• Published 23rd Jun 2017
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The Olden World - Czar_Yoshi



Equestrian culture loves cutie marks. Filly Starlight Glimmer hates them and never wants one. So, she leaves Equestria.

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The Worst Answer

Starlight tipped over. She couldn't move.

"Easy, darling." Felicity caught her numb form, setting her down gently. The act swirled a storm of emotion in Starlight she couldn't even begin to parse. Felicity had stunned her? Felicity had stunned her. Why? And then she caught her, too. It was rejection and acceptance all at once, wasn't it? Her heart tried to violently push the mare away and pull her close all at once, but her body couldn't move.

Felicity folded her ears, making eye contact. "Please don't look at me like that," she begged. "Starlight, listen. You care about your friends, yes? Because from where I'm sitting, there's a faint possibility... a possibility nonetheless... that we didn't come here by coincidence and you're some sort of devious impostor who nudged us along to this place with the express purpose of taking those dark treasures for yourself. And if I'm wrong, which I hope I am and am scared I'm not, I'll let you go as soon as I've talked to your friends and made absolutely sure. If they say you've always been acting like yourself, including in this... alternate gray form, I'll profusely apologize. I'm being safe, and doing it for your friends. You can understand, can't you please?"

Starlight could understand. She wasn't sure what Felicity was looking for from her friends, and had an idea the mare hadn't thought things that far through, but if she suspected anyone of having good reason to betray them, she'd do the same. Of course, given how much she needed everyone, she'd need substantial evidence before being willing to throw away mutual trust... and it hurt deeply being the one who wasn't trusted. But Felicity was still right, and she'd done harder things than this for her friends.

She tried to nod, and it was like her muscles were missing some attachment. Something twitched in her neck, and her head flopped slightly.

Felicity gave a sigh of relief and quickly ruffled her mane. "I'll be back as quick as I can," she promised, shadow sneaking under the door and leaving Starlight alone.

"It's lonely at the top, isn't it?"

Of course Glimmer would be there. Starlight couldn't turn to look at her, but flicked her ears, a part of her body that still seemed to work. Did she want to talk to her now? Did she ever? Better than having no one, at least.

Glimmer stepped around into Starlight's vision. Arcane rings flared around her horn, just like when she had given and redacted the batpony telepathy, and suddenly whatever Felicity had done was gone. Starlight stretched, her legs working properly again, and frowned.

"Well?" Glimmer shrugged.

"Well what?" Starlight looked crossly at her, still stinging from Felicity's mistrust. "What do you want?"

"I know how you're feeling," Glimmer said, horn going out as she paced to the bed and sat at Starlight's side. "Right now, you're more powerful than you've ever been before, with all the Nightmare Modules. You've just saved your friends from Yanavan, stopped a small war... and for all that, you don't feel at all in control of your life. Maybe less than you ever have, and that's saying something." She turned to look at Starlight. "Right?"

Starlight frowned. "And what do you want me to do about it? I don't have a choice." She looked at her hooves. "Felicity says I'm half-batpony. The Empire would hate me."

Glimmer sadly regarded her. "Can I tell you a secret?"

"Sure?" Starlight tilted her head.

Glimmer slid closer and put a hoof around her shoulder. "It'll be okay."

"What...?" Starlight blinked.

"Remember how you used to hate being different, or special? Or the idea of being better than your friends?" Glimmer looked away, but Starlight could tell her gaze was unfocused. "That drive that made you run across the biggest mountain range in the world?"

"Yes!" Starlight folded her ears. "And this is a big reminder of why! But I need to be better to protect my friends, and I can't do anything about it if I'm somehow half-batpony!"

"This world," Glimmer sighed, "is good at self-fulfilling prophecies, Starlight. Felicity just said she was only guessing. She has no idea why you're the way you are. For all you know, you're even more unique than that. Or, maybe having pegasus anatomy is just the way every pony in Equestria is, and you're more normal than any other pony here. Why you are the way you are doesn't matter. What will change things the most... is just the way you treat yourself."

Starlight bit her lip. "What are you telling me to do?"

"Nothing. I'm just explaining things a little more easily than thinking them through on your own," Glimmer offered with a reassuring smile. "Starlight, you paid attention to what you saw in the altar pool. The Nightmare Modules are the tools of an immortal alicorn goddess. It warned you of what they could be used for. The modules react to you. You can use them. They submit to your whims. So if you treat yourself like you have the job of a goddess..."

