A Place for Pinkie

by Chinchillax

Chapter 2

We teleported some matter past the wall and to the presumable void outside the multiverse. It failed to move.

One of our number tried to teleport past the wall, and they did not move.

Once we were sure there was no danger of being trapped outside, we started teleporting next to the wall at ever vaster distances.

Was the multiverse in the shape of an oblate spheroid, like most universes were?
---

Galaxia slowed down time to a trickle, enveloping the entire planet in an amber glow as she felt around for the planet’s root spells. She could feel the rules she had set in place for gravity, weather, the safe usage of hammerspace, the six elements of Harmony, a backup of the memories of every soul on the planet, the dreamscape, and more.

She decided against absorbing the memories of every soul on the planet, it would take some rewriting to perform that spell without Cosmos anyway. She dug around and absorbed a record of what had happened from the land itself: some griffon wars, some dragon problems, a few magical maladies, a frozen lost dictatorship caused by a malevolent unicorn; it all seemed like life was progressing here as it should in some form or another. The souls here had complete freedom like Hope demanded. What they did with that freedom was their problem.

She was a little discouraged that her changelings had stopped loving each other and had started using their magic for more hedonistic purposes. That particular efficiency loophole was mostly her fault. Looking through the root spells and spotting mistakes like these made her cringe. She had gotten so much better at creating worlds since she had made Equestria.

She shook her head, focusing on the task at hoof and bringing out the small gray soul in front of her.

Would it like being a griffon? Most of the griffon population lived in sprawling towns, the hunters and gatherers supplying the villages in the fringes of their territory. Their lifestyle had parallels to another world where the soul was part of a trio of souls, and that had not worked out.

The warring dragons did not seem a good fit either, the war torn world that the soul had lived through had not inspired her to fight and live on, but to give up. At best, it would be among the many hermit dragons that were scattered across the world, their long lifespans and vast hoards keeping them safe but stagnant. It wouldn’t work.

She looked at the other sentient creatures. Perhaps a nice camel form would best suit it? She looked through the memories of a few camels, finding similarities in the happy families that the soul had already lived in and decided to look elsewhere. Minotaurs, no, their isolated pockets of civilization on islands wasn’t too different from the lifetime it had spent as an Interlacer. Cows, no. They lived such peaceful lives, like that saccharine slug world it had lived on.

Perhaps a unicorn? She eyed an expecting mother in Celestia’s capital city of Canterlot. There was already a growing foal in the household, the loving father and mother watching over him. It was a wonderful family and she loved the atmosphere of the home. The soul would hate it.

She flew to the countryside. There was a nice family that farmed apples for a living, a little more boring than the unicorn family in Canterlot, but quite brave, strong and hardworking. She touched the souls of the orange coated mother and the bright red father holding an equally bright red foal. Unbeknownst to them, they both had a disease that would eventually cause their deaths, leaving a foal and any other children they had behind. This was not the place for this soul, she’d already been through an orphanage.

She flew toward the nearby town. There was an engaged young unicorn couple. They looked mildly uninteresting, but not quite as boring as what she was looking for.

She started to randomly teleport around Equestria, taking more samples of the souls that lived there. A rainbow maned stallion pegasus that had finished first place in the Equestrian games, his fiancée in second place behind him? Too interesting. A quiet pegasi couple that designed snowflakes? They might do, they were certainly boring. But the wings on their backs made Galaxia pause. The soul’s last world had been a lifetime floating in colonies similar to cloud cities. Was a pegasi form different enough that this might work? The more she thought about it, the more wings seemed to be a terrible idea.

She flew past picturesque landscapes, the rainbow of colors and the beautiful environment vividly scratching her senses. It was a little too bright. Perhaps the soul needed an entire boring world to be on, as opposed to just an environment. No, if the soul grew up in a secluded environment, it would see the bright world of Equestria outside and experience life differently. The juxtaposition was needed, that much Galaxia felt.

All of this traveling was getting annoying. She had billions of souls in the queue waiting to be assigned to worlds she should have created by now. And she had put all projects on hold to pay attention to this one insignificant soul? Why? Working on this soul meant leaving entire worlds unfinished. As much as she would celebrate the opportunity to help each and every soul, there simply wasn’t time to deal with every single problem. Hope had designed it this way, or else she would have only be given responsibility over one world and not millions. As sad as its predicament was, was it really worth giving this soul such unnaturally special treatment?

In her pondering, Galaxia discovered a gray, drab piece of land. Even the clouds around it were gray, and nestled in the valley of the ash-colored, rocky land were several rickety shacks. She flew down to investigate the ponies who lived there. Working in the fields was a sturdy stallion moving boulders around. A stern mare was sitting in the farmhouse, nursing a newborn filly. Upon accessing their memories, she saw that these souls were currently living through an incredibly dull incarnation. The rock farm provided a means of income for the family, but it left the ponies there with as drab and dull minds as the rocks surrounding them, an intense focus on their duties on the farm leaving them secluded to a small boring section of an otherwise bright and beautiful world.

They were perfect. They were a patch of boring amidst a cacophony of other more vivid lives. They were a simple haiku surrounded by detailed novels. It took time and an open mind to understand and appreciate the beauty of this family, but even so, their dullness was just what she was looking for.

The genius of her plan took hold the more she looked into the lives of Igneous Rock, Cloudy Quartz and their little fillies, Maud and Limestone. The soul would be born into this family. It would be bored, but not understand how bored it was. It would live in ignorance, unable to understand the concept of laughing, smiling, and the colorful world that surrounded its gray existence. That spark, that change when the soul would experience laughter and other emotions for the first time had to be enough to get it to appreciate existence.

Galaxia flipped through the forty-seven lifetimes of the soul one more time. This idea hadn’t been tried before, and she felt confident it could work.

She placed her horn on Cloudy Quartz and cast a temporary protection to prevent other souls from attempting to be a part of this family, at least not until the soul was part of it. She then placed the soul nearby, giving it free access through the protection. Sometime soon, when Igneous Rock and Cloudy Quartz had their next foal, her soul would be that of Asvarel.

She had placed the soul, and there was nothing to do now but wait for the plan to come to fruition.

Galaxia teleported back to a world she had finished recently, the first few souls awaiting their first and only after death interview with her.

Comments

[Greatazuredragon]

I should have remembered the tittle of the story...

The soul would be born into this family. It would be bored, but not understand how bored it was. It would live in ignorance, unable to understand the concept of laughing, smiling, and the colorful world that surrounded its gray existence. That spark, that change when the soul would experience laughter and other emotions for the first time had to be enough to get it to appreciate existence.

Considering the end result I would say her plan worked a little too well.

[Leonzilla]

Was the multiverse in the shape of an oblate spheroid, like most universes were?

How do they know that now?

I thought they were convinced there was a corner somewhere.

Oh I see they are comparing the shape of the multiverse vs the shape of most universes within it.

Minotaurs, no, their isolated pockets of civilization on islands wasn’t too different from the lifetime it had spent as an Interlacer

What do you mean by Interlacer?

Asvarel

I also would be interested in knowing how you choose this name.

~Leonzilla

[Karan Dash]

I'm liking this story a lot. I can buy this premise much better than Discord being in love with Flutter.