This is not the book about the life I lived between 756 to 791. It is not about the struggle to keep myself and family financially secure; nor the reasons I wrote my operas, symphonies, concertos, sonatas, and choral pieces. For that is not the story I want to tell. Everything about my life -- from private letters to first hoof accounts -- has been exposed by historians and teachers of music. Myths have been spun about my life, and countless concerts, recitals, and festivals have performed every piece that I have ever written.
That is not what I want to write.
Rather, this story is about my second life, after all of that. So, I suppose the best way to tell it, is to begin from the earliest memory I have of this new world.
I woke up on a bed that wasn’t my own. I lay on a bed that propped my upper half up. My clothes were replaced by a blue, paper gown that was covered with white sheets and a blue blanket. A turquoise curtain surrounded the bed, and above was a light that never flickered. My left foreleg had a needle in it, connected by a tube to a clear bag with what I assumed was water in it. My ears heard a steady tempo beep like a note of a clarinet. I felt around my face and discovered a mask with a tube connecting it, but it made my throat quite dry. So much so that I had a coughing fit as I was pulling it off me.
“Oh Celestia, he’s awake!” I heard a voice say while all around me, I heard the movement of hoofsteps like actors behind a closed curtain. Then suddenly, a mare in a white uniform and a pink mane pulled apart the curtain.
“Sir, are you okay?” Of course, I wasn’t. After I begged for water and she retrieved some in a paper cup, a stallion in a white coat with spectacles stepped in.
“Hello sir,” he said. “My name is Doctor Red Cross. I’m sure that you have a lot of questions.”
“That I do,” I told him as I downed the thimble of water. “Where am I?”
“Canterlot Medical Hospital,” he answered as he took out a clipboard. “You were admitted for emergency surgery for kidney failure and influenza. To which I am happy to report that the surgery has been a success, but you will definitely need to stay here at the hospital overnight.”
“Surgery?” I looked down at myself, pulling the covers over to the side and pulling up the paper gown to reveal a scar with black stitching. “What did you do to me?” I demanded.
He held out a hoof. “Mr. Moztrot, calm down. You shouldn’t move too much. We’ve replaced your failing kidney with a donated, healthy one. For the time being, we will be keeping an eye on you until you fully recover.”
“But… But sir, I can’t afford to pay you-” I stopped, “How did you know my name?”
Both ponies glanced at one another. “W-Well, you don’t have to worry about that, it’s already being taken care of,” he said as he flipped through his papers. “In fact, Celestia herself is paying your medical bill, but there is something that we need to clarify for you now that you’re awake.” He stuck his head and gestured for another pony to come in. The curtain was drawn a little bit aside to show a stallion that I had never seen before. He was orange and had a blue cloak like the night sky. His hooves and muzzle were white while his dark orange mane and beard were rather unkempt. Like the doctor, he had spectacles. “This is Sunburst, he is the one who brought you here.”
I tilted my head, “He brought me here? I never have seen this pony in my life.”
“Technically,” the stallion called Sunburst rubbed the back of his head. “You’re correct on that account. And uh…” I saw his ears folded backward as his face gave a rather guilty expression. “Mr. Moztrot, I’m so, so, so, so sorry for what I did.”
“Did wh- owe!” At that moment I tried to sit up but instantly I felt a pain in my abdomen.
“Please, don’t strain yourself,” the doctor put a hoof to gently lay me back.
“What in Tartarus is going on?!” I demanded. “Who are you ponies? Why am I here? Where’s my wife?”
Three ponies looked at one another until the mare pointed at the stallion in the cloak, “You tell him.”
Again, I demanded an answer, and the one called Starburst cleared his throat, “Before I say anything, I want to ask a very important question: What’s the last thing you remember?”
Now I was more confused than ever before, “What does that have got to do with anything?”
“Quite a lot,” he pulled on the collar of his starry cloak. “I promise that I won’t ask any more questions if you could answer that one.”
I sighed, “I was home when my wife had just returned with the children. And I was very sick… I had aches, pains, and my thoughts became sluggish as if time was slowing down for me. The last thing I recalled, I was in my bed with the manuscripts strewn about the blanket… And…” A thought came to me. I had many dark thoughts in the past, but this one horrified me. Terrorized me so much that I couldn’t bear to finish that sentence, the doctor put a comforting hoof on my shoulder as I looked up in fear. “Am I dead?”
“Uh… Yes and no,” Sunburst continued. “Yes for the fact that on December the fifth, 791, history says that you died. At the same time, however, the answer is also ‘no’ obviously because, well… again, it’s my fault.”
My jaw was gaping, “I don’t understand.”
He rubbed his hooves over his eyes, “I guess there’s no other way of sugar coating this: I’m responsible for taking you out of your own timeline. As of right now, today is August 13th, 1007. In other words, I have taken you two-hundred-and-sixteen years into the future.”
