When the Stars are Right

by Broken Phalanx

6 The Immortal Perspective

There were many emotions Twilight had for Apostrophe, the patina-coated construct living in the depths of the friendship castle: an initial, almost instinctual revulsion; later, a much less illogical distrust and, yes, fear. At times, fascination and a strong competitive drive, whenever they stood in intellectual opposition.

And now, despite herself, a semblance of pity.

Funny how the world works sometimes.

But those are thoughts that have both a time and a place, and frankly, there were more pressing matters that demanded more immediate attention. Like friendship and science.

“So, Apple Bloom, I’m glad you could meet with me. I heard that Applejack was acting a bit… strangely, recently.”

“Strange, nothin’! She’s gotten a bajillion time more eff-effect-affec… huggy n’ stuff. Ah ain’t implyin’ nothin’, but, uh…”

“No, Applebloom, she hasn’t been replaced by a changeling, not even as a practical joke. She’s, well, she gone through a bit of a paradigm shift recently.”

“A whatzit?”

“A paradigm shift is a change in perspective, and a change in attitude, Applebloom.”

“Oh,” Applebloom says, before the gears in her head ratchet into a higher gear and she asks, with the straightforwardness only the truly innocent possess, “Does all this shiftin’ have somethin’ to do with the stallion yah have locked in this here castle?”

Something fundamental shatters in Twilight’s smile; oh, it looks the same, but an astute observer would find themselves subconsciously stating she is ‘baring her teeth’ rather than ‘grinning’. “What, exactly, makes you think that?”

“Cause yah didn’t deny it immediately when Ah just brought it up.”

“Applebloom.”

“Yes, Ms. Sparkle?”

“Go home.”

And in a purple flash, that is exactly where the adolescent filly finds herself.

***

Some say Friendship Castle held wards with a potency not seen since Starswirl the Bearded. Some say that if the world were dropped into the sun, the castle’s inhabitants would be fine. It is even rumored, by those found only in the grimiest and shadiest of places, that the Castle possesses a will of its own, and directs ponies in accordance to its whims.

To Applebloom, all of that was may have well been crab-apples. It doesn’t exactly hurt she is unaware of the impossibility of breaking in, which is exactly how she and her two closest companions find themselves scaling down an interior window.

“Remind me again why we’re doing this,” Sweetie Belle manages to mutter around the length of rope she holds securely in her mouth.

“Duh! It’s cause Applejack got replaced by a-”

“Naw, Twilight was tellin’ the truth about that. Ah’m just worried cause she ain’t tellin’ the whole story.”

Two Crusaders stare down at the third below them before Scootaloo says, “So, what’s it like, Applebloom? You know, gettin’ all panicky just ‘cause your sister is giving you more hugs and stuff?”

“Blow it out yer pipe, Scoots! What if Rainbow Dash or Rarity were gettin’ all weird and lovey with y’all, hmm?”

A minute passes in silent descent.

“I kinda wish Rarity would be like that.”

Another minute.

“I mean, it’d be uncool if Rainbow Dash started acting all… you know… but I dunno. It’d be kinda, uh, cool, too. Heh.”

They reach the bottom of the rope a few seconds later, and the three of them carefully embrace, as if each of them were made of the most fragile of porcelain.

“So, uh, Ah suppose we’re findin’ this pony so he kin make Rarity and Rainbow Dash more like Applejack is right now, yeah? Assumin’ it don’t hurt’em none.”

***

“Applebloom, are you sure we’re heading in the right direction?”

“Fer tha’ last time, NO, Sweetie Belle! Ah’ve bin just as lost as you’ve bin, but Ah’m pretty sure if we keep headin’ down an’ towards the weirder noises, we’ll find somethin’ sooner or later!”

“Yeah, well, I’m pretty sure we passed those metal box things three or four times already…”

“Scootaloo, we’ve gone down four sets of stairs since the last time we saw one, how would that even work?”

