Restoring Circulation
Twilight knew something about Ponyville's gossip circuit, but it mostly came from what Rarity tried to pass on during some of the longer sessions at the Boutique, and it didn't mean she remembered all of it. Still, it had been enough to teach her something about the power passed-along words could wield, along with just how distorted those sentences could become through repeated retellings, each of which seemed to lose at least one of the original terms. The forgetful ponies would substitute, deciding that one changed word couldn't possibly hurt anything -- and twenty more exchanges would have nothing of the original gossip left.
Ponies had seen the book sorting being done in front of the tree. Some of them had certainly watched a portion of it, and a little of that had gone on for a disconcertingly long time. It meant that word was being passed around of something happening at the library -- but Twilight couldn't trust those words to be accurate, and it meant the next step had to be carefully supervised.
Step 2: advertise.
That one turned out to be a multi-pony effort. Applejack created the initial sales pitch. Rarity softened it somewhat, then rendered the words in her elegant calligraphy. (Both carefully kept Twilight out of those portions: they were all too familiar with what could happen when she tried to promote or sell any kind of service, especially since she tended to expect far too much from everypony else's vocabularies.) Twilight took the results into the basement, cleared space around her personal printing press, belatedly sorted out those books, and then ran off copies. Pinkie then tacked the largest-print version of the results to every notice board in the settled zone, and a grumbling Rainbow dropped a personal copy off in every mailbox she could reach before becoming bored and demanding to know why the Post Office couldn't just do it, not to mention a certain little dragon. Twilight wound up sending her out three times with reminders that postal services came with purchased stamps: one more expense which came out of her budget. (She had a certain number of rather expensive long-distance stamps, but they couldn't be broken up into smaller units: such things had to be saved for the library exchange program.) And as for having Spike send out everything... well, there were also only so many gems he could work with, and so much fire for each to power. Asking him to deliver every last one-sheet would guarantee an empty storage cabinet, exhausted little dragon, and a tremendous number of startled ponies who simply weren't used to having their mail arrive in bursts of green flame.
The stamps were an expense. The paper for the one-sheets was an expense. There were so many expenses involved in running a library, and the Mayor would set the budget that was meant to cover them all. If Twilight didn't succeed at the sale, that portion of the budget might become so very much smaller...
So they had to advertise, especially as Twilight had already missed two sales. The long-term residents of the settled zone needed to be told that the once-annual event was back on again, while those who'd moved in after her arrival didn't know any such thing had ever taken place at all. And given the sheer number of books they had to sell... well, it hadn't taken very long for Fluttershy to convince them that they needed to think outside the settled zone, and so a little ad space had been purchased in a number of Canterlot newspapers. That had been something other than cheap, and nopony knew if it would lure in enough extra traffic to justify that expense. Theoretically, they just needed one dedicated collector who was willing to risk a day trip. But Twilight had been careful in her weeding: things with a true value on the secondary market weren't going to be priced at a quarter-bit each, and the majority of those books had been retained on the shelves: even if they hadn't been used recently, the potential cost of replacing them seemed to justify the space. Such collectors would, for the most part, be disappointed, and ponies suffering letdown tended to keep their bits in their saddlebags. They wouldn't spend.
Twilight was the only one who seemed to be spending.
Spending money to make money: a concept which both Rarity and Applejack had been trying to explain over repeated visits. Twilight felt she understood it, to the point where she'd finally asked both of them, in stress-filled tones which hadn't been recognized until an hour after they'd left (or apologized for until she'd finished galloping after them), to stop talking about it. Yes, they'd forced one crucial point to sink below fur level: any bits gained from the sale didn't go to Town Hall. Instead, any funds she managed to raise would become part of the library's budget. She could use them for maintenance, improvements and, if she somehow wound up with any empty shelf space, she could purchase new books. As long as the money was spent on something to do with the library, its use would be completely up to her. And surely somepony had to buy something. With the exception of her darkest blanket-kicking hours within the nightscape, Twilight refused to indulge a fantasy which ended with her having the same number of books she'd started with.
(The worst of the nightmares had seen a long line of ponies stretching out to the fringe and beyond, every last one of whom had found things late and lost and forgotten, each carrying enough tomes to bury her, all having decided that this was the perfect time for a severely belated return. And then the newest pile of books had encased her to the point where all light and air had been locked away, leaving her to suffocate in the darkness of decaying paper -- until she'd woken up to find she'd somehow managed to kick her pillows into her own snout.)
She was stressed, and nearly three years of lessons had brought her to the point where she was both capable of recognizing it and trying not to vent her emotions onto ponies who didn't deserve it. Spike was taking the majority of patron interactions, she was swallowing back so many of the words which might have offended the friends who were trying so hard to help her, still couldn't stop them all, had her apologies accepted for every last slip and didn't know how much longer that would last...
"I hate this," she'd told Spike on the night before the sale itself. "I hate knowing it's my fault. If I'd done this every year, on schedule, we'd have less to sell tomorrow. If I hadn't tried to force a new planting. If I hadn't made all those trips to the auction house. The publishers. If I hadn't done... everything..."
Her right forehoof had listlessly poked at her okra. She hadn't found the appetite required for eating any of it, or much of anything else over the last day.
"It's over after tomorrow," he'd tried to reassure her. "We'll sell what we can, and I'll take care of the rest." Which had gotten him a stare, and he'd responded with a rather awkward expression. "Well -- it's like Applejack said. I'm up to a bonfire --"
"-- we are not burning books."
"Twilight..." A deep breath. "...do you really think we're going to sell enough to fit the mayor's orders?"
"I hope --"
"-- do you think we can? Not hope, Twilight: think."
After far too long a pause, she'd shaken her head.
"Then we have to do something with what's left over," he'd stated. "We can't risk the summer budget. Twilight, you have to -- let it happen."
More rearrangement of greens. Some of the results were starting to look like failed shelving systems.
"Let me do it," she'd finally said. "This was me. My problem, my buildup, my everything. So when it's time to get rid of them -- just let me do it, Spike. By myself. Please?"
He'd nodded. They'd both gone to bed, or at least one to bed and one to basket. The basket had done its job: the bed hadn't. And now Twilight was staring out the window, watching Moon during hours when she should have been sleeping, unable to descend into the nightscape for whatever fresh round of self-imposed horrors were awaiting her. Awake under Moon, watching and thinking and, in both cases, wishing she could stop.
It has to be me. It was my fault, so it has to be my solution.
We sell. As much as we can. And then I...
...open the grave.
I kick ponies in, one after the other. I tell them they're worthless. Nopony remembers them any more. Nopony loves them. Nopony ever will again. I bury them, and I trot away to find their replacements, right up until the day I wind up burying them too --
-- it's just books. A book is not the author.
It's never just books. A book isn't the author, but it's what the author was thinking about, what they wanted to say.
Some of it was stupid. Some of it never should have been said at all.
But there should still be a record. That once there was a pony, and even if their words were wrong, that pony still had something to say.
Did real librarians feel like this? Did their marks shield them from such thoughts? Let them ignore the pain? Was it only her, so unsuited for the job, who inflicted agony upon herself, hurt without reason, emotions which never should have been felt at all?
I am a real librarian. Rarity believes that. This is a real library and I'm responsible for it, so I'm...
...a real librarian never would have let things get this far.
I love matching ponies to books. I love seeing the light come on in their eyes. I love... being there at the moment when love begins.
I'm going to get rid of books. Books which will never find their ponies. I'm standing in front of the cemetery and ordering the herd to gallop into the earth.
I...
...the sky is starting to lighten. Sun will be here soon.
I have to get up.
She forced herself out of the bed which didn't work, made legs which didn't want to work carry her towards Spike's basket.
