Distant Bells

by Casketbase77

*Snort*

As was routine for her self-taught teleports, a cloud of burnt sienna afterglow lingered in front of River Song’s eyes. She snorted to clear it and when she saw where she’d ended up, she snorted again, this time in agitation.

This didn’t look like her secret cloister. Her cloister was a dry, small cave in the side of Peril Peak, accessible only by teleportation. The ugly swamp in which she was standing looked wide and open enough to house all the sludge in Equestria. It certainly smelled like that was its function.

River Song felt lightheaded, and not just because of her sudden altitude change. Pulling a cloven hoof out of the mud she was standing in, River Song ran its sensitive digits over her forehead, confirming the worst: Her antler was gone, no doubt burned off at the perennially weakened base and lying abandoned on the grass back in Kirin Hollow.

Brilliant.

That’s what she got for spellcasting during shedding season.

With nowhere to go but forward, River Song trudged through the muck in what she hoped was in the direction of drier land. Dour though her mood was, the quiet, rhythmic squelch of River Song’s hoofsteps began to soothe her. It certainly was quiet out here.

She stopped moving.

Now it was silent out here.

The antler-bereft Kirin closed her eyes and tilted her head back in stoic bliss. Darkness. Silence. She hadn’t experienced real peace and calm in so long. Not since before… before...

River Song snorted a third time, reopening her eyes and continuing to navigate the swamp.

Since before the Return. That was… how many moons ago? A lot, that was for sure. River Song had only been a foal at the time, not old enough to really understand why everykirin else was suddenly making raucous noises with their mouths and distorting their faces in such disturbing ways. Upon discovering she too was affected by this frightening new curse, River Song had gone full Nirik violently and immediately.

So much noise, so much stimulation. None of which she’d ever experienced before or understood in the vaguest sense. According to chief Rain Shine, it took literal days to calm River Song down and get back to her senses.

River Song reckoned that was about right. She remembered that lapse of consciousness very well. Or rather, she remembered the experience of not remembering. More than remembered, actually: she cherished it.

Having come of age in a world of stoicism, River Song‘s biggest passion was passionlessness. Her favorite thoughts were muted ones. Her favorite company was solitude. And her favorite emotion…

River Song attempted to snort again, but instead it came out as a sniffle.

Her favorite emotion was none at all. But that state of mind had been cut away from her long ago.

River Song hadn’t grown up like this, with these awful, volatile things called ‘feelings’ inside of her. They’d just been foisted on her the day of the Return, channeled through a mug of accursed tea she’d been too young to say no to. More than the changes in those around her, it was the changes inside River Song’s own mind that she had never ever gotten used to. Things she’d never minded as a foal now clenched her stomach and wobbled her knees. The width of this swamp, for example. The current darkening of the sky. The dirty wetness clinging to her hooves.

She missed her cloister dearly. Whenever the laughter or shouting of the other Kirin got too much for her (which was often) she’d poof there to recollect. It was the only spell she knew. The only spell she needed.

The nub where River Song’s antler had once been throbbed dully.

Now her spell had been taken away from her too. A tightness was gripping River Song’s throat from the inside, which she recognized as sadness. She stopped walking again and looked back up at the sky. Stars were just beginning to fade into view.

“Nothing in me is good,” she croaked, her voice thick and gravelly from lack of use. “I want the nothing back. Where did it go?” The uncaring sky didn’t answer.

So very few Kirin ever talked about why or how things were silent and unfeeling before the Return, and because it took years for River Song to figure out how her own voice worked, she missed her immediate opportunity to ask. The best she gleaned (once she understood that the utterances everykirin was making were actually a form of language) was that covering oneself in water was the key. In the weeks after the Return she was often found swimming desperate laps in the Hollow’s watering hole, much to the amusement of her elders.

The swim sessions didn’t end up fixing her, but it did give the others the idea to name her River Song after the helpless, malformed bleating that escaped her tiny lungs as she dogpaddled in circles. A belated name for a foal born into a world once silent. No doubt they all thought it was adorable. River Song did not, but by the time she’d learned to form words of her own it was too late to protest. She’d been named, and therefore permanently tethered to this world of noise. There was no going back for her. Only the brief breaks she took in her cloister before jetting back to the others once they started to notice she was gone. But there was no jetting back this time. Faust alone knew where in Equestria her antlerless teleport had dumped her. Was this miserable bog even in Equestria? Damn shedding season. Damn it to Tartarus.

River Song hung her head. All she’d ever wanted, from the moment she gained the ability to want was for water to bring quiet and unfeelingness back to her life. Now, with her legs numb from cold mud and her heart hardened by loneliness, River Song regretted that she’d finally gotten her wish.