Starlight swallowed.

Glimmer averted her gaze. "Let's just say Garsheeva and Equestria's princesses might have been mortals once, too."

"What are you saying?" Starlight fought off a lingering cold at the edges of her senses. "That I could become...?"

"Not just you," Glimmer apologized. "Anyone who tried hard enough and went looking for the way. What if the world works that way? The knowledge could be sitting there to be found. You've learned so much already. You've found the tools of a goddess. Who's going to stop you from going even further?"

"But I don't want these!" Starlight gritted her teeth, wishing she could throw the Nightmare Modules at the wall. "I don't want to be different, or to be stronger than my friends, but I have to! Because otherwise I can't keep them safe! Even with these, I don't know if I can!"

Glimmer took a breath. "That's... also true. If these tools are built for a goddess, and you try to use them as a little filly... what's to stop them from failing you when it turns out you can't do something an immortal would have taken for granted?" She looked at Starlight again. "Either way, it doesn't end in you being happy."

Starlight felt a pressure building in her chest. "You're not helping. That's not telling me what I can do."

Glimmer wrapped her other hoof around Starlight, pulling her into a filly-sized hug. "Shhh. Have you ever tried doing nothing?"

"Yes," Starlight said bitterly. "I did nothing when Sunburst was taken away, and that's what started this whole thing."

"No, you didn't," Glimmer whispered. "You ran away, across mountains and worlds rather than live in a world that wasn't better."

Starlight sniffed. "And what should I have done?"

"This might sound unfathomable," Glimmer answered, "but you could have done nothing. You could have stayed in your town and grown up in Equestria, stopped running from your cutie mark, lived with your loss and made new friends and seen where life took you."

"How is that supposed to be any better!?" Starlight choked. "You want me to just do nothing when things aren't right and there's something I can do?"

Glimmer closed her eyes. "Things will always be going wrong. It's in the world's nature. And you're powerful, talented, creative and stubbornly determined, so there will always be things you see that you can do. There are for all ponies, actually, believe it or not. Everyone always has the opportunity to make the world a better place, no matter their standing in life. But they don't always do it. Sometimes it's because they don't care, but more ponies care than you think. It's just..." She took a breath. "If you never stop and never draw a line, you'll end up trying to take responsibility for the entire world."

Starlight swallowed.

"Even Garsheeva settles for a tiny continent," Glimmer continued, "and even she settles for keeping it stable rather than making it perfect. Who are you trying to be, and when will you stop? You can live a normal life, no matter what's different about your body or abilities. You can. But if you don't... Princess Luna was an alicorn, and she was the loneliest pony in the world."

"What do I do?" Starlight whispered. "Please help me..."

"You need to learn to live with loss." Glimmer shook her head. "And grief, in a world that isn't perfect and where you don't have control. You're so unused to letting go... I'm not asking you to leave your friends, or anything that normal ponies don't have to live with in their daily lives. But there's a reason the world is populated by mortals. Everyone deals with accepting this. Everyone. You can start small. You'll need to, with how unused you are to not fighting fate. But if you ever want peace in your life, you have to come to terms with the nature of the world. You have to."

"I-I..." Starlight shivered. "And how will I be any better off if I just lose everything I care about?"

Glimmer exhaled. "You don't need to stop trying for a better life. I wouldn't, in your position. Ponies who try are the reason the world isn't a lot worse than it already is. You just need to learn how to draw a line and live with being able to do more. Can I tell you where to start?"

"Can you?" Starlight folded her ears. "Do you even know?"

"Right now," Glimmer said, pushing Starlight to her hooves. "Before they get back with Yanavan. Go to Maple and have her put you back to normal, and think long and hard before ever touching obsidian again. Starlight." Glimmer's eyes were serious. "Once he gets here, you'll be tempted to use the Nightmare Modules again. You're already used to thinking like a god. It'll be that much harder for you to be a normal pony if you get used to calling on the powers of one as well. There will probably come a day when the amount of harm using them could spare the world from will justify anything, if they were in the right hooves, but that won't be today. Put them away. Don't use them. Lean on your friends if being powerless hurts, or even me. But you can do this, Starlight. I believe in you."

Starlight swallowed. "Why? Why do you look like me, why do you know so much, and why are you trying to help me?"

Glimmer shook her head and didn't answer, taking a step backwards... and then she was gone.

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