23. Never Volunteer
Substitute Archivist
Never Volunteer
“Should. Have taken. The elevator.”
No matter how much he was overheating, Emerald could not stop on the Archive tower’s ramp because he was fairly certain he would just be stuck there until somepony dragged him off. At least he did not have to worry about slipping down to the bottom of the tower and rolling the rest of the way back to Celestia’s school because of the friction spell on the ramp. It was both a blessing and a curse, which was why he was carrying the heavy boxes instead of pushing the enormous pile of cardboard and supplies ahead of him.
Why is it always stairs?
Spring was turning out to be warmer than he expected, which would have been a good thing except his winter coat did not believe it and had not even begun to shed yet. Therefore, Emerald had decided to do this task just as early in the morning as possible while leaving his toy-stuffed vest youth education and magic evaluation tool collection behind in his fraternity room. Of course he was still wearing his threadbare hat, because some things were more important than practicality, but the warmth of early Sun was starting to send trickles of sweat down through his thick green coat, from his forehead to his flanks to mark the cardboard boxes he carried with faint damp patches.
“Never. Volunteer.”
This time of morning was when Emerald normally went jogging for his health, enjoying the warmth of a Sun that had just barely started to peek over the horizon to start the Day also. Health was more important to him than ever, particularly since he had that short stint of volunteering at the Ponyville library. For a few Moons, there had been a fair certainty that he would need to make his escape from the town as fast as he could run, and getting that pace up from ‘panting with a slow trot’ to ‘a brisk gallop for at least a short distance’ was an ongoing goal.
After all, there was a good reason he was not volunteering in the Ponyville library any more. That small and nearby town had six unmarried mares who bore the Elements of Harmony, and even if four of them were not unicorns, his parents would turn cartwheels of joy if he were to be paired up with any Bearer. He would much rather run away as fast as he could manage. Ever since he had taken his name off the school’s volunteer sheet for librarian substituting, he had breathed a little easier. After all, he only had a few more months of school before diving into his student teaching, and the near-misses he had with Miss Sparkle and her merry band of misfits were distractions he dared not entertain at this point in his fledgling teaching career.
Without a horn to use as a prybar to wedge open the door to any other career opportunity, Emerald was willing to risk anything to advance toward becoming a Unicorn Magic Teacher II (Introductory to Intermediate). Extra credit was not just a good idea, it was mandatory to bring his final grades up to the level where he would stand out among the herd of graduating unicorn teachers, and therefore have a chance at the relatively scattered beginning magic teacher positions that opened up in larger towns every year. Since Emerald was no longer on the Ponyville library volunteer list, that meant his extra credit points could only come from volunteering for additional undergraduate-level tasks around the university on weekends when ordinary ponies took some time off.
The view from this altitude of the Archive tower would have been more appreciated if the ramp had actual railings, but since industrious magic students studying the spellbooks inside tended to try out newly discovered spells where they found them, the tower was in a constant state of reassembly. Construction workers metaphorically battled against deconstruction students, and railings seemed to be a recent casualty of the conflict, although the ramp did not have any fresh gaps.
Yet.
He brushed one shoulder against the tower wall, and kept his eyes down but open while climbing. That helped keep his mind off the impressive drop to the other side, and the loud splat he would make if he fell.
It took a while to catch his breath at the top of the ramp. Thankfully, there was a lot of breath around to catch, since he had just about run out of up on the way here, and the broad balcony with the comfortable bench was the perfect place for him to reconsider his morning task. It also let him actually look at the way the city spread around below him in a way that earth ponies normally did not get to do, except perhaps when falling to their death.
Taking inventory of the heavy box full of folded cardboard boxes and tape was not high on Emerald’s list of things to do this morning. If there was anything not in the box he had been given an hour ago, somepony else could walk down to the ground level and get it. This was time to sit back, enjoy the breeze, perhaps lean out and take a nibble of the greenery cascading over the balcony’s ornate edges… No, maybe not that. Certainly not that.
His eyes wandered to the nearby minaret, set aside the narrowing Archive tower with enough space for five or six ponies to live in style. Canterlot rental style, that is, since apartment space rented in bits per hoofwidth.
