It's a trick. Get an ax.
I Cast It at the Darkness
by Present Perfect
To a scholar of magic, such as Twilight Sparkle, a spell can be thought of as a verb, in that some are transitive and some intransitive. This is to say some spells -- light spells being the readiest example -- require no material component upon which to act. They can thus be described as intransitive, a verb which does not take an object.
The vast majority of spells, however, are transitive. Transmutation changes one thing into another. Teleportation moves the caster. Telekinesis lifts an object, and so on. In fact, outside the magical category of conjuration -- spells of creation, be it light, a fireball or a field of force -- it can be said that all spells are transitive.
This is why Twilight Sparkle knew what she was hearing couldn't possibly be true.
"I'm sorry, Lyra, but what you've told me can't possibly be true."
The lines of Lyra Heartstrings's face traveled from smug surety to shock to a tiny bit of anger before settling back into smugness. She crossed her forelegs over her chest and sat back against the crystal dining room chair. The gems hanging overhead, filled with memories, twinkled along with her eyes.
"Cast it yourself." Lyra's voice flowed like honey. Her smirk tilted higher.
"No." Twilight couldn't keep the condescension from her voice. Talking to this mare was like trying to explain thaumatic resonance to a foal. "I mean, my point throughout this whole conversation is that the spell isn't possible. You don't have hands. You can't have used a spell on yourself that affects hands, because there's nothing to cast the spell on. Therefore, you cannot have made your hands softer."
With a great sigh, as though Twilight were the foal and Lyra the condescending teacher, Lyra shook her head. "Twilight, Twilight, Twilight. Haven't you ever read Lace Love in Wonderland? The mad tea party?"
Information about the book sprung immediately into Twilight's mind. "Yes. Can't say I'm a fan."
"And that's your problem!" Lyra sat forward. "You've never been able to deal with the abstract, even since we were friends back in Canterlot. You refuse to accept things that aren't--" she clicked her tongue-- "right in front of your face."
"But magic isn't abstract." Irritation was slowly overcoming Twilight. "Spells often require imagined input on the part of the caster, but magic nevertheless follows a very strict set of rules regarding what it can and cannot be used to accomplish. Rules that you claim to have ignored completely, if not outright broken! What does that have to do with a fantasy novel written by a stallion who married his cousin anyway?"
"Ad equinem." Lyra tsked softly. "And here I thought you were above argumentative fallacy, Twilight Sparkle." She sighed. "My point is, it's like when Lace Love is offered more tea. 'I've had none!' she protests. 'I can't very well have more!'"
Twilight frowned. "That's exactly why I don't like that book. Of course she can have more! Any amount of tea would be more than none!"
"And what does the mad March Hare say in response?" Lyra wiggled her eyebrows. "'Ah! You mean you can't very well have less!'"
Twilight sighed, having quite forgotten where Lyra was going. "Point being?"
"I do not have hands." Lyra leaned forward, resting her elbows against the table and her chin against her forehooves. "Therefore, they can become more soft."
Twilight stared at her for a long moment, mouth agape. Throwing her hooves over her head, she cried, "No! That assertion has nothing to do with your allusion!"
"What?" Lyra sat back, shocked. "It absolutely does! No tea, more tea, no hands--"
"You're actually arguing that the tea which Love Lace has not been served can be made warmer!" She sucked in a breath. "And don't say that the tea in the pot can be warmed. We're talking about a theoretical lack of tea here, not a reservoir from which it can be altered before serving."
"Okay, so I'm not the best at metaphors." Lyra waved her hoof. "But it doesn't even matter! When I said I didn't have hands, that wasn't true. Casting the soft hands spell on them proved otherwise!"
Twilight slapped the table. "That still doesn't make any sense!"
"Then prove me wrong by casting it yourself."
A retort stilled at the tip of Twilight's tongue. They were just arguing in circles. This meeting had been arranged to rekindle an old friendship, yet here she was, trying once again to prove that she was right instead of focusing on reconnecting with her friend. Her very, very odd friend. She took a deep breath.
This was for friendship. What was the worst that could happen?
As though she had read Twilight's mind -- yet another magical impossibility -- Lyra said conspiratorially, "Look, either it doesn't work and you're proven right, or it does work and I'm right, and also my hands get softer. Realistically, Twilight, what have you got to lose other than a little face?"
"Okay." Twilight licked her lips. "You've got a point. Show me the spell."
It was laughably simple. Twilight, who had often wondered if her special talent weren't learning magic -- she had picked up Rarity's gem-finding spell surprisingly quickly, after all, and talent spells tended to be more complex, owing to their innate harmony with the caster -- had it down after seeing it cast a single time. Though she couldn't help notice Lyra let out a long, low moan after it had been cast. Now Twilight had a second reason not to want to cast this spell. That had been quite nearly inappropriate.
