving her striking her hoof against... nothing. But she smiled anyway. "I am intrigued by your work, Doctor. I would like dearly to compare notes. It is not as if I were immune to making such... leaps? It's how I got these." She spread her wings. "Entirely unplanned."

"Messy work," chastised Fetlock, crossing her arms.

"Very." Samantha's agreement did not dim her mood at all. "But I was not trying to give myself wings. I would have been happy without it." She inclined her head. "I was trying to save a life."

Fetlock raised a hoof, just for the other to join it. "You don't seem like the 'shining knight' sort that'd put yourself out like that."

"They were family." Samantha leaned in a little. "Unborn family. I admit, part of me was curious if I could do it... so I tried. I tried very very very hard."

"Then you're not in a spot to judge me." Fetlock crossed her arms. "I was fulfilling my purpose. I was also trying 'very very hard'. And it worked. We did the same thing."

"Hm. And we both made life where there would not have been. Odd." Samantha's magic plucked at Fetlock's back lightly. "Why did you not get wings?"

"It isn't pretty." Silver wove a different spell, copying the pages he had made into a scroll that clattered to the ground. "But that should... work?"

Fetlock approached warily. "Without runes?"

"Without runes," Silver agreed. "But you may want to keep them around." He waved a hoof over them. "You'll have to adjust them."

"Pardon?"

Silver considered how to phrase it. "You have two choices. To visualize clearly enough what world you are reaching towards, or to make a runic pattern for it." He waved a hoof about. "If you want one from this world, that's easy. Not even much visualization needed. Don't send it flying out past the boundaries of the sky."

"And... Huh..." She sucked air in through her teeth. "And that's it? I'm forgiven?"

"No." A pony entered from the front, coming around the corner of the hallway that divided them. They looked like a mafia boss, frowning at Fetlock. "You might notta dragged us from Earth, but you still messed us up pretty good."

Fetlock inclined her head at the new pony. "You... pay me to create ponies at times, and provide protection. How have I interfered with your operations?"

The boss spat out his cigar to the side. "I ain't who you think I am. I'm the one you threw back, you crazy mare."

Fetlock's expression only became more muddled with confusion. "The one I threw back... threw... Wait?" She inclined her head the other way sharply. "You're that?!" She backed away in a sudden scurry.

"What, you thought we were gone?" The boss approached at an easy pace. "Ah ain't even proper angry, but other parts of us, well, they are. Right pissed. We've been watching you. You tried real hard to get rid of us, across, what, a thousand worlds."

Samantha shook her head. "Highly unlikely. She does not have the magic to do that."

"You keep out of this." He waved Samantha away. "You didn't just call us. You made us. An imperfect copy. And you didn't even have the balls to get rid of us proper. Tossed us into the next house over instead."

Silver watched the scene with growing confusion. "Sorry, who are you?"

"My boys put that hole in your rump. Sorry, not sorry. Thought you were messing with the Good Doctor here, and you were. Just not the way we figured." He thrust a hoof at Fetlock. "Now you made a mess. That 'soft clay' Silver's going on about? You dried it up, and broke it into pieces. A thousand angry little pieces."

Fetlock folded her ears back. "I am just filling holes."

Silver put a hoof out between them. "Clearly some mistakes were made. We're just discovering them. I hope we can stop them now?"

"Filling holes, yeah." The boss pony glared a moment before turning away. "That's why we keep you around. You fill holes real good. You still did us dirty. Ain't even feeling bad about it either."

"Are you here to... attack me?" She glanced towards the front. "Did you already harm Gudrun?!"

"She is fine. Having a chat with the boys." The boss smirked at that. "We're not here to bust skulls. But I am pissed. I think I gotta pretty good reason to be."

"So... what do you want, exactly?" Fetlock cycled her hooves. "For me to never reject a bad match?"

"What? No. That's dumb. You're smarter than that."

Samantha floated her colt up a little in the air. "If we could keep the volume down, please."

"Pardon." The mafia boss pony took off his hat in apology. "Look, we like you. We like how ya work. We like how ya look. We like the whole package, see? But this?" He gestured at himself. "This can't ever happen again."

"So you want--" She frowned as she was cut off abruptly.

"--you to finish what you start." He pointed at himself. "Next time you get a bad match, you don't throw that 'soft clay' away and hope fer the best. You pulverize it." He punched one hoof against the other in a firm clop. "You mash it up, until it's just clay, waitin' to be used again. No half-assing that."

Samantha inclined her head. "At that point, they possess will. You want her to--"

"--murder it. Murder it good." The boss set a hoof on his discarded cigar, drawing it back up to his mouth to take a puff. "Murder it real good. Either make do with what you got, or if it's that bad a match, it needs to be dead. No middles. There isn't a middle."

Fetlock's horn began to glow. "Starting with you?"

"Ya could, but yer way too late for that, broad." He turned away. "We'll get out of your mane, but you watch yourself. And no halfsies. Living or dead. The middle's where you get monsters like us."

Author's Note:

I feel a lot of you are probably confused. This is some deep Silver Verse shenanigans being brought into light here. Sorry if it is too obtuse.

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Comments

[No one is home]

Theeiiirrrr baaccckkkk!!!!!

[harts fire]

a awesome chapter one of Fetlock's mistakes come back to viset her.
yep this is going to be good.

[Booster Spice]

Aww, SomeMaf needs an Extra Special Pinkie Intervention Party?

[lunaslove]

10966630
Yeah well in any case I despise haters

[Alvsecret]

"No no, right..." The scribbled continued, comparing runes from other spells, stealing their syntax for use with the new one he was drafting. Copying from Twilight's spell in parts, stitching, binding, making something new. This was Silver's talent. Perfectly efficient spells, no, but he was getting better at it. "Which leads to..." He scowled, slowly pressing past a point. "Skip that. Did you know you were already forcing past this part?" And on he went without actually listening for an answer, grumbling and working.

Scribbling

[David Silver]

11715813
Typos brushed away.