Supposedly, there had only been one old buzzard living here who had been pried out of her Archivist job, but he had absolutely zero interest in applying for the position and taking over her glorious perch. This position was about the antithesis of his life’s goal, far away from young unicorns who pressed up against the edge of their new talents in frantic need of wise adult advice. Or at least the unwise advice of a snarky green earth pony who was more of a child at heart than an adult on the outside.
“Boxes delivered. Task complete,” murmured Emerald under his breath as he stood back up. If the school had wanted him to stick around and help the elderly librarian pack her things, they would have asked, and offered more extra credit points. Certainly there were no end of young librarian assistants who would be willing to risk brief Sun exposure to assist, and if he leaned out just a tiny little bit, he could see the very bottom of the tower’s steps where they—
No, it was better to just sit on the bench.
There did not seem to be any other ponies starting their climb anyway, so if he started down now, he would probably meet the old biddy and her minions before the very bottom, and in the rare possibility there was an attractive young mare in the bunch, he would have to find an excuse to hike all the way back up here. Then again, if he was lounging on a bench when they arrived, he would be indistinguishable from any other lazy scion of a noble unicorn House, and most probably gifted with mutual scorn from their whole feminine herd.
Of course, there was always the brass token that R.L. had shoved across the desk at him an hour ago with the muttered instructions of “An’ water the plants while y’r up there afore they dry up.” The greenery around the edge of the broad balcony probably qualified as plants, although the only water he had available was most likely not a socially acceptable method of watering. Which meant the token was probably a key…
The double blue doors opened up soundlessly with a mere touch of the brass token, allowing a breath of cool and dry air to waft past his nose. It smelled of books, ancient texts with unreadable stories trapped inside, notes and undone homework that he really needed to be working on instead of lugging a bunch of boxes to the top of a tower so an old librarian could move out…
Darned responsibility.
The end of this semester would be a nutcracker, with the last courses of his degree in education giving him the key he would need to unlock a career in unicorn education, as opposed to being shackled to a socially ‘acceptable’ mare and working in his father’s factory until he was old and grey. He had all kinds of things he needed to be doing now that his volunteer project was done. Useful things. Studious things. Poking his nose into an old librarian’s apartment was not one of them.
He did it anyway. The scent of books was too tempting, with the faintest whiff of lavender to entice him the rest of the way into the room.
After one step inside, what little breath Emerald had managed to keep as excess after his climb was taken away in a silent huff of air. The library in Ponyville had given him a rough idea of what a librarian’s living quarters should look like, something spartan like a cross between a military barracks and industrial shelving. This was what the living quarters of a Royal Librarian must look like, if there was a Princess of Books anywhere.
The inside of the living quarters looked larger than what would fit into the outside, which could have been a spatial distortion spell, but was more likely the result of clever engineering and illusions, since neither of those had a tendency to torque back upon themselves and take the room contents into a random orthogonal dimension. The school may have been willing to lose an occasional librarian due to spell failure, but repeatedly replacing the opulent furnishings of the suite would have cost them a bundle.
Whatever unicorn architect who had designed the place despised walls. At first glance, the room certainly deserved a second and third glance, along with a few blinks to ensure veracity of the observation. Both the kitchenette and bedroom were exposed fully to any visitors, leading Emerald to the conclusion that this was a private living quarters, or else Librarians led a far more exibitionist lifestyle in secret.
Whoever took this Librarian job next would certainly be an early riser, because the outside walls of the suite appeared almost not there, replaced by what had to be the most realistic illusion of the outside world he had ever seen. Nothing like the stunning bay windows surrounding him had been visible from the outside, so that surface of the minaret had to be just as cloaked with illusions as the inside, only with the opposite intention. The first rays of Sun cascaded through the open area in a brilliant dance, glittering off a few small crystals hanging from the ceiling and bringing light to every section of the room except the bathroom. The brilliant illumination was a far cry from the minimal light let through by two Prench doors in Twilight Sparkle’s austere oak bedroom in Ponyville, or her small bedroom window that had barely enough space for a fern.