"Are you sure you didn't just soften your hooves?" she asked.
"Twilight," Lyra said, eyebrow raised, "feel this." She held her hoof forward. "Is that soft to you?"
Something about the casualness of the offer made Twilight's skin crawl. "I'll take your word for it." She steeled herself for as long as could reasonably be considered not procrastinating. "All right. Here goes nothing."
The soft hands spell was simple: transformation matrix keyed to soften, targeted at two hands. There were, of course, no hands to target, so she anticipated precisely nothing happening. Ponies in general were not creatures who were very knowledgeable about hands, but Twilight knew enough about them from personal experience to know that Lyra didn't have them.
Yet something did happen.
Though there was no physical way for the spell to have a valid target, it took hold of Lyra, penetrating her flesh, where the softening matrix went to work. In a short moment, the spell had resolved without a hitch. Lyra's hands -- impossible and nonexistent though they were -- were softer.
Lyra loosed another long, inappropriate moan, curling into the chair.
"So soft!"
"That isn't possible." Twilight didn't realize she had been backpedaling until her rump hit the wall across the room from where Lyra sat. What she had done had been like getting an A on an essay containing the sentence "I need." The transitive had been used intransitively.
"That spell shouldn't have worked!"
"And yet it did." Lyra smiled, eyes closed. "Do you understand now, Twilight? Do you believe me?"
Twilight shook her head. "How can this be possible? You don't have hands! What did the spell affect?"
Lyra stretched like a cat, smacking her lips.
"When I found that spell," she said, words dripping languidly from her mouth, "I had thought the same thing as you. 'There's no possible way it could work!' I said. Not on a pony, anyway. So I found a minotaur and cast it on him."
She opened one eye. "He wasn't too happy about the results."
Twilight swallowed.
"But it had worked! The spell was viable! All I had to do was figure out some way to use it on myself!"
Lyra stood and paced around the chair. "How to get hands, though? Would transmogrification suffice? After ample consideration, I rejected the idea. It would, after all, have a great, potentially negative impact my life, all in the name of merely casting a silly spell." Like a jungle tiger, she stalked towards Twilight. "I cast it on myself anyway. Just as a lark. Just because I could. Imagine my amazement when it worked."
Sweat rolled down Twilight's face. Eyes wide, she packed herself into the corner as Lyra drew closer. "I-I-I can imagine!"
"But why did it work?" Lyra's voice grew hushed as she pressed her face near Twilight's. "That's what you're thinking, right? It's simple, really."
Their cheeks were nearly touching. Twilight could feel Lyra's breath on her ear. She wished Spike had kept his big mouth shut as Lyra whispered into her ear.
"Feel my hands, Twilight. See for yourself. They're so. Soft."
Her hoof passed along Twilight's neck, a few inches above her skin. There was nothing between hoof and neck but air. No magical aura or invisible construct tickled Twilight's senses.
Yet as the hair along her back stood on end, Twilight came to a sudden, terrible realization.
The spell had had a target after all: that hollow echo of nothing that defined a pony's being, real and unreal at the same, living just left of the soul.
It was the same force which had conjured Nightmare Moon from Princess Luna. It was the memory of giving up on her friends while under Discord's control, of Applejack the liar, Fluttershy the tyrant. It was the piece of her left behind every time she returned to Equestria from that far-flung world where Twilight herself had hands.
Twilight understood.
Lyra did not have hands. Lyra did have hands.
And Lyra's hands were so soft.
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Oh my god, that title reference. I love it. :D
I'll get to the actual story later tonight.
Good. Bad. I'm the guy with the gun.
I enjoyed this, though if anyone has a good explanation of the ending, I'd love to hear it trump my half-formed thoughts.
Twilight, casting a spell without proper material components handy? Tsk, tsk...
From Dragon Magazine's "Still More Outrages from the Mages" (April Fool's issue, 1989):
Bigby's Interposing Eye
School: Astigmatic
Level: 2
Components: V,S,M
Range: 2"
CT: 5 rounds
Duration: 2 rnds./lvl.
ST: None
AE: Special
Explanation/Description: Casting this spell causes a disembodied and sightless human eye, of normal size, to interpose itself between the spell-caster and any attacking creature. This eye is as effective as any normal eyeball in impeding onrushing and enraged monsters, although it might deter the more squeamish dungeon denizens. The material component for this spell is a human eye, and the magic-user had better have one handy before casting the spell; the ability of this dweomer to "improvise" can be attested by Mooncalf the Monocular, among others.
You lost me...
Heh. Heheh. Heheheh. Yes. All the yes. Have a moustache.