Despair, anger, and bitterness were convalescing into a physical change. River Song’s nub sparked dangerously and her coat began to darken. Heat built, the type of heat that was so hot it looped back around to feeling cold again, like water from a hot spring. River Song was losing herself, just like she had before that tantrum she threw in response to the Return. But this time, nokirin would be around to diffuse her. She would let go and drift unfeeling through her mind while her altered, primal body stormed around forever, leveling everything in its path-

”Hallo down there, shaggy leetle pony.”

Startled back to her senses, River Song looked up. For a moment, she thought two stars from the sky had actually spoken in a tiny voice and were presently drifting out of the aether towards her. Once her eyes adjusted however, she saw something even stranger: a minuscule pixie-like creature whose light-tipped antennae were reflecting off a pair of delicate, gossamer wings. Whatever the creature was, it’s speech had a tone and volume that didn’t hurt River Song’s ears. She’d never experienced that before.

”Windfall hazt been flying over water for many hours and izt tired. May he land on you?”

Without any reason to say no, River Song nodded her consent. The pixie-thing lighted down on her forehead, possibly even right on her vacant antler dock, though he was so weightless River Song couldn’t be sure.

”Apologies for Windfall’s speech. Breezie tongues, zey find Ponish words slippery to say. This Breezie izt Windfall, as said already. Who is shaggy pony?”

River Song snorted.

”Zat, Windfall cannot pronounce.”

“River Song,” the Kirin rumbled painfully. Then she began trudging again. The little pixie, or Breezie, he was apparently called, let out a barely audible squeak of surprise as the sudden air resistance buffeted his tiny body.

”Where izt we going?”

River Song snorted.

”Will you answer none more of Windfall’s questions?”

River Song snorted again. Then she slowed down in case the Breezie wanted to flap his oversized wings and take off. But Windfall did not take off. Instead he reclined, seemingly settled in to ponder River Song's non-responses. The two of them traveled several additional leagues of swamp before River Song's diminutive passenger piped up again.

”You are outcast,” he eventually deduced. “Defiant stray. Such is clear because ze shell on your back izt not nearly as hard as ze shell ‘round your heart.”

Despite herself, River Song smiled inwardly at the eccentric little sprite’s bouncy, flutey meanderings. Never had she ever wanted to hear somecreature continue talking rather than stop.

”Windfall on other hoof, he used to be opposite: Wide-eyed, curious softie. Bad mix. Got him into trouble it did, it did.”

The Breezie audibly inhaled before letting a hint of scornful bravado season his words.

”But Windfall recalls old Diamond Dog idiom: Ze hunting sense gets stronger when starving. It means zey find treasures when zey need zem. And Windfall’s own sense has him on trail of his own treasure. He learned of it from quiet cave, see? Quiet cave zat whispered izt’s promises to him, and him only.”

River Song mulled over Windfall’s riddles as she walked. Quiet caves and promises. Was he talking about her cloister? Or… River Song’s pulse quickened at a new thought: did Windfall have a cloister of his own? Was he… was he a dreamer like she was?

River Song’s squelching steps were at last giving way to thumps, which meant they were making progress onto more hospitable land. If feeling ever returned to River Song’s legs, she was certain they would be smarting from exertion. To recline against a welcoming tree and sleep. That was her strongest desire at the moment. And while it was too dark to be sure, the sprawl of forest outskirts appeared to loom in front of them. She and her cryptic companion seemed to be leaving the swamp behind them, in more ways than one.

”Pony with 'Song' in her name must like music,” Windfall ruminated aloud. ”Does she sing?”

River Song’s responsorial snort was so vehement that it nearly shook Windfall off his perch.

”Ojdå! No sing, understood. Instruments, then?”

River Song nearly flinched, but stopped herself and kept walking.

It was true that, amid all the awful, endless cacophony with which the Return polluted her life, instrumental music was the sound that bothered her the least. Even before the Return, River Song had sometimes contented herself by sitting alone and tapping her forehooves together rhythmically. Her percussive pastimes weren’t symphonies by even the most generous measure, but they were her own tempos and she was proud of them. She took pride in her small, occasional flourishes that dotted the yawning hush that blanketed her world. They were her odes to a life of order and sense. If River Song knew how, she would reset the clock to make everything quiet enough that she could sit and do those hoof taps again. She’d reset it all in a heartbeat. She of course hadn’t the first clue where she’d acquire the power to do so, but just imagining it made the antlerless Kirin’s stony heart beat just a little bit faster.

”A-ha! Windfall sees repressed smile on friend’s muzzle. He reads other creatures like books!”

River Song was acutely aware of a tickle on her left ear as Windfall drifted down to her shoulder. There she saw the Breezie in profile for the first time: his grey body, this wispy shock of orange hair that made up his mane and tail, and most of all those tiny but vivid eyes that seemed far too fiery and fierce for the tiny waif-like body that housed them.

”Last question, Windfall promises: Since River Song smiles at ze topic of instruments, has... hee hee! Has River Song ever heard of... ’Bewitching Bell‘?”

Author's Note:

"I've been around for all these years...