He took his time wandering over to the outside wall and looking down at the city. There was no rush, and the apartment only got more beautiful the longer he lingered. It must have had a stunning nighttime view, with Moon up above and the lights of the city scattered out below, although if there was a way to get the view without the exercise, he would have preferred that. And of course, bringing a mare back to spend the night would be the oddest experience, with every nighttime pegasus flying by seeming as if they could watch everything going on in bed.
So I guess librarians really are secret exhibitionists. Who knew?
If Emerald was going to decorate a Canterlot bachelor pad after graduation, he was fairly sure some other elements of the Archivist’s suite were going to find their way into the design. That is, if the salary of a lowly starting Unicorn Magic Teacher could afford something bigger than a time-share closet inside Canterlot. The giant cushion draped over the couch would be a good start. You could never go wrong with a cushion large enough to make into a book-nest, slumped down with limbs sprawled in all directions for an entire morning of reading. Then lunch, a brief bathroom stop, and an entire afternoon of reading. Come to think of it, all he really needed was a cushion and bookshelves, although even his family library was not stuffed the way these shelves had been recently.
Around one side of the room was a tight cluster of floor-to-ceiling shelves with ‘unicorn’ written all over them, since there was also a disturbing lack of ramps to access the top volumes, and only one ladder on the reference section. Even a pegasus librarian would need space to flap, and the way the narrow shelves were packed together would mean shed feathers by the bundle, and a very short flightspan. The scattered contents of the shelves showed that the old Archivist had been removing books for some time, with some sections moved out totally and others still packed in tight rows awaiting their turn in the boxes.
“Maybe stopping by to help the old mare move isn’t such a bad thing after all,” mused Emerald as he browsed the shelf’s selections. “She might have at least put her books in order before retiring, though. Oddest sorting ever, other than Ponyville’s.”
The temptation to lift a few of her volumes and spend the morning reading did occur to him, particularly with the fascinating selection remaining, but he was officially here to work after all. A quick search of the kitchenette found a stoneware pitcher, which he filled partially from the tap, then wandered over to find plants that needed watering in the indoor garden.
“Behold the awesome power of earth pony magic,” he muttered while applying a little water to each plant, a good drink for the short bushes, and sprinkling around as much as he could for the body-length grass patch, which if he had thought about it before watering, would have been a good place to lie down and rest. “No snoozing in the green grass instead of working,” he murmured, putting the last drops from the pitcher into the miniature trees, then heading back to the kitchenette sink to get more water. There were still some tiny bonsai trees in flat pots that needed more precise irrigation, and he was far more careful with them.
“And done. Except for the flowers,” added Emerald. Yet another pitcher of water was needed for that chore, and he nipped a few of the wilted blossoms out of the collection in a rudimentary attempt at arboriculture. A proper earth pony could use their magic to bring some extra perk and bloom out of the neglected flowers, but… Well, it was worth a shot.
The clay flowerpot rasped under his hooves when Emerald held it close, poking his nose into the stems and taking a deep breath, just like he had done so many times at his home’s greenhouse. And now, just as then, his attempts to focus any kind of growing magic into the drooping plant had absolutely no effect.
“At least it didn’t catch on fire,” he mused while putting the pot back into its holder. “I don’t know if that would be better, but at least it would be something for a change. Guess I’m just destined to teach young unicorns.”
He returned the pottery pitcher to the kitchenette with a cheerful whistling, then considered a certain organic issue that needed to be dealt with fairly soon. The suite did have a bathroom, after all, and walking back down the way he came up didn’t.
“Better check first,” he murmured to himself. He could get a good look down from the not-walls next to the kitchenette just in case the old mare was coming up the ramp to interrupt his bathroom break. All he needed to do was put his hornless forehead against the wall and look straight down at the tiny shapes of ponies so far below, just like when his brothers had taken him to the Edge of Canterlot, and he had leaned over the—
”There’s a second town down at the bottom of the mountain,” said Regal, who was standing next to his little brother’s shoulder. “It’s in perpetual shadow, just far enough away from the overhang to keep rocks from crashing down through their tree houses.”
