Favorable Alignment

by Ice Star

Chapter 19: Away from Cloudy Skies

Luna:

In the sky, large white clouds drifted lazily, unmanaged by any pegasai. Today, they looked as if an unfocused painter had taken up their brush and applied generous white streaks to a crisp blue canvass, not caring how carefree the pattern of the thick strokes looked as they trailed into the distance, sometimes leaving patches tinged with silver.

Most of the time I did not even need to summon any strong winds to help steer. The new navigation and the summer gusts of the southern hemisphere's weather did that for me, now that I was no longer near the planet's girth.

The weather had been like this for quite some time now. Even the borders of the southernmost neighbors of Equestria were hundreds of leagues away, at the very least. As I often looked out over the rails when books and other objects failed to hold my focus, I could see the vast expanses of what I could almost believe was infinite water. The farthest shores were unreachable for weeks no matter how fast I flew and I felt anchored to the Sky Scraper more than ever, and it was not an object - or even a place - I took kindly to being anchored to.

It isn't that I was lonely with the weeks of silence and stoic meditation that this solitude has left me to contemplate, but I couldn't shake the mood of constant mourning, a faint pain that had faded to dull acceptance on this ship where I had only the wind to listen to.

I did not speak. I did not laugh, and none of this was unusual for me. There was nopony to say anything to, and I refused to honor myself with any kind of ruckus caused by talking to myself. What would I even say? Nothing, that's what.

The only one I talked to was Fish, who I had relieved from Sombra's cabin, and often brought with me to various locations on the ship when I was not flying beside the sleek vessel. It had felt so wrong to even enter the space he had happily read in - or at least as happily as Sombra could act - so I had entered only for a moment, particularly fleeing once I had saved Fish from such a stuffy location.

Here, at least, the poor creature could see the sun in the bubble of magic and water that he resided in, and I could have some creature as company, though I did not deserve it.

Outside of practicing magic on a whim and being in the company of myself, I had only Fish. 'Twas not so bad.

"Did he ever tell you anything interesting, hmm?"

Fish pursed his mouth in an 'O', his koi-like barbs swaying in the water.

"Are you ever going to tell any of u- me..." I caught my error again and started again. "Are you ever going to tell me what kind of fish you are?"

Fish turned his back on me. I can't blame him.

"Do you miss him?" I dare not name who I was talking about. He must hate me more than ever.

Wherever he is in this vast world...

I cleared my throat as loudly as possible in a manner closer to a loud cough before muttering a few unintelligible syllables, testing the range I had adopted.

"The Right-Honourable Lord Sombra certainly disapproves of you daring to imitate his err, glorious reclusive tendencies!" I proclaim, voice in a strange mockery of Sombra's, and one that didn't sound too far off to me. I was able to capture his unamused, arrogant baritone and add either curtness, sarcasm, or grandeur as I saw fit. Perhaps that was enough.

Fish swam in a slow circle, facing me with a cross-eyed stare that appeared intrigued with my antics, until Fish's gaze rested on me, who hoped only to cheer the creature as well as myself up, and then he returned to looking out at Celestia's day.

"You dare give me the tail! Gah, I'll have you know that in the estate of Nothing you'd be found guilty of..."

For the briefest moment, I faltered not knowing what to say - what Sombra would say - and had to speak whatever popped into my head that sounded remotely like him - an ad lib - to make up for the pause, even if Sombra usually didn't sound like a more bearable version of Blueblood even when he spoke as his persona.

"...attempted sass, against none other than me! Do you even dare think that I have the time to deal with the failures..."

Fish's opinion of me is getting lower by the minute.

"...and flaws of anypony else..."

That doesn't sound like him at all, I tell myself, my own scolding remark hurting more than it should.

"What do you think I should do, Fish?"

Fish choose not to reply.

"I know you miss him, but could you try to help me?" When I still hear nothing - even if I could understand Fish - I choose to fill the air with some sound other than the mournful tone of my voice. So, I give Fish a faux voice of his own - a deep purring voice that I knew I would have trouble keeping up for extended periods of time, so short lines would prove the best.