"Spike?" The first response came out as something like 'Gnniffl,' and she gently hoof-poked his right shoulder. "I know it's too early, but we have to get started. We need to set up the tables before the first train leaves the station, just in case any of the commuters pass us. Come on -- it's going to be a long day, but the sooner we start it --"
the longer it's going to be
"-- the sooner we... get it over with."
"Grisht," her little brother muttered. "Gah." Green irises slowly revealed themselves. "What time is --"
"Too early," Twilight sighed. "And too late. Come on. Let's try to grab some breakfast, and then... let's just get it over with."
Step 3: sell.
The version of the entry on the original internal checklist had featured more capitals and three encouraging exclamation points. Twilight couldn't seem to summon any of them up right now.
She surveyed the setup as it waited for its first customer under waning moonlight. Getting the tables ready had been easy, for Twilight believed in time and motion efficiency studies. She had found fascination in the works of Bunker Galebreath, especially as concerned how just about anything could be rendered into a more practical and energy-saving form -- with the possible exception of dating. (It had taken her second year in Ponyville before she'd understood how raising a family of twelve could channel somepony's interests in that direction.) As such, she'd taken the lost stallion's advice and saved a step. Sorted books went directly onto a waiting table. The table, when loaded, went into the basement. Once the first-stage sorting had wrapped up, any secondary process (pulling back essentials, rares, things which couldn't be replaced) took place on the tables themselves, and whatever remained after that could be levitated directly outside (while being carried rather high and with some serious worries about keeping things balanced at all times) and placed into its predesignated selling position, lined up with the chart she'd drawn on the third day. In his way, Bunker Galebreath had been a genius, the pioneer and first-mark Founder of his entire science --
-- dead for ninety-three years. Forgotten by just about everypony who didn't work in the industry he'd founded, with more than a few of those ponies unaware of the stallion who'd started the whole thing.
Three of his books were on the tables. Placed with efficiency and care.
Twilight forced herself to take a breath, began to trot around the tables -- and tree, for the only way to get everything arranged without having books piled up in the street had been to surround the trunk. Three hundred and sixty degrees of book overload. Every other arrangement would have involved tables on top of tables, hardcover hazards to traffic both hoofbound and airborne, and they'd still needed to angle things in a way which would leave space for the book fort. Twilight hadn't thought of something she could do with the book fort other than asking Rainbow to keep it dry: the tree had received a multi-day Weather Bureau exemption which had left it untouched through the last two seasonal sprinkles.
The fort, in its way, was rather efficient: Pinkie had casually figured out a base structure which allowed for considerable book density while allowing it to take the weight of multiple giggling occupants. Twilight had already caught several colts and fillies playing within the paper walls, and despite the damage which was surely being done to the book surfaces they were tumbling across, she'd -- let them. It wasn't as if she was going to sell all of those copies and in a way, it gave the books something to do in the last days before... today.
The structure had served other purposes: it was yet another means of letting ponies know that something was happening at the library, and it defined the rightmost border of the sale. If Twilight could see the fort, she was in her part of the event: once it was out of sight, she was in Spike's initial territory. With no way for any single pony to see everything (and even an overhead survey would have been blocked by a number of branches), they'd had to split up the assignments. Her friends would be coming in whenever they could throughout the day, serving as both relief and extra eyes: there was no way Twilight and Spike could get through the entire Sun-raising through (beyond) Sun-lowering shift without breaks, and neither had any hope of being able to watch the entire area all by themselves. Twilight was all too aware that during the times when it was just the two of them, it would be all too easy for anypony to snatch an unpurchased item from an edge table and gallop off before anything could be done -- then darkly considered that every piece stolen was one less thing they had to sell.
She'd put up signs, indicating sections and categories for the browsers. The printing press had been put back into action, and maps for getting through the maze of tables were posted at the outer edges. Despite Zecora's advice, snacks and drinks for shoppers had not been provided: the budget was already stretched thin enough. The Crusaders had shown early signs of using the fort as a lemonade sales station, and Twilight had displayed the double corona which had gotten them out of the area before anything could explode.
Rainbow had arranged for a rain-free day, negating book-moving wind gusts and keeping the humidity at pleasant levels while making the pre-dawn air around the tree a little warmer than it would be for the rest of Ponyville: weather which made it easy to browse for a while. Applejack had taken what remained of Twilight's stamp budget and converted it into an assortment of coins which she called a bank: multiple denominations which would make it easy to offer change.
They'd done everything they could have for her, after she'd done everything she shouldn't.
"Are you ready?" Spike softly asked as he gazed up at her, worry writ large across his scales.
"No," Twilight quietly replied. "But we're out of time."
She would retain the memories from the day for the rest of her life, but as something other than a steady flow. In the rare times when her blushing future self cared (or was forced) to look back upon it, things would play out as a series of little scenes, focus moments from the sale which she would never forget, sometimes in spite of her best efforts.
The first purchase: that stayed with her. Applejack had told her that getting the initial exchange into her saddlebags was crucial because up until the moment you had that one sale, there was a possibility to finish the day with none. (Applejack, in describing her personal segment of the disaster which had ultimately taken out their first Gala, had disgustedly borrowed a rounders term. "It's a perfect game. No customers, no sales, no money, an' no point.") A pony who'd been on her way to the train, ready for the sleepy commute into Canterlot, had trotted by the tables and paused just long enough to pick out a book by the light of corona shine, one which would wind up substituting for a window-propped pillow. That had been three-tenths of a bit, and Twilight had exhaled as the prospect of a total failure wearily staggered away from the sale, trying to make its way to the tracks.
Sun had been raised. More ponies had come by: some responding to the one-sheets and checking the tables on their way to work, others who never bothered to glance at mail or notice boards and thus got to experience the dubious joy of a settled zone where every scheduled event came as a complete shock. Twilight had moved among the tables and watched others easily doing the same: she hadn't repeated her mistake of basing the aisle spacing around herself. And then they'd had their first pony coming off the train.
"Can I get a better rate for bulk?" the mare asked, her words weighed down by a heavy Canterlot accent.
Twilight looked her over, noted the presence of the cart. "Are you reselling?"
The pause seemed to go on for a little too long. "Does it matter?"
"Other than the part where I'd appreciate your being honest with me? No," Twilight replied. "I'm selling books today. If you can sell them to somepony else at a personal profit, that's your business, and I hope it works out for you. I'll kick down the prices on some things if you're taking a lot of them, but I'm not going to do 'everything which fits in the cart for a hundred bits' on a pile six times my height, and if you try to sneak any of the collectibles into a bulk rate, I'll see it, and I won't be happy. But if you play fair with me and don't try to spear me on the final total, I'll work with you."
Because that had been on the checklist as 3a.
I'm not Rarity. I can't go into negotiations trying to win. The objective is to clear space, so if I have to deal a little or a lot in order to do it, I also have to accept some degree of built-in losing in those deals. Let them have their victories, and I'll have less books to deal with in the end.
The mare thought it over.
"I run a fourthhoof book stall," she eventually admitted. "I'm trying to see if I can stock up." An appraising pink gaze moved over the tables. "Your stuff is cleaner than most of what I get. That's just about Archives-clean."
"Thank you." She'd said the words without feeling them. "Go on in. Let me know when you're ready to total."
The unicorn mare nodded, then trotted past her, leaving the cart behind as she made her first move into the maze. An older earth pony stepped up to occupy the briefly-vacant space.
"Miss Sparkle," the mayor neutrally greeted her. "Beginning early, I see."
"Earlier than you might think," Twilight replied, forcing her words to stay calm. "We were setting up before Sun was raised."
The mayor slowly looked over the tables, or at least the half which were visible from her current position. "This is rather more -- stocked than I had expected. There is enough here to account for every one of the columns, added to most of the shelves --"
"-- it's what we had to sell," Twilight interrupted, and immediately prepared to not talk about any of the reasons why. "All of it. Nothing essential, Mayor: nothing I can't replace if I really need to, and nothing which should never be sold at all. This is what's been remaindered. I sorted, I weeded, and my friends helped me to get it all done on schedule. The sale is under way, on time. That's what you wanted."