“I don’t see it,” said the young earth pony, who was maintaining his determined squint and keeping all four hooves on the walkway despite the wind trying to knock off his hat.
“I thought Hollow Shades was on the other side of the mountain,” said Graphite to his other side, although the not-that-much-bigger-brother was not quite as adventurous as his earth pony sibling.
“That’s true.” The little earth pony looked some more and shook his head. “There’s nothing but a bunch of treeEEEK!”
Emerald recovered from his fuge in the middle of the apartment, as far away from the illusionary windows as he could get without trampling through the tiny tranquil indoor garden, although he could only stand and tremble for a time afterward. He could still feel the pressure of the hoof on his back, a ‘joke’ that Regal had set up with several of his school friends who had been flying below the cliff to catch him if he had fallen.
His older brother had considered it funny for an extremely short time, because once Emerald had recovered from his fright, he had torn into the older unicorn with a vengeance. Regal was used to being a friendly large fish in a large social pond with other large fish, in the company of important ponies and always at the best parties. Emerald had always been considered meek despite his age-relative larger stature, because he had been shoved ahead in classes, picked on for being himself, and had learned to defend himself with words, not strength. Unicorn peers had a much more comfortable relationship with a handsome firstborn stallion who always could be depended on for a smile and friendly banter, than the last hornless colt in a family who had been shoved forward in class because he was smarter than them, and was not afraid to show it. By the time Emerald was done, his older brother was crying on the sidewalk, and his two pegasus friends were begging for their lives, afraid that they were about to be thrown into prison.
It was a cold victory, because Regal and Graphite never treated him quite the same again. From that day forward they no longer saw him as the little brother they needed to protect against the world. It was cold inside as well, because Emerald could only think about where he had learned those words, and how to manipulate others into doing his will. Father would have been proud of the way he stood up for himself. Emerald had never admitted it to the rest of his family because of that. His brothers appreciated his relative restraint. Emerald held it as a secret shame.
“I’m not my father,” repeated Emerald under his breath. “I will never be like him. Of course not. He’s not a sociopath pretending to be social. He manipulates ponies right out in the open, while I sneak around behind their backs, pretending to like old librarians by helping them move and volunteering at the Ponyville library.”
It was impossible to sulk quite as hard as he wanted, because so many of his recent good memories were related to that small town and the ponies who lived there. After all, he was seriously needed by the smaller inhabitants, and tolerated by the larger ones, as long as he kept his hat on so they thought he was a unicorn. Plus, the town was at the bottom of the mountain.
That chapter of his life was closed now and a new one was opening up just as soon as he earned his degree. A new school was ahead, in a larger town than Ponyville, and many more worried young unicorns with magic troubles to assist. Once he was established as a teacher, his father would have no leverage over him any more, and only then could he consider attracting a bride. Preferably, somepony just as far away from Twilight Sparkle as possible. Maybe even an earth pony.
“I should have been born a pegasus,” he mused as he began to straighten the room and put tipped-over chairs back where they belonged. “I’d probably be as groundbound as Scootaloo or Snowflake. Still a closet sociopath, though.”
The nearly empty reference shelves held a book on sociopathy that he had not read yet, so Emerald made a quick visit to the bathroom to take care of an urgent need, then settled down on the largest cushion to read, once he had brushed away a few loose purple hairs. It was a fascinating read with several parallels to his own life that he had not thought about before, although two chapters in, a nagging thought rose to mind.
So an elderly librarian comes into her home and finds a young colt on her couch, reading a book about sociopaths…
He got up, looking for perhaps a more socially acceptable way to await the old biddy’s arrival, when his eyes fell on the one object he had been avoiding. It was impossible to walk all the way around such a huge object even in this beautiful spacious apartment, because it was inevitable that a piano of this size would find itself pushed to one side of the room and used as a bookshelf. Plus, its bulk would create a gravitational field that attracted objects in the class of ‘Need to be placed somewhere for a moment and forgotten.’
