The Second Life of Moztrot

by CrackedInkWell

Chapter 20: Requiem (Part 2)

While the orchestra was turning their pages, I had a moment to wipe the tears out of my eyes so that I might see. I took this moment to finally glance behind me at the royals there; they and their staff were not alone. Ponies of the town, curious to know what was going on, had poked their snouts through the fence and some of them had even gotten into the graveyard. I saw Sunburst was about to step forward but I held out my hoof for him to not come any closer. After all, I wasn’t finished yet.

I cue in and count time with my bow for the trombone to summon them. In my imagination, I heard my father speak once again. From those baritone notes, his phantom voice was stern as if he were lightly scolding me for not coming home earlier. In fact, he had much on his mind as he was questioning how I had been avoiding him for so long. There was a disappointment in his voice, upset no doubt; yet, I didn’t hear anger. And as he was asking me to explain myself, the tenor resurrected my son with a cry.

Even more, tears rolled over my cheeks as Franz asked me why I had to leave him, his brother and mother. He asked with a sorrow-ridden, trembling voice, why hadn’t I been around when he’d needed me most. How he had been living under my shadow and nopony could distinguish him as a composer from me. There were so much pain and grief in his voice. So much fear of being forgotten that when he demanded I answer him, I couldn’t.

The alto solo, I was sure of it, was possessed by my sister. While her confrontation was short, it was enough to pierce me with guilt. “Why did you let me be forgotten, little Wolfie? Were I and my music that unremarkable?” But the most heartbreaking moment of all was hearing the soprano that represented her… Constanze. I could hear her in the music… in fact, she repeated the very last thing I’d heard from her before I left. Of how she came back from the spa and told me that she was going to leave me. At the same time, she told me that she and the children needed me, that they wouldn’t know what to do without me, so I must get better soon for their sakes. It broke my heart because I couldn’t keep that promise.

Together, they asked me again for an answer to each of them. They wanted to hear it from me, the composer who wasn’t there for any of them.
So, from the next movement, I told all of them the truth with all that guilt within. Right on their very graves, I answered their charges.
In that piece, there were no more lies, only acidic truths. The choir acted as my voice, vomiting secrets out to them, spilling it on the ground. “It was because I was angry at you, father. It was because I was too sick and too poor to stay alive, my son. It was because I was jealous of your talent, sister. And… I couldn’t stay because I had failed you as a husband, my love.” And yet, at the softer ending, I added that I wished, more than anything, that they would forgive me for acting like a fool.

A sniff and then, hearing the sheet music turn over, I helped lead the oboes and the strings into the reply. A descending andante in cascading strings for the sound of understanding sympathy. Now it was their turn for them to speak and for me to listen. They too admitted their own faults and that there is no shame in it as they weren’t perfect. Their voices were in harmony with each other as they tried to get me to understand through their counterpoints. For several minutes they told me that each of them had forgiven me for my trespasses against them as soothingly as they could. At the end of that movement, they encouraged me to find that same forgiveness with myself.

If only that were so easy to do! In the next movement as trumpet and timpani, inferno strings coincide me to flames of woe. A chorus of voices echoing inside my head told me that I couldn’t be forgiven. Those same dark thoughts returned with a vengeance in the A minor chord. But at the same time, the alto and soprano chorus repeated that it was not too late. However, the lower register disagreed, yet once the higher was given a chance to have a say, I was finally able to truly listen. From those notes that wept, I finally gave in. After all, they are gone, and nopony is going to forgive me, other than me.

This led to the final movements, the ones that I hadn’t finished before my “death”: the Lacrimosa and the Amen fugue. In music, those two movements represented one thing – my goodbye. I led the violins on those disjointed marches that were like a series of sighs. The choir entered like mourners at a funeral, each with a heartbreaking farewell on their lips. A pulsating sorrow that grew into a crescendo of despair, and from there, tears that overlapped one another in harmony. Counterpoints of grief of the past, present, and future were woven with both the voices and the instruments, yet that same unsteady rhythm persisted throughout.

The soloist took part in the farewell on behalf of the dead, that although they might be gone, that there might be a chance that they will wait in the afterlife. Each voice climbed skyward with a hope that their wish might one day come true. A hope that one day I might fulfill if fate smiles upon me. Once they departed, the violins, timpani, and choir screamed into the sky before their weeping became quiet with every passing bar. Immediately, the final fugue at the end brought the funeral to a close, using that one word as a prayer to Time itself. Grant us that this pain be gone, that their lives be immortalized in the legacy they’ve left behind, to never forget the fact they once existed. As I played on my violin, I too offered up this plea to Time that I would hold my wife’s hoof again.