Softly, "Miss Sparkle, I can count, and I can see where the tables begin to circle the tree. I can also see that most of these tables have been borrowed. I told you to bring the collection down to something which would fit on the shelves. If I were to trot into the library right now --"
"-- you can't. Unless it's an emergency or enough ponies are helping to let me go inside, we're closed for the day. I'm needed out here."
The mayor took a breath, held it for a few seconds. "Please answer me directly, Miss Sparkle. The books which currently remain inside the library. Do they all fit on the shelves?"
"Yes. With space left for the ones which are checked out right now, and then some."
"And how many of those on the tables would need to sell in order to maintain that internal status?"
Twilight held back her first answer, just long enough to surgically extract the more impolite qualifiers and terms of direct address.
"Most."
There hadn't been much left over.
"Most," the mayor repeated.
"Yes," Twilight told her. "Most. Mayor, this is my sale. It's three years of sales crammed into one day, because that's what you told me to do. I complied. But it's my sale. I'm conducting it the best way I know how and when it's over, I'll make sure the collection fits on the shelves, because that's what you told me to do and... it's what a librarian would do when the mayor ordered it. When the mayor -- shouldn't have had to order it. You told me to make space, and..." It was so hard, not swallowing in front of the older mare, keeping her own gaze up and level. "...you were right to tell me that. I was neglecting one of the duties of my job."
The earth pony tilted her head to the right, returned it to center. The cravat shifted accordingly.
"I am somewhat surprised," she finally said, "to hear you admit that."
"It's my job," Twilight repeated. "It's your job. I don't want to step on your territory, not even when a mission forces me to. It's... not a nice place to be. But at the same time, Mayor -- it's my job. So -- are you here to shop?"
Grey eyes blinked, exactly once.
"I came by to see if the sale was proceeding on sched --"
"-- then you're not buying," Twilight cut her off. "And I currently have somepony who's interested in a bulk purchase. Today, Mayor, my job is to sell books. So I think my time is better spent guiding her than speaking with you. So if you'll excuse me, or even if you won't, until the day you finally fire me, I have to go and do my job..."
She turned easily within the aisle: she'd left enough space for that too. She did so quickly, before the mayor could see the other impact. For Twilight had watched as the words had kicked into the older mare, every one bringing its own hard-hoofed blow, but she didn't want the official to spot what was now happening on her own end.
It had been nearly three years, and she had changed so much. But it had been days of stress and confronting her own failures while getting ready to bury ponies, and sometimes, even now, after nearly three years...
...sometimes, the words just slipped out.
She could feel that now. She even knew that the words had been wrong. But she hadn't stopped them, she couldn't take them back, she couldn't fix --
"-- I don't hate you," the mayor whispered, and every last syllable somehow found a place within purple skull-flattened ears.
Twilight stopped. Facing away from the mayor, unwilling to turn back. Perhaps unable.
"It must feel like that sometimes, doesn't it?" the older mare quietly continued. "We come into conflict far more than any mayor and librarian ever should, or perhaps ever have. Some of that is because I so frequently -- too frequently -- find myself turning control over to you, or dealing with the fallout from the chaos which the mere presence of Harmony so often seems to summon. And so it's rather easy to fall into the temptation of exerting what little power I do have, in the name of getting some of that control back. But I try to avoid that, Miss Sparkle. I simply try to do my job, including the portions which require forcing you into finally doing yours. I doubt we'll ever be friends. But I don't hate you. And, even if it's too much, too late to hope... I'd rather... that you didn't hate me."
Hoofsteps moving away, accompanied by the subtle sound of a tail being dragged across grass and cobblestones. And by the time Twilight could force herself to turn, the mayor was gone.
There would be slow periods, and there would be many of them. Ponies would reach their workplaces, and most of those wouldn't emerge until it was time for the midday meal. Fillies and colts would gallop past the tree on their way to something far more important than a book sale, although a number of those had stopped -- to use the fort. Twilight had recognized that she would be spending long hours staring out over tables which had nopony sorting through their contents, and... well, under different circumstances, it could be argued that she didn't lack for the means of spending one way in passing the time. But she didn't open any of the books, not unless it was to show somepony which printing they were about to consider. To read one might be to consider keeping it, and to keep one would potentially open the emotional floodgates which ultimately washed everything back into the library. Twilight had learned many things over her time in Ponyville, and that included how to recognize a precious few of the times when she couldn't trust herself.
The slow times came, but they came for so much of the settled zone. She had been in the Boutique for enough hours to know when Rarity's traffic would dwindle to nothing, leaving a grumbling designer alone with her sketchbooks. Sugarcube Corner would end the morning shift and begin baking the goods required for the afternoon. The slow times came and in this case, her friends started to arrive with them.
"Ah can spare 'bout forty minutes," was Applejack's first remark as she trotted up. "But that's it, Twi. Still, for forty minutes, Ah'll do what Ah can." Sharp eyes surveyed the area. "Ah see some space opened up on those eight. Lots of space."
"I had a reseller," Twilight admitted. "We worked out a bulk rate. She got some things from the back section, too. It covered the Canterlot ads, Applejack, and then some."
It got her a practical "Good," followed by still more examination. "Magazines don't look like they're shiftin'."
She managed to suppress the sigh. "I know. Roseluck was by earlier, and... I didn't have the one she wanted, the same way I've never had it. And then she accused me of working with them in order to hide the truth from the public."
"That conspiracy rag?" Twilight nodded. "Ah asked her 'bout it once. Wouldn't show it t' me."
Twilight blinked. "She didn't want to educate you?"
"Said if Ah wanted t' see it, that proved Ah was workin' with them." Muttering somewhat, "Still tryin' t' work out jus' who 'them' is."
"So she wants me to carry that magazine to educate the public," Twilight carefully tried out, "but anypony who wants to be educated -- shouldn't be?"
"Yeah," Applejack concluded. "Makes as much sense as anythin' else she says or does. Which is t' say, none. Twi -- have y'sold one magazine all day?"
"...no. But there's a lot of Sun left, Applejack, and I'm not closing when it's lowered. I was planning on staying open until after the late train got back from Canterlot. I've got enough devices to light up the tables for a while, and as long as there's ponies out on the street --"
"-- Twi?"
She knew she'd waited too long before answering. "Yes?"
And the strong voice was gentle. "You're kinda on my turf here, sellin' an' all. So -- please listen t' me for this. An' Rarity, 'cause Ah think she'll tell you the same if she gets t' drop by. One of the hardest things t' do when you're sellin' is figurin' out when t' stop. When y'have t' -- give up. 'cause if y'push too long, y'get mad inside, an' then when you're mad enough, it starts t' come out, an' -- well, an' then y'get the Gala. Don't push too far. Y'ain't used t' this, you've had a hard week already, an'... it's gonna reach the point where y'have t' stop. Watch yourself, figure out when that time is -- then quit twenty minutes before it, in case you're wrong. Okay?"
"I have to wait for the last train," Twilight insisted. "Ponies might want to read themselves to sleep, and some of the commuters wouldn't have wanted to carry a book around all day, so they wouldn't have bought on their way out --"
"-- not arguin' that, Twi. Further than Ah'd tell you t' push on your first try, but it's a big job and y'already made that decision. Ah jus' don't want y'waitin' for the customers from the restaurants after they close, and then the cooks t' head home after cleanin' the kitchens, an' then the police on the night shift t' wander over... Last train, then some time after that. Enough maybe for those customers t' go by. An' then you're done. 'cause if y'say 'five more minutes' enough times, it's four more hours. Y'understand? No graveyard shift. None at'tall."