"Princess, I only wonder where he has gone."

"Do you think we'll see him again, Fish?"

Fish couldn't answer. I couldn't answer.

And so the silence between Fish and I resumed, a thousand questions within me like a storm on this bright day when all I wondered was whether I should seek an answer that would break the solitude I now have, so free of the tempest his presence would bring, or if I should steer myself off course to see if any place nearby - earth or sea - has spotted Sombra at the cost of whatever peace of mind I can muster, and forever miss him as he was. How I had liked Sombra when he was the intelligent, charming demon who spoke only the truth and had an arrogant, enigmatic air to him. Why did all things wonderful about him crumble away with a confession?

Those words had revealed him to be something else, something deep within him was disheartening and frightening because of the everyday delusion he revealed himself to have. Was it all a lie to make me enjoy his company, an act so cruel and dishonest he'd adopt an attitude that was everything he really wasn't?

So much time had been spent trying to answer all the questions my mind conjured, only for them to go unanswered, or to find seemingly endless possibilities that had so little evidence to support any of them, and they just felt like a far-fetched accusation. Some ended up feeling like they were just empty words I couldn't bear to attach a single hope to.

Even though he told me so much about where he came from, without Sombra himself here, I felt lost, for no claim seemed to hold any ground, since Sombra himself acts as the anchoring point for all. He defines himself, but without him here, I'm unable to say much more than I was before. I must remain skeptical - as if I could help but doubt him now - if I want to solve anything.

I look out over the rail, watching the clouds and resting my head on folded forehooves. I need something that could help shed light on Sombra when he wasn't interacting with me. Nothing from word of mouth will do, and I can't exactly contact my sister or Twilight Sparkle for information in my current situation, nor would it be anything I could trust. Even Cadance's experience's with him-

Wait, Cadance... she's my answer! Sombra wrote letters to her... and he even called her his friend. If what he spoke had any truth to it, as I believe most of what he says does, then he surely confided something in those letters. I'm not sure if Cadance would have kept the ones he wrote, but if she did, I could always see if she'd send them back to me. Even copies would do.

"It's really the only option I have, hmm, Fish?"

I heard the sound of bubbles being blown in reply.

"Yes, I know that going in his cabin would be an invasion of his privacy, but there's always the chance-"

-that I might not see him again.

I dreaded saying it, for it was just as true if it remained unspoken. Sombra had vanished in a storm. I had faith that he was okay, knowing that he had the ability to brave so much and had learned a proper array of spells to survive the sea in our time together.

There had been little I had been able to do to find him, as I knew not where he was headed, only that I would not falter in my journey southward. His dreams were not available to me either. Sombra might not be sleeping, he might be too far away, or he could have a mental barrier up - all of which were things that would keep me from entering his dreams in an attempt to locate him. I still had some problems with my dreamwalking magic, though. It was a new skill I had developed when I wanted to help my subjects more after I was freed from the thousand year curse I had brought upon myself - and of course, I wished to go somewhere new.

Yet, while I didn't want to see Sombra face to face even after this time, I did not want him to vanish in the vastness of the world only to return with a vengeance after centuries. I would not be able to fight him, being more torn than I am now.

I valued Sombra's privacy even if I wasn't sure I could be close to him, even as an acquaintance. Like me, he was so withdrawn that to intrude on this would be like directly attacking him. It would be breaking a rule I longed for another to fully comprehend and respect.

I push myself up from where I had been resting. The afternoon sky no longer held my interest, and unfortunately for both Sombra and I, we're both splendid at breaking rules one by one.

...

I levitated Fish's bubble down into the Sky Scraper's lower quarters, having it float in front of me like a shield to protect me from my own nervousness. I thought that I was done thinking about Sombra and asking questions that only brought me tears as discomfort, but it took only a single thought of Sombra to reverse that. Only now, I might get something like an answer - or at least, advice.

