World of Silver

by Tsujin Rilauco

Chapter 1 - Found

World of Silver

Chapter 1 - Found

Equestria, a land of ponies, a land of magic, a land of friendship. A paradise of a country and a country of paradise, where strife is fleeting and happiness falls as readily and regularly as the rain. In this shining, ideal land live tens of thousands of ponies. Earth ponies, pegasi, and unicorns living in the sort of harmony one would only expect them to, being blessed as they are with plentiful food, plentiful friends, and the chance to follow the call of their cutie mark, no matter what that call may lead them to do. Each pony with a story to tell, one of fulfilled dreams and wonderful friendships made along the way.

But this story does not start in such a wonderland. Far beyond the borders of Equestria, past the verdant fields and lush forests, past the desolate crags of mountains once ruled by an exiled race of shape shifters, and seperated from the prosperous Egallypt by a vast desert, lies a small county nearly forgotten by the greater world. To even call this barren spit of land a country is almost agrandizing, as the whole of it can be described as a single mining town surrounded a hundred-thousand miles of rough bedrock and infertile top soil. The capital, Silver Town, lying roughly in the middle of the country and exactly in the middle of an ever expanding pit, born of the sole purpose the town and its ponies had ever known.

Silver Town is what could be generously called a mining community, every building devoted in some way to the removal of gems and precious metals from the rock faces surrounding them. Rows of metal refineries, smelting facilities, and gem sorters broken only by the living quarters of the ponies who ran them. In an irony not lost on its residents, the fact each family was given its own home was one of the few luxuries afforded them. Despite its chief export being high quality gemstones, Silver Town saw very little income. The combined costs of mining, refining, and transporting the gems provided just enough monetary income to keep the town afloat and its citizens fed.

And much can be said of the citizens of Silver Town. Or rather, the types of ponies who occupy its facilities. Just as in the rest of the world, there are three types of pony in Silver Town, but the duties of most are vastly different. The pegasi still steward the weather, but in this land that amounts to keeping the clouds shifting from one end of the country to the next, barely picking up enough moisture to prevent a drought. The earth ponies and unicorns tended to all aspects of the mining process. The unicorns would find the gem deposits, blast away large pieces of bedrock with concentrated magical blasts, then break those pieces to a managable size. The earth ponies would haul carts of gem-filled rocks to the refinement plants, where any valuable gem or usable metal would be removed and sent to be either appraised or refined. Eventually, anything worth selling would be carried to neighboring countries by teams of pegasi, teams specially trained to handle the flight through jagged mountain peaks or across a scorching desert.

With such a limited range of jobs, very few ponies were able to answer the call of their cutie mark. There were those blessed few whose mark reflected a talent for the job they would inevitably recieve, but many were only able indulge in their special talent in what scant free time they were allowed. Most did not even get their cutie mark, having little time or reason to explore their personal interests in the face of a work load that, quite literally, never ended. No humor was spared for the children either. Why bother filling them with hope that would eventually be crushed by the responsibility of keeping their town alive and their families fed?

Nopony could be faulted for being confused by Silver Town, much about the town makes little sense at a glance. Why build a town in the middle of a wasteland? Why live in a town that was barely able to hold itself together? Why work a job with no future and no chance to follow your dreams? Why is a town which mainly exports gemstones named Silver Town? To answer, a quote from "Silver Town Educational Series: Book Three, Chapter One."

"Silver Town was founded in Year 563 of the New Celestial Calendar. While on a Canterlotian commissioned expedition beyond the Changeling Crags, a group of brave, pioneering ponies discovered one of the largest natural mineral deposits in the known world. Quite by happenstance, one pony, tasked with digging a latrine, stumbled upon a massive vein of precious metal and gemstones. Rubies, sapphires, emeralds, amethyst, and diamond mere inches from each other, lying between massive veins of gold. But more plentiful than any gemstone or goldline, was silver. So much silver was infused in the land one could hardly kick a rock without uncovering a piece of the shimmering metal. And so the pioneer ponies made to report their find as quickly as they could manage, and not two months later the first mining facility was established. Because of the natural obstacles between the facility and Equestria, most ponies opted to build their homes within trotting distance of the facility, and so Silver Town was officially founded."