Except for the part where stopping meant opening the gates to the graveyard. "Yes," Twilight quietly said, and found herself looking away.
"All right," the farmer gently said. "So let me do mah -- hey! Yeah, you'd better stop movin'! Ah see you tryin' to sneak that -- back in a minute, Twi' -- off without payin'! Oh, when I get mah lasso on you...!"
She didn't see all of her friends, not while Sun was still being moved across the sky. Rarity had her own hours to worry about, and the seasonal needs of Fluttershy's friends hadn't exactly abated. But as promised, Pinkie had some free time: her half-day added to a relative lack of birthdays on the calendar, and it intermittently left a pink blur pronking along the aisles trying to help everypony she could, at least during those moments when she wasn't trying to regulate the combat in the book fort.
(They hadn't sold a single book from the fort, nor had any of the post-saturation copies moved from the tables. Twilight suspected part of it was because nopony wanted to dismantle any portion of the structure, with the rest centering around That Book.)
Rainbow, however... well, Rainbow really wasn't suited for selling. If she wasn't interested in something, she generally didn't understand why anypony would ever be, and anything she liked had better be appreciated by everypony else or there would be Words. (Or, more typically, Actions, Demonstrations, and Fleeing Before Anypony Could Force Her To Clean Up.) Rainbow kicked her opinions into the world and didn't understand why the target didn't reshape itself to conform with her beliefs, much less why the world occasionally felt the need to kick back. Translate it all into a sales approach and it would have had her forcing pony snouts into the few pages she was willing to put up with while rerouting them away from absolutely everything else, which was why Twilight had preemptively put her on aerial security. Because there were a number of situations where Rainbow's participation actively made things worse -- all while refusing to recognize the true results of her efforts until somepony jammed them all up her nostrils. So in many ways -- just about every way, because security duty would quickly turn boring and lead to the pegasus uncovering one of the pillows she'd (poorly) hidden in the tree in case of Nap Emergency -- Twilight had expected Rainbow, at least for the sale itself, to be no help whatsoever.
She'd been wrong.
"What are you doing?"
"Hang on..." The weather coordinator nosed another cover. "Huh. Sixty years?"
"...sorry?"
"Sixty years. This book is sixty years old. I thought I saw that when we were going through the checkout cards." Paper was slapped on top of more paper. The sound had been repeating rather frequently, which was what had gotten Twilight's attention in the first place. "Now let's see this one -- ninety? Seriously, ninety? Well, you can't kick a book that old out into the cold! Or into the warm. The too-warm. I mean, the fire. In case Spike winds up -- anyway, you can't, so..." Another slap. "And this one's... huh. Well, it's still got some growing up to do. With the old folks. They know stuff sometimes." Slap.
"Rainbow, you've got about a third of the Adventure table --"
"-- so? An adventure's an adventure! No matter how long ago it was! And the older it was, the more impressive it gets, because if something just came out yesterday, then how do you even know the pony survived it? Actually, given how old some of this stuff is, maybe the ponies involved already -- no, don't tell me! No spoilers! It was bad enough when you almost blurted out the whole thing about Daring's mother secretly being -- anyway, what are you charging for bulk? And is there any special friend discount?"
"...Rainbow?"
Huffily, "Look, you're the one who practically forced me to get bookshelves. Which I had to pay for, with enough room for a whole Sports section, or you wouldn't have asked me to do something dumb like move all of Sports up there in the first place. So if I've got to have shelves, they need to have something on them, or what good are they? Oh, that reminds me -- Sports. You didn't clear out anything about flying records, did you? Because it would take a really mean pony to do that and somepony had better pick up after her. Oh -- yeah. While I've got you here. Thaumic Fiction. What is that and why are all the covers so awesome?"
Direct encounters with Mrs. Bradel always stuck in Twilight's mind, mostly due to embarrassment having the emotional consistency of hot tar.
"Oh. Twilight," Snips' mother awkwardly said as a rather wide body began to uncertainly back away. "Of course you're out here. Because it's... your sale." Another body length was put between them, also in reverse.
"Mrs. Bradel," Twilight uncomfortably replied. "Is there anything I can help you with?"
"NO! -- I mean, no..." The overweight mare was starting to sweat. "I can talk to Spike. If I need anything. Yes. Spike."
"He's inside," Twilight told her. "It's been hours already. I told him to take a break."
"So it's... you," Mrs. Bradel weakly said. "Just you." And, much more quickly, "Well, that means you're overworked. I'll come back later..."
Twilight kept the sigh internal, and still wondered how much of it Equestria's foremost book restorer had heard.
It was... a common misconception regarding Twilight's talent, really. A distressingly large number of ponies believed she was capable of inventing spells on the spot (generally untrue and, on the few occasions when she'd tried it, always disastrous), while just as many seemed to feel she could copy a pony's personal spells just by standing in their general vicinity for a few minutes. This was an utter falsehood. She'd performed a speed duplication all of once (and still wasn't sure that hadn't just been a group of long-time theories suddenly coming together): with every other spell, she typically had to be in the original caster's vicinity while they worked their magic over and over again, sometimes for hours. Even then, certain spells simply wouldn't yield to her, and she occasionally suspected that even for the workings which she did add to her personal repertoire, she hadn't matched their creators on every last detail.
Mrs. Bradel had created several workings which nopony else in Equestria could cast, spells she outright refused to teach in order to keep so much book repair traffic moving across the continent and into her shop. She had workings which could add moisture to dried-out binding glue, restore luster to pages and covers alike, make paper heal itself as if it were a living thing. She was the best there was at what she did, to the point where Twilight had heard of her long before coming to Ponyville: both the Gifted School and Archives -- the Archives! -- trusted her to restore their most precious texts. Twilight had been thrilled to find out that she would be sharing a settled zone with the one pony who was best-suited to keep her own collection in order, and sent all of her repair traffic to the shop accordingly.
It was just that... Mrs. Bradel didn't trust her. She felt Twilight wanted her spells. Would duplicate them, put the restoration shop out of business entirely, and would be capable of doing so after spending just a few consecutive minutes in her presence. Which was, frankly, ridiculous, not to mention more than a little paranoid. Because all Twilight would actually do was keep the library and her own personal collection in order. She had too much going on in her life to take over all the other restoration traffic. Plus she couldn't copy Mrs. Bradel's personal spells that way in the first place. Which meant the older unicorn was just being silly. So there.
"Pinkie's in that section now."
"Oh. Pinkie. Then Pinkie can help me." Another three body lengths. "I have some things ready for you, by the way. Please pick them up when you can. Or send Spike. It's best to send Spike. Not that you have to any more, since the restraining order couldn't be renewed -- actually, my son really likes Spike. And that's why I'd rather see him. As would my son. So send him. Please."
And Twilight watched the creator of the spells she would probably never get to learn gallop away from her, backwards, until the tree was put between them and she could finally let the sigh come out into the open. Purely, utterly, and pointlessly silly: that was what Mrs. Bradel's actions were. A wonderful book restorer, the best on the continent. But as a pony? Silly. Imagine, being afraid like that...
Admittedly, having been caught lying low within the flowerbed outside the open shop window during business hours probably hadn't helped Twilight's case. Especially when it came to that recently-expired restraining order.
(She'd been wondering if there would be any practical benefit to having Rainbow sneak her in while Moon was still up and drop her off on the roof.)
Some ponies purchased books, and some of those purchased -- well, more than she'd been expecting them to, really. It had been some time since the last sale, and it seemed as if there was a category of resident who did all of their book buying during such occasions. She recognized more than a few faces among that group, and just barely managed to keep herself from asking most of them for their late fees -- although she did darkly consider that at least now, she had some potential idea of why they'd been so reluctant to pay.