When I arrived at the door of his chosen cabin, I still felt part of me plead to reconsider. Sombra was not somepony I ever wished to cross and when he was here, it was an unspoken rule that neither of us was to invade the other's privacy, a boundary that nopony else respected about me or had with me, for the most part. Certain topics we would not pressure the other about, or in certain cases consider entirely. He mentioned having knowledge of my time in the moon and I told him not to ask about it again. He didn't. I asked him as deliberately as I could if it was him or Onyx that had hidden the Crystal Heart. He said it was him, and asked that I not inquire into anything about the events in those eight years of his life beyond what he was willing to divulge himself. I agreed.

Now, I threatened to break any trust he had in me by deliberately going through his things.

More than ever, I needed answers. This was the only way I could think to get them, and so I opened the door, pushing away any second thoughts with it.

There was little to observe in the cabin itself. Everything looked as it was in place. Only the sheets on the bed looked out of place, simply being folded at an odd angle. A small stack of books lay on the nightstand, with a larger amount below - about fifteen overall, I didn't stop to count.

While I was unsure if I needed to be in the exact spot he stood in to open his pocket dimension, I think it was the most appropriate spot to stand in case it had a spell laid upon on it that would make matters more difficult were I to overlook this. I had taken care to memorize where he laid the spell to anchor his cache of things and who knows what else, since having a hidden room whose interior I knew nothing about around me was not a feeling I enjoyed. It made it much easier to 'sneak' into his cabin if I knew the spot to avoid. This ensured that when he left his door open, I could come in and see him reading at the desk without nearing the area where he not-so-secretly kept the bulk of his worldly possessions.

I was relieved when my surge of magic was all it took to figure out how to pull the exact threads to open it, although I had to put in more effort to undo the 'knots' that sealed off his portable lair from the world. Had he used dark magic this would have been almost as difficult as he is when in a particularly stubborn mood.

Maybe it should be 'was in a particularly stubborn mood', I thought sadly before immediately regretting it, and shaking my head in attempt to clear my mind, keeping my eyes to the gray-crystal ground.

Sombra's pocket dimension was much more interesting than his cabin. Whatever light shone on the cool, quiet crystal was not from any single natural source and still left much cloaked in shadows. A few blankets - only about six, really - lay about wherever they were dropped, some casually folded into crooked squares like quaint makeshift cushions. Others laid about in small piles covering a few objects with their plain and easy to miss solid colored fabric, which often had a few faded patches covering a hoofful of things that remained undisturbed under them: pens, books, and various notepads.

Papers were scattered about the ground like a leaf pile, but more organized. They seemed to be sorted in loosely collected piles that spread outward like a chain of interconnected stacks awaiting use again. I dare not look at their shadowed surfaces for long in this oddly cozy place but I caught the fleeting glances of many scores of dots in patterns I could not make sense of, the surfaces of faded yellow and white dull among gray and lightly coated with dust. Others looked more recent and bore defined script with varying degrees of legibility, while some of these pages were independent of their stacks, as if by some invisible breeze, while a neighboring piece might be poking out from between the pages of a well-cared for book.

I suppose if the books and papers - among a few other objects I never bothered to even look at, their shapes already indiscernible to my fleeting look - were the leaves than the peculiar forest of bookshelves kept by Sombra would be the large clusters of äerint as tall as I was. They had 'branches' that grew into each other, each lined with books, the writing on the spines hidden in splinters of darkness that bathed over the muted colors.

On the floor by one such cluster was a stack of papers - perhaps twelve or so - among a few ripped envelopes and ribbons used to bind scrolls, seals discarded on the ground. I knew that the glitter remnants and stickers adorning that acted as the wax bearing coats of arms were certainly not Sombra's.

With that in mind, I picked up Cadance's letters and left, wanting to read under the sky instead of the stormy monochrome void clouded over with shadow.

Comments

[Sigmacipher]

Note to self: If I ever end up in Equestria during the events of the show...Make sure to invest in making a version of the Recollection spell from Magi-nation...it may just have been a cheap plot exposition device in that show but god damn it all if something like this could be used to throw Celestia's own horseshit right back at her I use it in a heartbeat.