“I dunno, magic?”

“Ah’m startin’ tah think that’s a catch-all fer all the strange stuff in tha world…”

***

“Ah don’t wanna alarm none of y’all, but we’re out of sandwiches.”

“I’m more worried we’ve been wandering for about four days. I hope Twilight wasn’t a fan of the furniture we burned last night.”

“Urgh! We wouldn’t be in this situation if Applebloom was able to accept affection like a normal pony!”

“Hey!”

“Scootaloo!”

“No, Sweetie Belle, I’m not apologizin’, cause this is dumb! We’ve been gone for four days, and that means we’ve got at least six ponies, probably a whole lot more, lookin’ for us. And they still haven’t… found... us…”

The vitriol drains from the Pegasus’ tone at a soft sniffling noise, almost imperceptible amongst the echoes of Scootaloo’s outburst.

“...ah’m sorry, y’all. Ah just… Ah was scared, cuz mah sister ain’t always like that, and when she started, Ah figured Ah was… losin’ her…”

There is nothing but the shuddering of thunder as brisk magical light illuminates the three friends hugging as if their lives depended upon it, at least until Sweetie Belle prematurely breaks free from the group with a whinny of realization.

“We’re at least forty floors deep! No way we could hear thunder unless somepony like a Pegasus was here!”

“It’s like one of those what-cha-ma-call-its that Cheerilee always talks about when we read those old boring stories about Princess Celestia!”

“‘Deus Ex Machina’s?”

“Yeah, those’re the nerd words for it!”

A clatter of hooves, fueled simultaneously by hunger and hope, crack along the crystal foundations, the fillies hoping, perhaps, they had found salvation. Instead they find a tired storeroom, retrofitted with iron bars and barrels of, of all things, fermenting apples; not the most appetizing selection for a trio of hungry fillies.

Oh, and a green statue with a smashed-in face that looked hastily bandaged, but that was neither food nor water and therefore pointless.

“Well, ah suppose this ain’t the worst place to hole up fer now,” Applebloom says with a sigh, before she leans against the barrels and half-heartedly moans. “Better’n the hallway, at least; Ah’m pretty sure Twilight needs to bring Fluttershy here or somethin’. Monsters shouldn’t be wanderin’ the place like they own it.”

“Pftt, you can say that again.”

“Ah’m pretty sure Twilight needs to bring-”

“You don’t actually gotta say it again, Applebloom.”

“Ah know. Just makin’ light, ya’ know? Anywho, Ah’m thinkin’ we should make camp fer the, uh, time bein’, since we have some food and we ain’t exactly in danger here.”

The three fillies unconsciously shoot a glance at the foreboding statue and share a shiver; nothing so stock still should emanate the sensation of compressed wriggling. But the Crusaders had learned (for better or for worse) that Equestria was a land where like attracts like, and as long as they did nothing bad, nothing bad would happen to them.

Probably.

Yet despite lingering doubts, makeshift bedrolls are laid out and soon the three drift off to an uneasy sleep.

***

-the shadows are strange and the air thick and yet treasure is found and gold exists but it isn’t the actual metal it’s-

***

-thesunthesunthesunthesunthesunthesunthesunthesunthesun-

***

-more precious than that far more precious than any metal and yet it’s so easily taken for granted this gold through which even the fundamental forces are yoked-

***

-largerlargerlargerlargerlargerlargerlarger-

***

Like grains of diamond sand upon eternal shores. Common yet precious. A cosmic recollection. There is the color of beauty here. The color where the difference between zero and one is both distant beyond hope and-

***

-nearer than can be dreamed.

***

The three fillies awake with a start under an unbearably hot winter breeze, so warm that even the stars seemed to have fled the night sky. Something turns in the pits of their collective stomachs, a hint of forgotten regret mixed with a heaping helping of equally lost triumph.

They had done something they shouldn’t, or perhaps couldn’t, have, that much was certain. And they had undergone the weirdest dreams.