With the final chord, the graveyard stood there in silence. Putting the violin and bow on the grass and clearing my tearstained face, I went up to my wife’s grave and kissed her headstone. “I guess, this is goodbye my darling.” I said to her, “There won’t be a day that I will ever forget you; that I can promise. I hope… I wish that we can be together again, one day. Would you wait for me, Constanze, for a little longer? I know that I wasn’t truly dead for two centuries, but I’m still mortal. So please, be patient with me. So until then…” I planted another kiss on the cold stone, “Goodbye.”
I turned to the royal company and Wilfred who was packing up my violin. After a sniff and a bow, I told them that, “My apologies for acting out of line, Your Majesties.”

Celestia was the first to approach to hug me with her wings, “No, you have nothing to apologize for. It’s good to let it out of your system, Wolfgang, and what we’ve heard will help the future to mourn.”

“Thank you,” I replied, hugging back. “That means so much coming from you.”

Her sister walked up to us, “Are you going to be alright Mr. Moztrot?”

Another sniff to which I broke away the embrace, “I will be. After all, I’ve told them everything I wanted to say.” Here my ears folded back, “I just hope they listened.”

Now it was Sunburst’s turn. “I’m sure they have. If anything, if there were any family that would have been proud of anything that you wrote, it would have been them.”

“Speaking of which,” turning my attention towards the orchestra and choir I said: “Everypony, I want to personally thank each and every one of you for doing this for me. Doing so otherwise would have been impossible. Every note of it was perfect. Every voice was clear. And while we didn’t have much time for rehearsals, I think that you’ve pulled it off flawlessly. So thank you all, and be respectful and take your appreciation outside of the graveyard so they can rest.”

One by one, the musicians gathered their things and departed from the circle, and thankfully the townsponies that had listened in did the same.

As we started to exit, Sunburst pulled me aside, “Mr. Moztrot, there’s somepony that I’d like to introduce you to.” The wizard walked me over to where Princess Twilight and the mare that acted like her shadow. “Wolfgang Moztrot, I’d like to introduce you to an old friend of mine and graduate student of Princess Twilight’s, Starlight Glimmer.”

I shook the mare’s hoof while acknowledging the other Princess, “So, you’re really Moztrot?” the one called Starlight asked of me.

“Yes.”

“Huh,” she tilted her head to the side, “You’re a little shorter than I thought you’d be.”

“Why does everypony keep saying that?” I questioned.

“What? It’s true. I mean you are a little bit shorter than I am.”

I groaned, “So is there a reason you wanted to meet me other than telling me how tiny I am?”

Twilight cleared her throat, “There is a reason, actually. First of all, she wants to get to know you, since she’s planning on writing a biography on you since I already did one with Beethoven. So basically she wants to do an interview with you.”

“Interview?” I raised an eyebrow.

Starlight nodded, “Yes, and while there are plenty of secondary sources to go around, I think it would be best to go to the source, from the very stallion himself. To tell you the truth, I didn’t know much about you, or your name until recently.” I asked her what she meant by that. “Well you see, I was once a dictator of a village which was isolated from the world. Heck, I never learned anything that didn’t relate to magic in one way or another so I didn’t bother to learn about you for a while. But after Twilight here had forgiven me and made me her student, I was exposed to more things that were outside of magic, things like art, culture, languages and even music. I mean, I was blown away when she told me about Beethoven. So when the news came that you came back, I had to do some research on you and found you surprisingly not what I thought you’d be. This is a good thing, don’t get me wrong. So I wanted to do an interview in hopes of getting to know the pony behind the music. If that makes sense that is,” she added.

“I suppose so. But just not today given the circumstances,” I sighed.

She gave me a sympathetic look, “Hey, I get it. But do think that I could cheer you up, even just a little?”

I raised an eyebrow, “How?”

The unicorn hummed in thought for a moment before she got an idea, “Follow me.” She told me, “If my resources were correct, then I think that there is a place in town that you would find amusing.”

Princess Twilight shared my confusion and curiosity. I couldn’t help but wonder what exactly she would want to show me that would lighten my spirits after service like that. However, I did follow her and the others, including my servants, were close behind. Even Sunburst asked her where she was taking me but she didn’t want to spoil the surprise.

She lead us through Saltzberg that, now that I was able to actually look up at the signs, found it disorienting; there were different shops from my time so that I didn’t know where exactly I was. However, there was a common theme -- my image and music were indeed everywhere. On signs, dolls, ceramics, clocks, books, spoons, just to name but a few. However, Starlight stopped in front of one of these shops and encouraged me to go inside. Overhead there was a golden ball with my image on it.

“What is this place?” I questioned her. But she insisted I go right in, so I did. Inside this shop were shelves upon red painted shelves of boxes with clear lids, each holding dozens of these curious golden balls. There was a pyramid of the things in the center of it, and in the back, there was a flat, life-size image of me holding up one of these things. And above it all, there was a poor rendition of my Little Night Music being played on those speaker things overhead in each corner of the room.