Others wandered between the tables, picked things up and put them down, left without buying anything. Most of those tended to put things down several tables away from where they'd picked them up, and Twilight found a brief burst of energy in the fury that had her trading reshelving for retabling. Apparently there was also a certain category of resident who couldn't be trusted in the vicinity of a book for more than three seconds no matter where that tome was -- but she held her tongue. She'd had her outburst, and... she couldn't afford to chase anypony away, not now, not with Sun shifting across the sky. Some of those ponies might come back later. Several had promised to and Rarity, who'd just barely managed to drop by long enough to overhear one of those, had softly snorted and turned away.
There were ponies who would camp out in an aisle, seemingly having arranged their bodies to block the maximum possible amount of groundborne traffic. Those ponies would choose something, and then they would read it. They wouldn't buy whatever they were reading. They would simply stay in one place until they'd finished their chosen text, which really shouldn't have taken as long as it did when the vast majority of those ponies had arranged themselves around the magazines.
(It didn't get much better with the pegasi: they tended to hover over the exact center of the Periodicals table, which meant their shadow fell over whatever everypony else was reading. It created an angry number of fliers who wanted the reader to abandon that best spot so they could start, along with more than a few earth ponies and unicorns who would carry the magazine to another table, one where the light was better -- and then leave the issue there.)
Children moved in and out of the book fort. It provided a steady supply of laughter throughout the day, along with a total lack of sales.
Three ponies had decided, based on what seemed to be a total lack of evidence, that she was stupid. The Canterlot advertisements had lured in more than the one reseller, and some of those ponies made purchases of their own. However, this particular trio -- they arrived one at a time, about two hours apart -- asked her about books which the Archives only allowed to be removed from the stacks under heavy guard, and they generally also asked whether they could get them for five bits each. Such ponies easily gravitated to the few minor collectibles, which had been priced accordingly. And everypony of the set had an amazing ability to, with a mere glance at a number, place a decimal point to its immediate left. This rather insulting piece of numerical punctuation would be invisible to everypony except themselves, would make no sense to anypony who knew what the book was truly worth, and yet still had to be honored at all ridiculously low costs -- or at least so they kept on claiming up until the moment they found themselves trying to explain their viewpoint to her flaring corona, whereupon two had considered the debate forfeit. The one who kept going beyond that... well, she couldn't afford to lose a single customer. And by definition, those who were never going to pay her prices on the things which deserved to sell for those bits weren't it, especially for that last one, whom Rainbow caught trying to smuggle the first printing into his saddlebag when he falsely believed nopony was looking.
An hour after that, a mare, one whom Twilight had never seen before, had come along. She had silently surveyed the entire section of quasi-rares, nodded Twilight over, passed over the total number of bits required, levitated the books into her saddlebags, and left without a word.
There were slow times, and busier ones. Sometimes she had five ponies trying to give her bits at once, and it would eventually be followed by thirty minutes where Pinkie did whatever she could to make Twilight laugh, trying to take her mind off the feeling that thirty minutes seemed destined to become forty.
Sun moved across the sky, and books sold. Sun was lowered, and the tables became that much emptier. The rest of her friends concluded their labors for the day, and then it was all of them under newly-raised Moon, setting out the devices whose glow granted them that much more time. It allowed them to intercept some of the ponies heading home from the train station, or those whose Ponyville businesses had just closed and finally given them time to shop. Many of those purchased, and she even saw two return from those who had promised to do so -- two out of the forty-seven who'd said the words.
But then all that traffic went home, and stars shimmered down upon increasing desperation. Twilight began to lower her prices for those few who came in, hoping nopony from earlier would find out about her discounting and complain. Offers to get a free book with any three which had been paid for began that stage. Then it became two in order to reach the self-assigned gift, and Rarity just barely stopped her before she turned the entire thing into a saddlebag-stuffing contest: ten bits for everything the pony could fit and still have some retaining amount of fabric left between the hardcover-created rents.
They sold books until long after the last of the trains had pulled away, deep under Moon, until the smells from the restaurant district stopped drifting across them, with Spike long-since having fallen asleep under a table. It meant he missed a minor sales spurt: two novels and, with one chef having shut down with exceptional speed, four cookbooks.
Applejack packaged them, nosed the bundle over, thanked the cook, and then quietly trotted over to Twilight.
"It's time," her friend said. "Y'know it."
"The police should be coming by to check on us again after we had to restrain those shoplifters. The night shift police, Applejack. Maybe if we --"
"-- Twi..." A soft sigh. "Look around."
She didn't want to. She also didn't have to, because some lonely part of her soul had kept count throughout day and night. She already knew.
They had sold books, so many books. Twilight had bits secured in the library in what felt like ridiculous quantities, all of which could be used for the library, for anything that would help the tree at all. They'd sold books --
-- but they hadn't sold enough.
At the start, she'd levitated sixty-eight fully-loaded tables into position around the tree. None of them were completely empty: other than the collectibles, there was no such thing as a completely sold-out section, and that hadn't occupied an entire table to begin with. Some had given up more of their contents than others, and she'd been keeping track of every space. This book occupied that much room: the doorstopper was three of those, one slim volume only truly counted for the value of its words...
"Ah took a trot 'round the tree, just before that last fellow came in. An' Ah make it out t' be..." Applejack sighed again. "Well, put it all t'gether, take out every last gap, an' Ah think you'd have 'bout thirty-seven tables left, Twi, plus the fort. Y'did nearly half. An' that's better than Ah thought you'd do. That one bulk sale near the start really helped. Gotta thank Fluttershy for that: wouldn't have seen none of the Canterlot traffic without her."
Twilight barely managed a nod, followed by a soft "Thank you, Fluttershy."
From three tables away, "...it's okay. I just wish it had done more..."
"It's over, Twi," Applejack gently told her. "Y'know what comes next."
She did, and called out to her friends. They all came to her, and every face was laced with concern.
"Everypony," she sadly told them, "thank you. For everything you did, and tried to do. We did -- as much as we could. You did, to save me from myself, and... this time, I created something nopony could get me out of. Not completely. But you all tried, as hard as you could, and... thank you for that. All I can do is thank you, and promise this won't happen again." Ruefully, hating herself with what little energy she still had to give. "My next giant mistake should at least be a different one."
Rarity's voice cut through the air, urgency driving the syllables. "Twilight --"
"-- I hear myself," she broke in. "I'm just... tired, Rarity. It's been days, and -- I'm tired. You all must be tired too, and that means the last thing I can ask you to do is -- go home. The final part is mine. It was my mistake, and -- it's my cleanup. All mine. So if somepony would take Spike inside, let him sleep somewhere a little more comfortable, and then just... go home."
"Ah don't think we should be leavin' you all by yourself," Applejack steadily offered. "It's been a long few days for you -- too long. An' --" she stopped, and her face scrunched up: the sign that she'd been about to say a truth which she'd then decided shouldn't be voiced and blocked herself just in time. It didn't take very much for Twilight to guess what it would have been.
"And you think if I'm alone, I won't do it," Twilight quietly finished.
Applejack winced -- then nodded.
"Come back tomorrow morning," Twilight told them. "A couple of hours after the library opens, because I'll need some time to... sort things out. When you do, it'll all be gone." Which was followed by a slow sigh. "No, I'm lying. It'll probably almost be gone. Everything will be gone with the possible exception of the book fort. I'm... not sure what to do with the book fort."
"I'm sorry, Twilight," Pinkie offered, lower lip quivering. "If I hadn't --"
It brought out a smile. "Nopony bought a copy of that one all day," Twilight told her. "It wouldn't have mattered if those books were on the table or not. And the kids had fun. A lot of fun. Go home, everypony."
"And if we say no?" Rainbow demanded, a little more softly than usual.
"Then I'd tell you that you do what's best for me. And sometimes that also happens to be what I want, and..." She had to force the last words. "...I think what's best for me, and what I want to do, is finish it myself. So I'll -- remember. Please?"