What you won't find until much later in the text is how Silver Town was quick to fall from grace. After two years of steady growth, an unfortunate discovery was made. Because of the abundant silver in the soil, no mining could be done without setting countless tiny particles of the metal airborn. As the ponies worked they slowly inhaled more and more of the silver, gradually poisoning them. Silver built in the ponies' systems, depositing throughout their bodies and causing a blue-gray discoloration of the skin, fur, and eyes. The condition was named argyria, after the first pony to contract it, an earth pony by the name of Argyle Geranium. Argyria was not a deadly condition, but a disfiguring one. And as the paranoid, distrustful creatures ponies are, many were quick to condemn the afflicted and the very soil they had lived off of. All but a few hundred families fled the town, leaving only the original settlers and the most practial, faithful, and desperate ponies to tend to the many facilities left behind.

So now, nearly four-hundred and fifty years later, the rotting remains of a town lie, nearly forgotten, sustaining itself on meager wages and the ghost of a dream. Filled to capacity with broken ponies, no dreams to follow, no future to hope for, a lifetime of toil or abandonning their family the only options given to them.

But a short distance from this ever expanding graveyard of the living, two unicorns slowly make their way toward the town. One, an unassuming stallion with a short black mane and gray coat, his cutie mark of a clip-boarded check list with multiple items checked off, the other, a somewhat small mare with a long light blue mane and gray-blue coat, offset by her cutie mark, a large pink heart surrounded by a shimmering silver ribbon. Each carried a large pack and a pair of saddle bags, laden with either mountain climbing gear or some tool of science. The two came to the edge of the pit surrounding Silver Town, and began to survey the numerous factories and dim gray homes.

"This is it, Silver Heart." The stallion spoke as he turned to his wife, "This is our new home."

"And," the mare said in return, "where we will change the world."

Author's Afterword:

Well, after a lot of procrastination, a lot of obsessive fantasizing, and a little more planning than I'm used to, here's my first piece of writing in some time. I'm really out of practice, so any criticism, friendly or harsh, is greatly appreciated. Especially in regard to spelling and grammar, 'cause it bugs the hell out of me when I let stuff like that slide! Hope some of you get a kick out of this, and I do plan to write more, I'm just not sure if it'll take me two days or an entire week to finish the next chapter.

And a big thank you to everyone who's giving this fic a chance to shine like silver!

Comments

[Pigeon Wings]

I usually don't bother nitpicking on minor spelling mistakes, but since you asked....

amathyst = amethyst
vien = vein
citiens = citizens
expidition = expedition

My grammar's nowhere near perfect, so unless there's some glaring primary school-grade error, I usually won't pick it up.

But this is a very interesting start! I'm intrigued to see where you'll go next -- there's a lot of different ways you can go here. You've got a town in which it's rare for a pony to get their cutie mark at all, something which is a large part of how you define the ponies of Equestria. Then you've also got the argyria, a condition you've mentioned is "disfiguring", but not to what extent...

I shall be keeping my eye on this.

[Tsujin Rilauco]

607577 Thanks for pointing those out. I don't have an editor or pre-reader and I REALLY dislike 'I know how to spell the word but goofed anyway' mistakes like those.

I did briefly describe argyria, it only causes a slight discoloration of the skin, eyes, and fur. Doesn't seem like a big deal, but neither does a stampede of bunnies.

[Pigeon Wings]

608400

There's plenty of people around here who would be happy to pre-read for you, if it really bothers you. There are entire groups set up to help find people pre-readers and editors.

Well, yes, you did say that. I suppose when someone says "disfiguring", I start thinking that the coat discolouration would only be the start of it. Maybe it's my own association with the word, but it just conjures up the picture of something far more physically crippling than an aesthetic change. If the colour-change is all that happens, it would be like calling someone accidentally bleaching their hair "disfigured". Which I suppose someone might if their hair was very precious to them...