A Pony a Day

by OfTheIronwilled

Loop (5/9/2020)

Moondancer scowled down at the book on her desk. She dutifully rolled the written word over and over in her head, and definitely didn't think about the fact that she'd already read this book seventeen times before. She didn't shiver uncontrollably at the chill leaking in from below the door, nor sniffle at the dust wafting around, or rub at her eyes because it was so dark and she didn't have enough energy to even relight her candle. She ignored the faint giggles of Canterlot fillies going out for a night at the town, and she read.

Her stomach churned with hunger, her throat rasped with dryness, but she ignored those things as well. She hadn't felt like going to the market for groceries today, meaning her larder was almost bare, and even if it wasn't she didn't want to eat right now anyways. Her stomach growled and ached for food, but nothing else inside her did. Same for water. She felt the discomfort but... honestly, she didn't care too much. She hadn't for a while. Plus she was going to the library tomorrow anyways, like she always did, so she could just buy some tarts and drink from the fountain there, so it would be fine. It didn't even matter.

The only thing that mattered was the book. She knew what happened in it, already, of course, but she had found her mind drawn back to magic theory again, and this afternoon she'd had a craving to reread this old beat up copy of Starswirl's manuscript she'd gotten from Twi--

-- somepony gave it to her a long time ago. Didn't matter who. She'd wanted to read it, is the point, and so she was.

It didn't matter that the emptiness in her stomach had spread to the rest of her body, leaving her body heavy and numb and her heartbeat speeding just a bit too fast. Or that her eyes were aching and twitching from straining them. Or that her behind had gone numb from this chair, that the numbness brought pain shooting up her back and neck, that she broke her glasses this afternoon, that her house was cluttered and dusty and falling apart, that there were noises of ponies outside her window so close and so very very far away--

She didn't think about it. She didn't think about how, if she really tried, she could go outside and say hello to those ponies and go out to that restaurant with them and chat with them about her favorite line in this very manuscript. Or at least stand up, stretch her legs, and buy herself something to eat so this awful cramping would go away. She didn't. Because it didn't matter. It wouldn't ever matter.

Because she had already tried, okay? She'd given friendship a shot. It didn't work out, and it never would, because she wasn't like those fillies outside trotting off to have a fun night. She never had been and never would be, because ponies never liked her for a reason. She got too attached and smothered ponies to death until they plucked her off like the leach she was then threw her away- and so then she would look at every other pony around her who did somehow like her for some reason, probably because she'd somehow tricked them all into thinking she was normal, and then she shoved them off of her so they wouldn't get to really know her, because if they really know her then they would leave too. She was just saving them a step, right? Moondancer wasn't stupid. She knew it would happen, and she knew Celestia-damned well it would be her own fault, too. So it was better for her - and for those ponies she would inevitably leech off of - if she just went through the motions and followed her routine, and never tried. Not again. It didn't matter if she was hungry, or thirsty, or bored, or crushingly lonely, or currently sobbing into page one-hundred thirty-seven of the copy of the book her first friend, her first heartache, had given her ages ago.

The only thing that mattered was the book itself. Because maybe, oh Celestia maybe, if she reread these words and let them roll around in her head and settle fully into her heart once again, then some sort of thrill would swell through her soul once more. Maybe she would red it and it would fill her with that understanding, that "aha!" moment, that strength that it had to the first read-through, and she would be able to do it. She would be able to smile tonight, and get up and at least force herself to choke down a scoop of peanut butter and a sip of water, and to rinse her mane under the sink, instead of flopping uselessly down into her sweaty bed and laying there for twenty hours before she dragged herself to the library again, and again, and again. Dear Celestia, it had to, because if it didn't...

With a blink, Moondancer realized. It didn't matter if this book didn't make her happy anymore, either. Because even if it did, Celestia knows that tomorrow would be the same. She wouldn't talk to anypony except the librarian, then she would waste away her hours researching everything and nothing. She would check out some books, read them, and then the cycle would start all over again. So she would break out this book one more time, give another broken prayer to the Goddesses above to please let this fix her, let her feel something, anything, for once- and it wouldn't. And even if it did, Celestia knows that the next day would be the same...

She was a race horse, circling and circling, running herself ragged across that track, except there was no glory, no trophy, no crowd to watch her struggle. There wasn't even a finish line. Her reward for running a lap was the fact that she was alive, and so she was able to run another. And it was her own fault. She'd made the track herself, and one day she would collapse on it.

So Moondancer closed the book. She didn't bother looking around the house and seeing what a mess it was. She didn't lock her door, or take off her disgusting sweater, or clean her glasses, or even take a sip of water.

She laid down in her bed and stared at the ceiling until she made relative, numbing peace with the fact that she would be this way until the day she died. It was better if she excepted it and moved on.

In her dreams, Luna at least let her feel something. Sleep was fleeting but peaceful enough.

Then she woke up, and got ready to go to the library. She went. She picked out some books. She brought them home. She read.

--There was a knock at her door. She had been on page two hundred this time.

Somepony punched a whole through the rotting wood with a hoof.

---

Twilight Sparkle was standing outside.

And the track Moondancer had been running on for ages now finally, finally, had a checkered flag.

Comments

[Crack-Fic Casey]

Wow, that felt really intense.