“Anypony feel…” Scootaloo manages, before the fundamental limitation of language presents itself as immutably as Friendship Castle’s walls.

“Yeah,” Applebloom and Sweetie Belle both reply, though they can’t begin to fathom why.

But the memory of such dalliances fades from their minds, as all dreams do. And quietly, they part, the undercurrent of sadness tinging their departure from one another as all partings from friends do.

And despite the ringings in her head, Scootaloo turns around to face Friendship Castle, that place where all three had shared… a dream?

For a cursed second she spies a blasted and molten landscape, steaming and screaming with rock so hot it had turned to gas. Nothing can hope to live as the orange seas lap against the blackened castle, except, perhaps, a dream.

And then the hills return and Scootaloo finds herself sprinting home in a cold-sweat.

***

Twilight sighed in consternation as she glanced at the cracks that spiderwebbed around Apostrophe, even as she mentally removed any possibility of interviewing Applebloom this afternoon. Even so, her analytical mind nevertheless managed to pick something of merit from this drudgery; the damage was less ‘cracks’ in the foundation, and more actually akin to the scuff marks a hasty hewing might entail.

“This is going to take a few days to repair, I hope you know,” Twilight says drily, knowing full well this is an exaggeration; a couple of hours, tops, and that’s only because the cracks were on the walls and few extending to the ceiling.

Thank goodness she had Spike ready and able to retrieve blueprints on a moment’s notice.

The only real loss was the barrels of 'Hard Apple-Cider' that had been fermenting the last few weeks; now, there were just a couple of barrels worth of apples.

“Verily, fret ye’ not. Ah enjoy the more rustic appeal o’ my considerably humbled abode; more pressin’ issues await discussin’.”

Okay, why is it dropping ‘g’s all of a sudden? It says it learns from social and mental contact, but even with the Applejack-mind-fix-thing happening, a country accent shouldn’t so overpowering-

“Verily, that was unintentional; I haven’t communicated in such a duration that my filters are hardly existent.”

If that’s supposed to be a jab, it’s a weak one.

“Verily, the youngest Apple-” there is a noise not unlike the crackle of static electricity “-here for a duration, among her two fellow… burglars, I suppose?”

There is a distinctive tinkle noise as Twilight’s magic abruptly erupts into existence. A look of intense consternation passes the Alicorn’s face as a thousand little magical alarms are checked.

“No she wasn’t,” Twilight finally says, sighing with equal parts relief and irritation.

“Correct.”

“So what’s the point of lying to me, then?”

“Verily, there was no lie. I simply concurred on your tense usage; she was not here. But she would have been here, will be here, a thousand little tenses your species has no words for, hundreds they never will.”

The smell of burning hair fills the room as the local Alicorn goes incandescent.

“What. Did. You. Do?”

“Verily, I fed them. Bartered for a time. Sent them home. You are such little beings, ponies, requiring much care to be nurtured. Commensurately tiny and fragile beings require exponentially greater care.”

“Bartered?! What did you take from them?”

“Verily, a few bad memories.”

“What memories? Don’t act like you’ve been struck silent, I know you have more to tell me!”

“Just because ye’ are so erroneously convinced of your own immortality you wish to remember every moment leading to the event horizon of death does not mean all others do, Sparkle. Death scares those wise enough to realize it cannot be evaded; in time, perhaps, they make peace with it, but rarely are the young so mature.”

“They died?!”

“No, everything else did.”

Moments pass in measured silence. Apostrophe doesn’t lie, has never truly lied, but can and has obfuscated facts before.

I suppose it's not too different from Applejack that way, Twilight finds herself pondering, only to bite her tongue a moment later to keep from mocking the comparison aloud.

“Look,” Twilight begins, before bringing a hoof to her forehead and massaging the ache around her horn, “This pseudo-philosophical babble can wait until tomorrow, after we get the walls repaired.”