The five of them exchanged glances, silent looks laden with heavy words. Then they nodded, trotted up, nuzzled and wished her luck and, in Rainbow's case, bumped her more softly than usual. Spike was carried inside, brought to pillows and blankets and everything else he needed to recover from the too-long day. And then everypony went home.
Twilight stood alone, under Moon, among her failures, and let the weight of the night drive her spirits into the soil.
I messed up.
She'd already known that.
I did this. I was wrong, and I couldn't fix it.
That too.
And now I have to...
Step 4: disposal.
About thirty-seven tables worth of books, plus a fort. A full day under Sun, part of the night beneath Moon, and all that time had led to a total of three magazines leaving the tables.
She knew so many spells, and few of them were suited to destruction. She'd never had any need to study combat magic before taking up her Element and even now, most of her direct offense centered around using her field to create quickly-projected bursts, bolts of applied pressure which could shove hard. But if all else failed... given enough time, she could just pick everything up, then carry it to the trash, over and over again, until the forgotten became the buried.
She stood among the dying, and prepared to open the grave.
"I'm sorry," she whispered. "I... I couldn't, and I'm..."
She knew they couldn't hear her. The books were merely captured thoughts. The beliefs and conjectures and dreams of those long-passed into the shadowlands, about to lose one more anchor holding them to the living world.
There would always be a last anchor. There was always the Archives. The buildings so few visited, and the ones who did go just about always entered with specific reasons to search. Intentions which would bring them nowhere near the final copies of these books.
"...I'm sorry..."
Her library didn't need them any more.
Her settled zone hadn't cared.
Her world...
The white hoof gently touched her shoulder, and Twilight's eyes finally opened again.
"You never sleep at your desk," Rarity quietly said. "How long did it take?"
"Hours," a not-quite-focused Twilight just barely managed. "I... just finished the last ones -- what time is it?"
"Later than it should be," Rarity replied. "Spike is still sleeping, but... he is youngest and yesterday, at least for the labor, was hardest on him. Let him rest, Twilight."
"I did," she said. "I never woke him up, not even once."
"The book fort is still outside."
Twilight sighed. "I know. I still don't know what to do with it. And the mayor will be by later..."
"She told you such?"
"No. It's just really easy to guess."
"And she may complain," Rarity decided. "But it will be the only thing she has to complain about. Because before I came here, I went to your storage unit. And when I first entered the library, I checked on Spike, then ventured into the basement. And I suppose it is possible that you have used a new hiding place, but... I choose to believe in you, Twilight. With the exception of those which make up the fort, as far as I can see --"
"-- they're gone," Twilight wearily smiled. "They're all gone."
The books fit on the shelves. All of them did, with space left over for those waiting to come home, and then a little more.
"How do you feel?" Rarity carefully asked.
"Good." And it was the truth.
Rarity blinked.
"From... disposal of a burden, I would expect." More quickly, as if hastening to recover, "Along with knowing that you are now capable of such actions, even when that burden is arguably somewhat more personal than before --"
"-- no." And with a rush of joy, "I feel good because I figured it out, Rarity. It took me hours, and then I had to go back and collect them from the trash, but -- I figured it out! They're gone and I didn't have to destroy anything! Nothing got thrown away! They're back in circulation! Every last one!" A brief pause. "Except for the fort. I may ask the mayor if I can keep the fort. As a fort."
"...Twilight?"
"It'll take a few spells," she mused. "Something to protect it from the weather, just for starters. I don't have to worry about anything which would normally fuse the pages as a side effect because they're not really books any more: they're part of a fort. But I've got the space outside the tree, and sometimes a kid just wants a place where they can go outside and rest with their book on a warm day. Or even a fort. I could even add some more playground equipment after the next sale, once I have some bits again." With a rueful shrug, "I'm a little broke right now, or at least the library is. Well -- back to normal, really. But once the summer budget opens up --"
"-- Twilight."
"...what?"
"I believe I am going to need an explanation. And in order to prevent it from being repeated six times..."
"Say that again," Rainbow challenged, just a little more weakly than usual.
"I thought getting everypony together was supposed to keep me from having to repeat --"
"Naw," Applejack interrupted. "One more time. Slowly. With a lot more detail. Y'did what now?"
Twilight beamed.
"It's the library exchange program! Well -- the postage which gets used for it, plus I spent pretty much everything we got yesterday on stamps. And boxes. I needed a lot of boxes. But that's the idea, Applejack! The tree doesn't need the books any more, because we have a proper library -- well, a proper small town one. But do you know who barely has any library at all? Appleloosa. They're still trying to get everything established and a real library is just about at the bottom of their list for some reason -- so I sent them enough to get them started! It's not enough for a true library, but it'll at least give them something to build on, and something to read while they're building. And then I scattered some of the rest around to the other desert settlements. But I still had a lot left over, so I thought about all the foreign books I've been bringing in, and then I realized some of the libraries in the other nations probably don't have enough Equestrian volumes --"
Pinkie, who appreciated it when somepony allowed one of her own verbal barrages to reach the last piece of ammunition, seldom interrupted anypony. 'Seldom' did not indicate 'never'. "-- you donated them?"
"All over the world!" Twilight grinned. "New homes for every last one of them! Including the magazines. I'm sorry, Fluttershy, but sometimes the desert settlements fall behind on the news, and I thought they might appreciate some magazines --"
Pinkie facehoofed.
It was something else which happened on occasion. It had happened at the storage unit. And yet it was still a fairly rare sight, rare enough to stop everypony in their own hoofprints.
"Oh, Twilight..." Pinkie groaned.
"...Pinkie?"
The baker sighed.
"It was a good idea," she admitted. "And a really really nice thing to do. The new settlements could use the books, and I'm sure some of the other libraries will appreciate what they get. But Twilight... you mailed them..."
She wasn't seeing the problem. "I was careful! I bundled up the boxes, I reinforced everything so it wouldn't come apart during shipping, I used the exchange program directory to get all the addresses right, I wrote everything clearly and had the post office weigh it all --"
"You wrote everything clearly?" This from Spike, whose eyes were starting to widen.
"Of course! The postponies need to read where it's going!"
"And," Pinkie said, "where it came from."
This time, Rarity's collapse came all at once, with her forelegs pressed around her horn as her barrel hit the library floor.
"Oh, no..." the designer groaned. "Pinkie, you don't think -- no, of course you do, that is exactly what will happen..."
Fluttershy softly sighed. Spike moaned with something very close to agony. Applejack joined the facehoof parade with a hat-muffled downbeat. Rainbow just looked confused, and Twilight gave her company.
"What's wrong? I found the answer, everypony! Sure, I had to put a return address on the package because that's how mailing things works, but why does it matter if they know who donated? It's a donation! They'll understand that!"
"They're libraries, Twilight," Pinkie wearily said. "They're libraries which have their own space problems. And the desert settlements will take whatever they can get, mostly. But they still have some librarians in charge there, and the other nations sure do. They'll see donations -- but they're also going to see something else. They're going to see another librarian on the other end of the postal trail -- one who was just trying to find a new home for books, somepony who made her problem into theirs. And when they have their own remaindered sales and can't get rid of everything, including some of the stuff you made into their problem -- they're still going to have your return address, along with some money they can spend on postage..."
Twilight sat down. Hard.
Silence reigned over the library for a time, at least until they all heard the dignified trot of the inspection rapidly approaching.
"We don't tell her," Twilight said.
They nodded.
"We can't tell her."
Again.
Twilight sighed.
"I think the storage unit owner offers a discount when somepony rents by the year," she said as she forced herself to stand up. "Rarity, would you please go with me after I finish pretending everything's okay? I need you to haggle --"
"-- negotiate --"
"-- that down on the biggest room they have..."
It had been weeks, enough to put them into summer. Weeks before Twilight had what she needed to make the journey across town, speak to the staff members who served, in their way, as some level of Guards, and finally knock on the door.