Admittingly, I lay there in complete silence for a good solid minute while the other three ponies waited to see my reaction. Well, I did what any sensible pony would do: I laughed in my usual hyena-like giggle. “This is a fantastic joke!” I declared. “The best one yet! So, who is the mastermind of all of this? Salieri? Schikaneighder? Oh! Is this Princess Celestia’s doing? I know she’s quite the trickster but I can never imagine her pulling off such a prank as this.” However, I had to pause when nopony else was laughing along with me. “Why are you all looking at me like that? You’ve all made a fool out of me and the joke is over… This is a joke, right?”
“No Mr. Moztrot,” Doctor Red Cross told me. “If anything, we wouldn’t believe it ourselves if it weren’t for the fact that members of the Royal family witnessed you come through.”
“I was only trying to demonstrate a very complex spell,” Sunburst explained. “One in which was to fetch something that was lost in the past. I tried to bring back some trinkets like some pottery or keys that nopony could find… but when you came through… Celestia knew who you were and how sickly you looked that we had to get you to a doctor immediately.”
Another long pause, this time it was mine to speak up, “None of you are suggesting that this claim is… is real?” Sunburst nodded. “But, even if it were true, you can get me back home, could you? I have a wife and two small colts that are depending on me.”
The bearded unicorn’s ears folded backward. “I… I can’t. The spell I cast was already complex enough to take you out of the past and into our present, and doing the opposite requires knowledge and mathematical precision that doesn’t exist. What’s more, even if I could, Celestia herself wouldn’t allow it as to prevent a paradox in time. Mr. Moztrot, I’m sorry. I’m really, really, really sorry.”
Even still, I couldn’t believe it. Why would I after all? I have some fantastic tales before but this one goes above and beyond the nonsense that I like. “I will tell you this,” I said. “If you could so much as get Princess Celestia off her throne and plop her right here in this room, I will take you more seriously. Until then,” I turned to the doctor. “Could you send a letter to my wife Constanze? Have it say where I am and that I’m fine. Oh! And in the meantime, could I get some paper and something to write with?”
But YOU were the one who wrote Beethoven's Tenth already! Are you TRYING to make classical music a fimfiction fad?! :D
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How many stories do you know that has written based on the lives of music Bach, Paganini, Chopin, Debussy, Handel, Mahler, Strauss II, Listz or Tchaikovsky? I don't care if it's a fad, because due to the lack of such stories, somebody has got to do it. I'm rather shocked that no one has tried to write how interesting these guys and their music were. If no one else is going to do it then I will.
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The Life of Zombie Pony Mozart. Sound like something I would write for the stoner market.
Liked and faved on the spot, i would have like mozart was the human version, but this may make things differently, unless of course this is in the previous storys cannon, after beethoven left, this happend, o well, thanks for starting another one, mozart is my favorit composer an musician in general :D
8364600
Hmm... (A sequel to Beethoven's Tenth...) I'll have to sleep on that. I just think it would be an interesting character study of how a guy like Mozart would react to the modern world. That, and horrify the elite.
Ay! A story starring my favorite composer, and starting off on a sci-fi (even if just the time travel) foot to boot! Fun!
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Considering on how insane the guy actually was, I think I’m going to have some fun with him and the rich ponies yelling at him to get out.
8364656
Fantastic!
Musical jokes? Telling ponies in music to "kiss his butt?" More?
I don't know if it is true, but wasn't Mozart in real life an alcoholic and party maniac?
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With the intelligence of the Enlightenment, a man-child personality and loved making fart/sex/poop jokes that has the most remarkable musical mind that the world has ever seen? Why yes. Yes he did.
Okay now i'm intrigued Mozart (I mean moztrot) as a pony. it's gonna be a fun ride.
Question: Did or have you ever listen to the commentary with the director & author of the stage play of Amadeus movie? the director say it was a prostitute that killed two composers (Beethoven & Mozart) & it's based on actual fact. p.s: I put this bit of info in private so there isn't some comment war on your story.
i0.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/original/000/770/889/b31.jpg
I knew the bugger was still around!
XD While you're at it, why not bring all the insane musical geniuses back? It will be great.... for the readers. XD
8368566
It really works.
https://myanimelist.net/anime/31157/ClassicaLoid
http://www.crunchyroll.com/classicaloid
In a rural town undergoing revival through music, high school students Kanae and Sousuke meet none other than Beethoven and Mozart! Calling themselves "ClassicaLoids," this mysterious duo creates a strange power through the "music" they play. One night, stars fall from the sky and gigantic robots appear, causing trouble every single day! Bach, Chopin, Schubert also appear as ClassicaLoids. What is the mystery behind the powers they possess? Are they humanity's friend or foe?
Before I get too far into this, I should ask is this only a spiritual sequel to Beethoven's Tenth (in such that it's about a famous musician in modern ponyland) or literal sequel, by which I mean Twilight might theoretically say "Another one? Sorry Moztrot you should have been here last week we had a fan of yours from another dimension".
EDIT: As of reading to chapter 4, I redact this question.