“Oh my Goddesses!” I heard a shout, and I quickly turned my head towards the counter and I presumed the shopkeeper. A rather round fellow with a coat like chocolate and a mane as white as cream was gaping at me, “A-Are you?” he asked me.

I looked all around me to see that I was the only pony in the whole shop. “What?”

“You’re Moztrot? The real Wolfgang Amadeus Moztrot?”

“No, I’m Buch,” I deadpanned. “Yes I’m Moztrot, and what is this place?”

The shopkeeper went around the counter and immediately shook my hoof. “Oh, it’s an incredible honor, sir! To have you here in my shop,” he was shaking my hoof so much that it was a wonder that it didn’t pop off.

“What do you sell anyway? What is this place?”

“I’m a confectioner,” he told me. “This shop is the only place in the world where I use high-quality chocolate to make Moztrot Balls.”

I was forced to suppress a giggle. “I’m sorry,” I said with a creeping grin. “I don’t think I heard that right, what was that?”

“Moztrot Balls.” Oh Celestia, he said it again! “Basically it has a creamy but slightly salty center which is covered with a rich milk chocolate coating.”

My body was vibrating from the sheer amount of laughter that was trying to force its way out. “Would you excuse me for a moment?” I had to run out of the shop and, much to the confusion of onlookers, busted out laughing. I was convulsing, rolling on the ground, hugging my sides as I was chortling out loudly in the streets.

“Oh my Celestia!” I screamed. “That actually exists!”

In a moment, Wilfred stood over me, “Wolfgang? What are you laughing about?”

I pointed over to the shop, “H-He’s selling my balls! That shop h-has my salty balls!” I was streaming tears since I was laughing so hard. “My chocolate covered balls! M-My sweet tasting balls! Oh, Goddesses this is too funny!”

“Wolfgang!” my butler sharply told me. “Breathe.”

It took me about a minute to collect myself, “I’m fine now.” I told him, a grin still on my face. “Wilfred, we must get some of those. In fact, I have a few ideas for our cook to try with those things.”

He obeyed. We went back into the shop and got several boxes of those things. I had to thank Starlight for lightening my mood somewhat. After all, something like that was needed.

Comments

[Greenhorn]

I pointed over to the shop, “H-He selling my balls! That shop h-has my salty balls!” I was streaming tears since I was laughing so hard. “My chocolate covered balls! M-My sweet tasting balls! Oh Goddesses this is too funny!”

Here you are!

[CrackedInkWell]

8515081
And the funnest part: these things actually exist.

yusypovych.com/image-Mozart-balls-Salzburg.jpg

[TheDriderPony]

I really thought(/was worried) that that meeting was going to go. "Hey Moztrot, now that you've just finished mourning and farewelling your family, I'd like to introduce you to Starlight Glimmer, Mistress of Time."
Glad it didn't though, (though retrospectively, it was really never a conceivable option). Would have made far too big a plot hole.

Now the only question is as to the origin of those balls. Are they being sold with the knowledge of the joke? Or was it started with the knowledge, but after a few generations they just kept making them without context? Or is it just a anything-with-his-face-on-it-will-sell scenario? Or did Moztrot make a remark at some point in his life, insulting or goading somepony via writing, and they found the letter after his "death" and thought he was being serious? Such mystery.

[CrackedInkWell]

8515298
And just like that, I have the theme for the next chapter.

P.S. Thanks by the way.

[Chrome Masquerade]

The unicorn hummed in thought for a moment before she got an idea, “Follow me.” She told me, “If my recourses were correct, that I think I know that there is a place in town that you would find amusing.”

My body was vibrating in the sheer amount of laughter that was trying to force its way out. “Would you excuse me for a moment?” I had to run out of the shop in which, much to the confusion of onlookers, I busted out laughing. If anything, I was convulsing, rolling on the ground, hugging my sides as I was chortling out loudly in the streets.

Well, she was right.

[Pony_Person_123]

My only complaint is that immediately pouring his heart out to his dead family startlight just ups and confronts him, saying 'I want to make your biography'. It just feels a little rushed.

[BurningSkies]

The unicorn hummed in thought for a moment before she got an idea, “Follow me.” She told me, “If my resources were correct, then I think that there is a place in town that you would find amusing.”

My body was vibrating from the sheer amount of laughter that was trying to force its way out. “Would you excuse me for a moment?” I had to run out of the shop and, much to the confusion of onlookers, busted out laughing. I was convulsing, rolling on the ground, hugging my sides as I was chortling out loudly in the streets.

"Amusing" is a massive understatement