"Yes?"
She pushed it open and slowly trotted into the Sun-lit office, the package floating in the field bubble at her side.
"Miss Sparkle," the mayor politely nodded. "I wasn't expecting you. Or -- that." She looked at the bubble again, then inspected the well-wrapped bulky rectangle within. "Is this Bearer business? Something we need to be concerned about? I can have the police alerted within minutes and after that, the settled zone can be --"
"-- no," Twilight hastily said. "Nothing like that. Nothing's going on, not on that level."
"Oh." The older mare exhaled. "Our streak continues, then. With the constant exception of the Crusaders, the relative peace goes on. So why did you need to see me?"
"I just wanted to give you this." She sent the package onto the desk, winked the bubble out.
Grey eyes regarded the rectangle for a few seconds.
"What is it?"
"It's for you."
"I do not," the mayor stiffly stated, "take bribes."
"It isn't," Twilight weakly protested. "It's just -- a present."
"A... present," the older mare tried, seemingly tasting the words as they moved across her tongue.
"Because we are trouble," Twilight said as she stood within a dusty sunbeam. "All of us. There's been trouble since I got here. Things we respond to, and things we --" she swallowed "-- start. Sometimes without meaning to. You put up with a lot, Mayor, and... maybe it's too much sometimes. I can't do anything about the missions which come looking for us, or when things are just -- random. With him out of the garden, there might be more of that. But for the rest, we're trying. We all are. And I... wanted to give you a present."
That grey gaze moved across her, snout to tail and back again. And then the mayor's head went forward, teeth closed on the end of the string, pulled...
The wrapping opened, because that was what it had been designed to do. The older mare looked down.
"Oh."
Twilight couldn't hear anything within the syllable. There had been no recognizable emotion at all. There had just been a sound.
"I'm sorry it took so long," she tried. "I -- well, I had to find out your birthday, but that was just asking Pinkie. But after that, I had to track down your teachers and ask just when you'd gotten the assignment. That took a while, just finding and writing everypony, back and forth. And then... well, there aren't a lot of ponies who hang onto the old editions and most of them don't ever think somepony might be looking, so I just kept getting classified ads and searching through every sale I could find, just in case..."
It brought out a tiny nod. Nothing more.
"It's not your exact copy," Twilight apologized. "At least, I don't think it is. There's always a chance, I guess. But I know I have the year right, and the publisher, and --"
"-- is there anything else, Miss Sparkle?"
She took a breath, and the warmth of the air failed to reach her.
"The Princess asked me to investigate an incomplete spell. One of Star Swirl's. I'm going to start on that today. I already told Chief Rights and I wanted to make sure I told you. I don't think anything's going to happen, because it's just an incomplete working, but -- I thought you should know."
"Yes, I should," the mayor nodded. "I appreciate the warning, of course. Let us hope it was ultimately unnecessary. Good day, Miss Sparkle."
Twilight turned, began to make her way out, ears and tail carried far too low.
And then she heard it.
The soft intake of breath. The hoof rubbing against the old book's spine with the gentleness which only came from love.
"Volume Seven," the mayor whispered. "My Volume Seven."
Twilight looked back, and saw the shine in Marigold's eyes.
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That ending! So sweet!
I was wondering what happened with that TimeSkip over the evening... I don't think I predicted that precise ending? I wonder if anyone did.
... There are more desert settlements? Interesting worldbuilding.
Thaumic Fiction for Science Fiction, or in addition to. Nice idea!
Well, we'll see how the Starswirl Spell works in this universe! ... IIRC, it doesn't affect anyone else's memories other than the Mane6?
This was a deep look into Twilight's psyche. I really enjoyed it. That scene where Marigold asks Twilight not to hate her was so raw, it hurt. I'm glad Twilight found a solution that didn't involve her killing the books, and the humorous burst that came from her inadvertent results was comedy gold in the most Twilight manner.
Really fantastic work here.
And so Twilight learns the bibliophile's greatest tragedy: There is never enough shelf space. Ever. For anyone. Not even royalty, as she'll shortly learn.
A fantastic presentation of a problem that no amount of friendship could solve in its entirety, a hard look at how one cannot avoid responsibility forever, and yet another reason why Marigold Mare may be the greatest sufferer in the pony multiverse who doesn't wear a hooded sweatshirt. As I've said several times over the course of the story, this one really resonated with me. Thank you for it, and may your books and your storage space forever be approximately equal.
Book exchange program, Twilight. EXCHANGE!!! Send one out, get one back...
Next year's sale is going to be interesting. Princess level interesting...
7946596
Are you referencing what I think you're referencing? Even if you aren't, I'm going to reread Background Pony.
Again.
As someone who adores books, I thank you for this. In its own way, this story is a love-letter to the importance of libraries. Or at least, that's what it felt like to me. I'm tempted to show this to some librarian friends of mine, they'd probably appreciate it...
I don't know what this is, and I feel finding out might be one of the greatest discoveries of my life.
7946596
Please tell me what this is in real life.
Always nice to see a reasonable authority figure.
7946855 Since I saw it before FOME, I'll copy from Malandy's comment:
7947085 It's Star Trek that admits it when they use magic spells.
Sci-Fi in Equestria must be the best thing ever.
Nicely done, and I'm happy that Twilight didn't have to burn/trash her remaining books. Although that must have been quite a postal bill.
I know this world is probably never going to cross over to Equestria Girls, but I wonder what the local library system in Canterlot High's city thinks of donations from other dimensions?
(And now I'm wondering what books are duplicated across dimensions. Does the Equestria Girls world have its own Daring Do series?)
Out of curiosity, which one from the show was the one in your continuity? Or was it not something from the show?
So, you expect all librarian to be assholes? Well, the Mayor certainly is a bitch huh? Twilight goes to all that trouble to get this 'volume 7', whatever that is, and she shows no gratitude at all. The only signs of appreciation came after she saw Twilight turn to leave. Two things I take from this story, One, Twilight is clearly suffering from bepression, the poor thing, I just want to hug her. And two, I really don't like the Mayor. I know this story is part of some larger universe that I know nothing about, so maybe Twilight's depression is an ongoing theme that I'm not aware of.
Dear sweet innocent Twilight... What a plonker she is.
And once more, in the words of the great Sir Terry Pratchett,
A few nights ago I finished reading the Aeneid, and last night I finished Neil Gaiman's Norse Mythology. So much has been lost, but so much survives as well, and it continues swimming through our thoughts.
Part of me still thinks that the real ending of this story came at the end of chapter 3, when Twilight opened up about what was really bothering her and accepted that she had to do the sale. That was the most powerful moment for me, and the ending here... while good, I'm not sure it's as good. The donation bit felt like backtracking, and ending with the Star Swirl spell doesn't feel like it has any real point, other than to establish where in the timeline this story fits.
...Well, okay, that's not entirely true. Twilight has endured grueling book-related emotional trauma, has tried to leave behind the behindlings, has failed at it and failed at fully realizing emotional growth, and is marching into destiny with both eyes closed and as unsteadily as ever. All of which is very Triptych Continuum. So okay, it fits the theme of the setting.
Thank you for a good story.
7947316
And still FIMFic's all-time leader in being praised with faint damns.
pretty decent story. A little heavy on the purple prose.
I don't think Twi has to worry to much about stuff being sent back, when these other libraries can have their own remainders sales and not spend anything on postage
7947410
I was in a hurry earlier: I had just read the chapter and wanted to put down my initial thoughts before rushing off to a lecture.
One issue is that I think you're a good enough writer to deserve a critical response. Not critical in the sense "I think this sucks", but in the sense "I think this is how this story works". Those two points are very often too hard to distinguish. Things that get dissected tend to look dead. That is unintentional, and I'm sorry if I've given that impression.