I hear the sound of Distant Bells..."

- Leprous

Comments

[Ice Star]

There are species tags for breezies and kirin you can add.

[Casketbase77]

10054075
Done. Thank you kindly for the info.

[Str8aura]

It means zey find discarded bones when zey need zem. And Windfall’s own sense has him on trail of his own ’discarded bone’ zat he learned about from quiet cave.

Peculiar line shift here.

It would appear Windfall has a companion, and one whose backstory is impressively being revealed bit by bit without seeming obnoxiously exposiionary, despite 75% of this chapter being exposition.

Once again, no obvious storytelling problems are visible, and you did a good job by leaving a couple mysteries on our new characters shell. Kirin stories are not uncommon, but I have yet to see a Qilin handled this way, and I look forward to seeing more of her.

How often will this story be updated?

[FanOfMostEverything]

That’s what she got for spellcasting during shedding season.

This might be the most intriguing kirin-related sentence I've seen on the site. I've seen the concept of unicorns shedding their horns once or twice, but kirin doing so makes more sense given their more deer-like anatomy, and organically creates the spellcaster equivalent of no cell phone reception. Nice one!

And she grew up during the silent era! Oh my goodness, why has no one ever done something about this? How disturbing would it be for someone who's only ever known quiet tranquility to sudden be beset on all sides by noise and emotion, including the inside?

And Windfall, the maligned poet turned sinister little influence. An almost literal shoulder devil who guides the great lumbering beasts he befriends to his dark ends...

This story is full of amazing ideas. Eagerly looking forward to seeing where you go with it.

[Thought Prism]

10054689
Yeah, this grabbed my attention too. River Song is a very unique and intriguing character, especially in this setting. Hopefully she can meet a less manaical companion in the future she can get along with. Like Marble. Or Gummy.

[Casketbase77]

10054689

10055761

Apologies it took so long for me to comment on my own fic. I’m glad these two characters are connecting with readers the way they’re supposed to. Seeing a lot of sympathy for our developmentally stunted Kirin friend here, but not much for defiant little Windfall.

“Tsk tsk. Windfall izt helpless underdog with only hizt wits for weapons. Yet zat does not win your support?? Windfall shan’t forget zis injustice!”

Anyway, in terms of updates, the contest rules forbid me from making this fic any longer than 10,000 words. That’s a bit of a pickle, since I got some canon characters and plot points to introduce even before the inevitable attempted heist for the Bell. Might write and add a couple new chapters before the February 29th deadline, and only seriously work on completing story after the contest is over.

[JLtheking]

I, too, am similarly enraptured by the uniqueness of your take on Kirins Poor Rain Song! I hope she doesn’t get too easily manipulated by Windfall

10055878
Probably the reason why Windfall isn’t getting as much love is because his characterization is rather dull at the moment. Misunderstood person with (formerly) good intentions is rather cliche, and he seems to be a little mean-spirited. He’s also been made into the clear anti-hero of the story, and together with the fact that’s he’s not that likeable (yet), probably explains why he’s not getting much love.

That’s not to say he was written badly, just that he’s not written to be a likeable character (yet), and that’s fine. Off the top of my head here’s another fic (https://www.fimfiction.net/story/70619/no-room-for-regret) I can think of with a dastardly unlikeable protagonist, and yet she carries the story by simply being interesting enough. I can foresee some fun character interactions between him and Rain Song though!

Out of curiosity what are your plans for this story? Are there going to be more additions to our motley crew? (another evil trio would be fascinating!) Is it going to be more character-driven or are we speeding off to the heist with the 6k words you have left?

Between this and Innocent Until Proven Cozy you have my Follow!

[Casketbase77]

10061590
Thanks so much for your praise. I do aim to please.

I think Windfall and River Song are going to be the only OCs this story’ll feature. (Technically, River Song is the name of an actual canon Kirin, but perhaps revealing that is tipping my hand to much towards her story arc’s eventual conclusion).

Regardless, the story’ll definitely surpass the 10k word mark. Our protagonists still need to get to a pony settlement and find out about the War Of The Bell. A young Luster Dawn will be a relevant character. And like you said, there definitely needs to be a few scenes of Windfall using his nihilistic determination and his clueless Kirin ally to further his plans. Opportunism is his weapon, and opportunities take time to produce a satisfying payoff.

[JLtheking]

10061616

Thanks for your reply! A young Luster Dawn, eh? Now I’m really intrigued Time to corrupt that young filly!

Windfall: The abyssal magics is a pathway to many abilities some consider to be unnatural.
Luster Dawn: Is it possible to learn this power?
Windfall: Not from your princess

[publiq]

…and the mare in the rain journeyed up the mountainside, far above the clouds
And nothing was ever heard from her again, save for the sound of be/witch/ing bells.

Modified from Mike Oldfield, Tubular Bells 3

“I want the nothing back. Where did it go?”

That’s a feeling I know well.