Tales Untold

by ArgonMatrix

III. Metamorphic Harmony

Maud hadn’t intended on passing through the Everfree Forest, but something had called her there. Specifically, the nearby escarpment gave off a strong scent of dumortierite quartz with only trace amounts of alkali feldspar. Not unusual for a granite formation, strictly speaking, but certainly on the high end of normal.

It also happened to be the most direct route between the badlands and Ponyville, which meant she would get to see Pinkie Pie that much sooner.

Mostly it was the escarpment, though.

Night had fallen by the time she arrived, so her research would have to wait, but that was fine. She didn’t expect the rocks would go anywhere overnight. Rocks couldn’t really move much on their own, except for sailing stones and tectonic plates, of course. For an escarpment of this size, it would take thousands of years of erosion before it moved a significant amount. Maud didn’t plan on staying that long, so she was pretty sure it would still be there in the morning.

She felt a poem coming on. Maybe she would write one before bed. She could call it “Geology is Slow Most of the Time.” Good enough for a working title, anyway.

The dilapidated ruins nearby made the most sense for a place to set up camp, even if she avoided sleeping in pony-made buildings when she could help it. Natural caverns were far more comforting, and her Maud Sense indicated one a short hike away. She didn’t mind the extra walking, but Boulder was already pretty tired, so she decided to investigate the ruins for his sake.

The bulk of the building seemed to be made of basalt and slate with marble and gneiss used for accents and detail work. Gneiss had fallen out of favour as a construction material a long time ago due to the frequency of toxic minerals in its composition. Modern buildings tended towards travertine instead, which meant this place had to be a few centuries old at least.

By far the most interesting feature she found was the shrine. The limestone base was as commonplace as mica in pegmatite, but the arms of the shrine held five metamorphic rocks carved into spheres. The sculpture didn’t depict anything in particular, so she had to assume the shrine was for the rocks themselves.

At a glance, Maud couldn’t tell why anypony would enshrine them like this. Sure, metamorphic stones were less common than their igneous and sedimentary cousins, but to dedicate a whole chamber to them seemed excessive. She could understand if they were suevite specimens or another impactite, given ponies’ cultural obsession with the worship of heavenly bodies, but all of the spheres appeared to be garden-variety, mudstone-rich schist.

Still, if somepony had dedicated this much effort to displaying them, they must have had some meaning.

“Wait here, Boulder,” Maud said, setting him down with her saddlebags. She scaled the shrine and picked one of the spheres at random, sniffing it carefully.

The rock gave off the inimitable odour of both divalent magnesium and trivalent aluminium, indicating an abundance of pyrope laced throughout. Mildly surprising at best; the majority of Equestrian schists were garnetiferous, after all. The only anomaly with this one was how much of the mineral was present.

There was something else, too, but she couldn’t pinpoint it. It almost smelled like ozone, which only ever occurred in rocks as a byproduct of certain chemical reactions and would never be contained inside a stone naturally. Curious, but not enough to get her to open it up.

Testing the other spheres revealed much of the same: heightened amounts of various garnet species with a secondary smell each time. The only differences were the smells themselves: apples, flowers, perfume, and…

A smile crossed her muzzle as she sniffed the last one. Smells like cupcakes.

She plucked the sphere from its pedestal and clambered back down the structure. She didn’t plan on taking it with her—these clearly belonged to somepony already, and Maud preferred finding her own rocks anyway—but having a little extra company while she slept would be nice, especially company that felt so familiar.

She returned to where Boulder had been waiting and patted him gently. “Good boy,” she said, then fished his nightcap out of her saddlebags. She brought both Boulder and the sphere near the base of the shrine, where she laid out her bedroll and nestled in for the night.

She still had a long hike to reach Ponyville, so it would probably be best if she skipped the escarpment and left first thing in the morning. She didn’t want to keep Pinkie Pie waiting.

Maud lay awake for a few more minutes, deep in thought. She eventually pulled the sphere closer, snuggling it as she fell into a cozy slumber.

Comments

[FanOfMostEverything]

Fantastic work in voicing Maud. Having geology references on hand is practically a requirement when working with her. I'd never considered having her examine the dormant Elements, but the concept works fantastically. I can only imagine what she would've thought if she had gone into that cavern and seen the Tree of Harmony.

Plus, between this and pointing Starlight to the Cutie Vault, there's something of a running theme with Maud secretly being involved with most of the major developments in Equestria. The rock-based ones, anyway.

[ArgonMatrix]

10440305
Glad you enjoyed my interpretation of her! This was my first time writing Maud (and my geology-term-rich search history proves it), and it came a lot more naturally than I expected. I did also consider having her visit the Tree of Harmony, but it felt like the story would have been a bit overlong at that point, so I left it here.

Now that you mention it, a surprising amount of major events in Equestria are rock-based in one way or another. There's the Elements and the Cutie Vault, of course, but also Discord's statue, the Crystal Empire, the Tree of Harmony, Queen Chrysalis's throne, Ponehenge, and the Staff of Sacanas (that one's admittedly tenuous). The trend crosses dimensions into Equestria Girls too, what with the sirens' necklaces, the geodes, and the memory stone.

Food for thought, I suppose.

[Dracon_Pyrothayan]

10440415

Now that you mention it, a surprising amount of major events in Equestria are rock-based in one way or another. There's the Elements and the Cutie Vault, of course, but also Discord's statue, the Crystal Empire, the Tree of Harmony, Queen Chrysalis's throne, Ponehenge, and the Staff of Sacanas (that one's admittedly tenuous). The trend crosses dimensions into Equestria Girls too, what with the sirens' necklaces, the geodes, and the memory stone.

Would those be the eponymous "rainbow rocks"?

[Comickook]

Again, VERY logical short story. Maud studying the dormant Elements of Harmony makes a lot more sense than it should. Excellent catch on that.

All in all, wonderful characterization.

Other possible ones for the series:

1. Shining Armor planning to propose to Cadance at the Grand Galloping Gala.

2. Pinkie reflecting on how she knows so much about Parasprites while she is hunting for instruments.

3. Discord's statue after the Gala but before that fateful field trip reflecting on how much delicious chaos that Gala was and how it would only take one more incident of concentrated chaos to give him the strength to escape.

4. Your choice of one of the Crusaders silently making the realization that Spike's birthday is ALSO the anniversary of the day the Mane Six all got their Cutie Marks.

5. Luna reflecting on the idea of setting up a support group for reformed villains (at a point in time where there would DEFINITELY be enough reformed villains TO form their own support group; so probably some time in late Season Six).

6. the Rainbooms' graduation from Canterlot High (which would probably be around the same time as the LAST Summer Sun Celebration/FIRST "Festival of the Two Sisters").

7. Twilight visiting Celestia and Luna at Silver Shoals during Hearth's Warming.

8. Pinkie Pie and Cheese Sandwich's wedding day