I’m going to have to ask AJ if she has anymore cider stocked; that, or see if Fluttershy wants a drinking partner or something. This nonsense is absurd.

“Verily, it can wait? Your species places stock in the phrase ‘immortal’ so grievously, yet the word is a portmanteau of ‘I’m-mortal’. Should you choke in your sleep, or a meteor crushes you as you walk beneath the starless skies, or death visits you in a thousand little ways, shall we still wait until tomorrow to speak, as one cadaver to another? How foolishly ensconced are you in the notion that tomorrow will exist for you?”

“Are you threatening me? Jumping down my throat because I won’t make a few minutes to talk with you? Or are you actually trying to tell me something?” Twilight finally interjected tiredly; mortality was a topic she avoided addressing like the plague, for exactly this reason. Some smarty-pants would get it in their head that she suffered some undying ennui at her own longevity and try to get her to ‘open up’ about it.

At least Apostrophe is alien enough to make some new arguments; I don’t think I can tolerate another idiot trying to dedicate their existence to me...

“Verily, whichever ensures ye’ listen-”

“Look,” Twilight mutters, waving her hoof before Apostrophe and cutting off whatever was going to be said, “Even if you have something important to say, you’ve done nothing but be vaguely threatening or insulting since 'arriving'. I haven’t had enough sleep to deal with you, and I can’t honestly think of anypony you’ve endeared yourself to lately, either. Just… I’ll send Spike by in a bit, once you’ve calmed down enough to be civil, alright? He’ll be able to help you with whatever you’re having a meltdown over, or find somepony who can.”

She turns and leaves, the clacking of her hooves and the creaking of the door drowning out a self-satisfied, “Verily” behind her.

***

“Why do I get the feeling I don’t want to know the contents of this letter, much less how you wrote and sealed it?”

“Plausible deniability, as some of your kith declare it. Send it.”

“Uh, I don’t feel comfortable sending this letter-”

“Verily? Nevertheless, send it.”

“Dunno how you’re expecting to get a reply so quickly; plus, I’m pret~ty sure Twilight’s gonna ask all sorts of strange questions about this, and that’s assuming Celestia herself doesn’t-”

“Direct uncomfortable queries to me. Send it.”

“Fine, okay, your funeral. Remind me why I’m doing this, again?”

“Ye’ journal. Your litany of undelivered poetry regarding Ms. Increased-Property-Value-”

“-Rarity.”

“Verily, Rarity. And because you wish to see how this goes, and because it is a story that shall be worthy of retelling, however it transpires. Send it.”

“So, for ‘the luls’, basically?”

“And blackmail. Send it.”

“I can respect that. And chill, I’m sending it, jeez...”

And so flame takes a letter further than even the mightiest breeze could hope. And, for a time, there is silence.

***

Living Star,

Why does your Sun perish?

Author's Note:

Superman, to me, is honestly one of the best superheroes from a storytelling perspective.

Go figure that he also be the most consistently dreadful as far as utilization is concerned; I feel the reason for this, however, is not the usual 'Over-powered' argument folks make, because, honestly, all superpowers are basically broken.

No, the real reason Superman is the best franchise hero (and also why he's regularly written like garbage) is that Superman isn't the only hero of the story.

Ma and Pa Kent, two earthling yokles who just wanted to raise their kid right, are. Jimmy Olsen, who is the best friend a nuclear alien can ask for, is. Lois Lane, champion of truth (except those times we don't talk about...) is. Everyone except the villians in the Superman franchise is a hero, because the world doesn't need Super-men, just brave ones.

Anyway, enough of that... honestly, this was my second favorite chapter to write. It's chaotic, a mangled mass of intentions without clear forms. In other words, exactly what I wanted to do.

Comments

[Tapestry]

“Verily, Rarity. And because you wish to see how this goes, and because it is a story that shall be worthy of retelling, however it transpires. Send it.”

“So, for ‘the luls’, basically?”

[audible laughter]