Now, you write a lot of great stories. You also focus a lot on having all the stories add up to a distinctive, richly detailed AU. And as a purely subjective matter, while I think your stories can be amazing, elaborate world building for its own sake doesn't do much for me. Having read all the Triptych Continuum stories from very early on, I think I've gotten pretty good at spotting the bits you include for the sake of future development, how just about every single chapter you post (of whichever story) includes a world-building point that will be referenced in the next chapter you post (of whichever story), and refers back to a point from the previous chapter you posted (of whichever story).
I can understand why you want to do that. This is a fandom, of course, and fandoms traditionally love nothing more than understanding how things fit together elegantly. But my tastes run less along the lines of wanting to build a rich world for its own sake, and more along the lines of wanting each individual story to be the best it can be. Sometimes those two strands end up competing, and focusing on one ends up taking from the other.
So: this was a great story, funny and heartbreaking and insightful. The characters all fit with each other, and fail to fit with each other, in exactly their own proper ways, and the prose flows as vividly and effortlessly as anything you've written. Every part of it rings true for everyone involved and it raises some very big questions and makes us confront them without feeling out of place in a zany-scheme-comedy story. I read this 12k-word chapter in one sitting (which never happens), first thing in the morning when I was supposed to be preparing for a lecture, and I don't regret it.
Well, it's good to see Twilight being a lot more mature about the Mayor than I would have been in her shoes.
...yeah, if I were in Twilight's position here, the Mayor would get a somewhat frosty reception in the library for about two or three months after the book sale. And probably for two or three months after every future book sale, too.
So I'm glad to see Twilight's at least trying to improve relations a bit.
Damn, I really feel for Twilight in this. I realize things had to be done, but at the same time no one really asked just what it meant to her. Her true reasons for preserving books were very, very reasonable and poignant. Passing off the legacies, the memories, the essence, the imprint of the soul of ponies long gone, who'd never again have more to share with the world to say they ever lived in it to begin with... to people who aren't going to appreciate it like she does. Or appreciate it at all. Who won't care that someone wrote it, that someone researched and studied or spent long hours by candlelight furiously writing and wracking their brains so that they could be remembered.
That's some seriously raw hurt there. It's depressing as fuck, to be honest. Sort of a "We're all going to die, and no matter how great we are, one day no one will remain who remembers even the slightest shred that we were ever a person who lived on this planet at all." and Twilight, who had the cure for that, was forced to betray those memories she so carefully cultivated and protected, just to follow codes and ordinances she couldn't care less about but had to adhere to anyway for the sake of the zoning and the pitifully few who came in to use the library.
7946855
Science Fiction, 'cept instead of science, it's magic. Thaumic = Magic.
I don't know if it would be any consolation to Twilight (the whole being in another reality thing kind of makes it a moot point) but I knew exactly who she was talking about the moment the name came up. Who he was, what he had done and the size of his family.
this was a melancholic joy to read.
a lot of what Twilight said of dead books could apply to fanfiction as well. If not more so.
7948132
*sigh*
Welcome to the Continuum. Have you seen our semi-official motto as regards the author?
"Thank you so much. But also screw you."
Stick around, if you want to. Sometimes we have a few laughs.
7948835
Think I'll do just that, Estee. Thanks for having me.
7947190
I assume it's Dog and Pony show when Twilight duplicates Rarity's gem finding spell, although I think she did mention that she had been studying it recently.
As a man who loves and collects books I must say I loved this story. It's always so hard to get rid of books. It's heartbreaking in its way.
oh, remember that scene in "swarm of the century", where Twilight said ""i'll cast a spell to make them stop eating all the food!" THAT was an improvised spell that turned disastrous.
7949417 And yet it was also a technical success. The parasprites certainly did stop eating the -food-...
I enjoyed this, and didn't find it nearly as depressing as some readers seem to have done.
I totally sympathize with Twilight's difficulty in giving up books, and it's good to see her growth. It's also good to see her developing a little bit more understanding with the mayor, as her impending aliconification and coronation are sure to cause that relationship to become even more confused.
For a minute there, between the books disappearing and Twilight revealing what she had done with them, I thought she had invented the world's first postal delay line library backing store.
That probably says more about me than the story, though.
I was out with a friend this evening, and conversation took a turn to that book (in our world) and he mentioned something I wasn't aware of. I had to come home and Google it...
Although I am becoming less and less surprised by what Estee is aware of, and is just waiting for the rest of us to get the joke.
Charity shop bans that book. And the attached image...
i1.irishmirror.ie/incoming/article7608362.ece/ALTERNATES/s615b/PAY-Charity-shops-cant-flog-Fifty-Shades-of-Grey.jpg
(If the image doesn't work, an image search of "fifty shades of grey book fort" should bring it up.)
I'd like to imagine that that pony was Crystal, but she's always been more concerned with the knowledge and the stories themselves rather than the container.
Of course they're very nice containers, so convenient and flexible. Read them on the coach or the train, while sitting at a table or lying in your own bed; there's no need to worry about wild zone magic interfering or your Slate™ running out of charge...
Of course sometimes the container may be the only container left and if there aren't any more being published that makes it a very important container indeed.
Actually, she may have bought them and stuck them on the bottom shelf in her apartment and never actually read them because some things are important to have simply to prevent them being discarded.
A good read Estee, like many of your stories are.
7989039 I think you just named the teacher of that idea, IIRC.
Twilight never asked herself a mighty important question: What about the ponies who never write a book?
Yes, I think a spell to waterproof the fort and seal the pages shut would be a very good idea to protect the young crumb crunchers who will be playing on the new piece of outdoor equipment available at the library. And don't forget the bonus prize, since Twilight is now researching Starswirl's Unfinished Spell, she's going to have a castle of her own fairly soon.
I think of your completed Triptych works, I am now down to just Goosed! being left on my list. I'm debating whether or not to do an Estee-only Read It Later post, as I've got reviews of this, Twilight's Escort Service, Sick Little Ponies (And One Dragon), and Stupid Direction-Face queued up.
In any case, this was kind of one of your stories where I felt like it took a while for it to get to the point; this is 36k words long but I feel like the story only really took off in an emotional sense and really solidly found its emotional core around the end of chapter two. But I did like the emotional core.
I reviewed this story as part of Read It Later Reviews #78.
My review can be found here.
Ahh, the old 'I will come back later' ploy. E'gad I hate hearing that lie. Now the window-shoppers, my epithet for them is just "B.T.N.B.A.", Bucking Tourists, Never Buy Anything!
I can’t help but think that one huge reason that she had such a problem with this, beyond what she admitted, is that on a deep-seated level she views these books as friends. At a time when she didn’t have any friends, at least in this ‘verse, the books were the next best thing, so getting rid of them feels like abandoning the only friends she had.
Knowing that she views these books as the only remnants of ponies long since dead puts another interesting twist on her issues with disposal of her collection.
Option #? Send the books to the archive or to Princess Celestia...
Option #?2: Make a big hole and bury the books after making a list.
Definitely worth the reread especially since I now have to start getting rid of books in my own personal library soon.
Well that's not suspicious at all.
...
I've got dust in my eye, that's all. Stupid dusty bedroom, I'm sure that's it.
...
GODDAMNIT ESTEE, HOW ARE YOU SO GOOD?!
They saved the book fort
And now I have this image in my head of Luna slipping away from a really bad hand during Monthly Poker Night to curl up in the book fort
Watching Moon...
Under Moon...
A random thought passed through Twilight's mind, on its way to brighter and less worry-wrought pastures. What about on Moon?
The thought was detained and subjected to a baggage inspection to see if it was attempting to transport any inspiration.
It's Moon. I'm fairly certain that there's no moisture on Moon, and no insects neither. There's nopony there now. Plenty of... space. An iota of what the librarian thought of as humor was found and had to be quarantined before the inspection could conclude.