The way this hits not only the grammarian in me, but also the MTG player (I imagine players of some RPGs might feel the same way, or other systems), with certain terms having a special relevance, a sense of what is right and what just can't happen, accentuates the sense of unnatural impossibility beyond what I think I could have felt otherwise. Like the difference between the rules text of a creature including the sentence "X can't be countered" and first seeing the same sentence on a spell, absent "by spells or abilities," with Supreme Verdict, and thinking how strange it seemed.
Perhaps it's not fair to dwell so much on a personal point of emotional resonance to the exclusion of everything else. And I have to say, the argument itself rings true to some I've had, even recently. So there's that, and I was happy that Twilight did at least raise the objections I was able to think up as the story progressed (mostly related to the tea metaphor), dodging the straw-man aspect that sometimes comes up in this kind of argument-fic. In fact, that happening accentuated the sense of helplessness, disorientation by offering a place to stand on, just to pull the carpet out from under it immediately after.
Nice job.
As to the tea pot argument. Can the tea get any colder? Then it can only be made warmer. As her hands can't be made harder, the only possible thing is to make them softer.
Lyra, stop being so damn creepy with your not hands.
I was told this would explain the "soft hands" thing, whatever that is, but... I don't get it. I still don't even know what the"soft hands" thing even is!
Much confuzzlement!
I do love seeing Twilight catch up with the friend she forgot in "Amending Fences." This was an enjoyably surreal take on that meeting, full of enjoyable magibabble and a truly bizarre ending. I can't honestly say I understand it (or the "soft hands" thing in general) but I did enjoy it.
7442461
Soften two target hands. (All creatures have hands.)
7442461
...I am a genius.
7442717
My bad, it only explains why Soft Hands is on the site, not what it actually is. (That can't really be explained. c.c)
7443079
Ha ha ha! This story reminds me of when Jar of Eyeballs first came out and there were hilarious arguments about how many eyeball counters you would put in the jar. Like, if a cyclops died, would you only get one? If it was a spider, would you get eight? If a Polar Kraken died, do you get no counters cuz its eyes are way too big? If a creature has no eyes, do you get no eye counters? Let's not get into the mess that happens when Doubling Season is on the field. Like, where in the hell are all these eyes coming from? XD
Yet when any creature of yours dies, that is how the jar works; you get two eye counters no matter what creature died. The Jar counts them as contributing two eye counters to it, whether the creature had two eyes, many eyes, big eyes, small eyes, or no eyes. It just sort of happens that way because the Jar has rules and that's how the magic obeys. It is as it is, RTFC lel.
That begs to question where these eyes are actually coming from. The answer is the arts and craft store where you bought the plastic googly eyes you're using as counters :B
What the heck did I just read? I... I don't even get it and I don't think I'm supposed to get it.
And that terrifies me.
If you read this aloud in a dark room, it will make your hooves shiny.
This fic is so confusing and horrifying.
I must read it again, Lyra is calling me, her hands are so solf.
7900184
w h a t l u r k s w i t h i n
w h y i t i s t h e s o f t e s t o f h a n d s
This is genius the way Alice in Wonderland is genius.
Also: Lyra is deliciously unsettling
Nice work!
7997359
I'm quoting this. :V
The spell didn't affect anything physical, but something metaphysical. Twilight would be able to soften her own hands as she has the remnants of hands from the EG world. The spell would affect the memory of her hands and whatever their stored counterpart would be when they aren't part of her body. It's the same as her clothes when she goes thought that portal. She gets clothes from nothing and they return to nothing. But apparently it isn't quite true nothing. Something remembers those clothes belong to that pony when that pony becomes a human. That something would also remember those hands.
This leaves three possibilities for Lyra's hands. Each has weird implications. One, she has been to the human world and has metaphysical hands. Two, all beings in the universe have stored counterparts for any form they may take (Sequel about Octavia making her tentacles more slimy?). Three, Lyra has tricked the something into remembering her hands somehow even though she shouldn't have any.
8010816
This is pure evil.
8010920 I wouldn't say pure evil. 80% from concentrate maybe.
The chapter title is appropriate. And it makes sense. Artists always work with "negative space." The absence of something is, in itself, something. That makes this very Lovecraftian in it's level of horror.
Phew... this was undeniably an interesting read. It was a little confusing at the beginning with all the verbs and stuff, but it slowly cleared out into a hilarious, albeit creepy story. Furthermore, I like the details you put into your descriptions. The ending is maybe a little too abstract, but I think I see the point here. Or maybe I don't see it? Anyway, thank you for this story!
8418058
"Abstract" is a good way to put it. :) Thanks for reading!
8418204
You're welcome!
7442461
Lemme tell you about Gilded Drake.
What was, will be, is.
WHAT IS THIS i don't even AHHHHHHHH
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