“Terrible shame,” he murmured, running one hoof down the keys in a descending series of notes. “My mother would die to have this in the house instead of that old Wolffhauser. It must have taken an army to bring this up the ramp how many years ago. Or an alicorn…?”
Curiosity was a dangerous thing. The underside of the piano did not give any clue to its legacy, but a small brass plaque on the side sported ornate letters and numbers, giving a date several centuries ago.
“Sheesh,” murmured Emerald, giving the massive ebon body and majestic curves of the ancient instrument a second look with far more respect. “Celestia really must have taken lessons on this thing when she was a foal. And probably hated it just as much, if she dragged it all the way over here for storage.”
The Wolffhauser in his family’s music room was about two octaves smaller than this monster, and just slightly under a century old. Every one of the children had been dragged through lessons except himself, and the resulting sibling bonding had taken off in a direction that his parents had not expected or noticed. When it was his younger sister’s turn to lie down on the padded piano bench and practice for hours, a deal had been struck with her curious older brother: one hour of his noisy practice matched against one of her NuttyOatyOat bars, to be delivered at the earliest opportunity. Many weeks of practice while Frost studied in the same room with earplugs gave him time to get the practice pieces just about as good as he ever was going to get. Of course, all good things—like a dependable supply of candy bars—come to an end when parents find out, and to be honest, it was his fault for missing several points on a test at school due to lack of his study time.
That padded bench was far more comfortable than the black Ironwood of this model, and the upright console keyboard easier to get situated against, but the thick, rich sound that emerged when he pressed the first key made it all worthwhile. He let the music carry him away for a short time, ignoring any mis-struck notes or shift-register misses with the excuse of time and an unfamiliar instrument. Perhaps it was easier now that he was an adult, or maybe the professional piano was balanced more precisely than the Chrysanthemum House heirloom. In either event, it was a welcome break from his normal intensive study schedule, and he was reluctant to stop when he ran out of his limited collection of memorized pieces, so he dug a piece of sheet music out of the bench and battled with Reinbits for a time until he inevitably lost the fight.
“I suppose it’s a better place for the retiring Archivist to find me than reading that book,” said Emerald as he slid off the bench and stretched.
He had wasted enough time in idle frittering to put Sun firmly up in the sky, leading Emerald to consider the possibility of the missing Archivist showing up tomorrow. Lurking around the apartment all day and into the night would mean trying to find something to eat in her icebox… which was defrosted with the doors hanging open, so no munchies there. Or the empty pantry, which he could see from the piano bench. There were the flowers in the tiny garden, but they seemed far too small to make a respectable salad, and grazing on the bonsai bushes would ruin all the hard work some arboriculturist had put into making them all grow in the shapes of various magical notation formula. In other words, it was high time to leave and get some breakfast.
“Welp,” he said, gathering the sheet music book off the stand and opening up the bench to put it away. “Concert’s over for the day and the audience is a no-show. Guess I’ll just have to meet the retiring Archivist some other day. Until later, Miss—” he checked the faded name written on the music book “—Twilight Velvet, House Twinkle.”
There was something terribly wrong with that name, but Emerald could not and did not want to put a hoof on it right away. The ‘Twilight’ part had spooked him at first, but there were families all across Canterlot with a Twilight or two in them. Twilight Sparkle was a member of House Twinkle, but Houses tended to spread out over the years. For example, the Archivist could even be Twilight Sparkle’s great-great-grandmother, or no relation at all. Or, he thought as a cold chill began to creep down his spine, maybe the piano belonged to Twilight Sparkle’s mother, much like the House Chrysanthemum piano, passed down from mother to daughter through the generations…
Then again, he had access to a library, so there was no need to remain uninformed and panicked. A quick stroll over to the sparse reference bookshelf showed many gaps, including one where Twerp’s Peerage should be filed, and a few moments of further browsing did not reveal any other reference books on pony families, but the familiar order in which the few remaining books had been placed on the shelf started a trickle of sweat down his bare flanks.
No. It can’t be her. She moved to Ponyville Moons ago. She has friends there, and a tree home… that leaks, drips, and drafts. Besides, there are all these books.
Ever so slowly, Emerald opened the book on sociopaths to the front page and stared at the bookplate glued there.
While he was frozen in horror staring at the tidy bookplate, Emerald could hear voices outside on the balcony. He had a terrible suspicion it was not some elderly librarian from the school with a half-dozen young assistants to help her pack, but in fact the exact unmarried unicorn he had been dodging ever since his first trip to Ponyville.
“Twilight Sparkle,” he murmured to himself. “Twilight Sparkle!” he repeated with more panic. “Oh, stars. She’ll see me here and urk!”
Sheer terror blocked his voice, along with the spine of the sociopathic book which needed to be returned to the exact slot he had taken it from or she’d know and track him down and throw him all the way off the tower and back to Ponyville in one lob if she hadn’t brought one of the Princesses with her because this was Canterlot and she could do that if she wanted to and the room which seemed so huge and uncluttered before was throwing chairs and slick patches of floor in front of him as he dashed over to the bookshelf and jammed the book into one of the many empty spaces, then looked for a bookshelf hole of his own to hide in perhaps under ‘H’ for Hopeless.
The bathroom was the obvious choice for his non-bookshelf hiding spot since it actually had a door that closed, but there was a second door he had not opened yet, and in the sincere hope it concealed an elevator shaft into the sub-basement, he yanked the door open and vanished inside at about the same time the outside doors opened behind him.
It was dark in the closet. That was fine.
It was also filled with unpacked clothes, indicating his stay of execution was only temporary, and the duration measured in empty boxes.
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There are days when everything seems stacked against you. Sometimes we all want to hide in the closet until they go away.
Welcome to another three-chapter arc of our Substitute Librarian, only this time he is engaged in a librarian activity far, far away from Ponyville and the most dangerous unmarried mares on the face of Equestria. After all, how could he screw up the simple task of taking a stack of folded cardboard boxes up to the former Archivist's apartment? That is unless...
Set during the time of Estee's 100% Move, 50% Fire. Let's just hope none of Emerald catches on fire or gets moved.
11187676
that's a mood that many can relate to
hope you're ok
Magic is all relative. Most think Wizards live in tall towers to get away from the rabble.
Wizards are placed in tall towers to keep them away from the rabble. Like antimatter.
The machinations of fate are usually subtle and insidious, obvious only in retrospect if ever.
This is the equivalent of it mashing two dolls together and saying "Now kiss!"
Eagerly looking forward to seeing what comes of the coming debacle.
Poor Emerald, not only can he not escape but now he's going to be found in the most awkward place next to her bed.
I've gotta say I love this story. The recent blog post took a large amount of that enjoyment away though.
Now that I know that Emerald will never meet Twilight, these moments lose all their tension. The whole "avoiding marriagable mares" plot line is also kinda weak now that any named character in Estee's stories are out as well.
Mhm, this was a pleasant surprise in my feed today. Thank you for taking your time to write.
11187746 Second most awkward. I've got one scene roughed out where he doesn't quite escape Twilight's library in time when she returns unexpectedly and he tries to hide under the bed.
11187768 It's only fair. He didn't realize it either.
11187718 This is one encounter he can't blame on that blasted tree.
11188235 Time is the greatest gift. It can't be smashed (but oh boy can it be wasted).
Good chapter, it's always nice to see this one updated
Cool to see a new Substitute chapter! Thanks for keeping us entertained with another story of our poor put upon lad.
I know where Twilight is coming from here... even if it was not as beautiful as you have described Georg (the description you gave was quite stunning)... I had a lab in a remote site’s basement which my old team built over about 7 years before a change in management broke us up. I had been trying to hang on to the space and equipment for the last couple of years but have just had to let it all go.
Ahhh... I know you said that Emerald and Twilight will never meet but I suspect that Emerald and Rarity may be about to meet. Question is, which one gives the muffled scream? (that is if I remember the original story correctly)
11187836
On the other hoof, much like so many other stories where you know the main character(s) come out ahead/alive/&c., the suspense of 'will they or won't they?' is replaced by the intrigue of 'how will he get out of this pickle?'