One night, Twilight notices something odd as she's nestled in bed with Rarity: her hair smells different, just slightly. The next morning, her tea tastes a little bit less sweet, and the flowers outside smell somewhat less fragrant. Out at a cafe together, the music doesn't sound as sharp and clear, and Rarity's new dress feels marginally less smooth against her coat.
Twilight just wants to know what's happening, so she can fix it. It has to be temporary, after all.
Written for the Quills and Sofa Speedwriting group contest with the prompt "How will I break the news to you?"
Cover art by Koviry.
Chapters (1)
Although crushingly sorrowful, and imparting a sense of loss, you've earned a like by quality and heart alone.
This passage right here. Holy shit. The sense of loss in this story is conveyed so well. Fantastic stuff.
Wow full likes
Kudos to you
Also amazing story *respectful nod*
What's hypoesthesia? It doesn't even show up on my spellcheck.
10156283
Hypoesthesia is a side effect of some conditions where your sense of touch or sensation is reduced, or partially lost. Basically, numbness.
That's sad
10156354
really? and here i was thinking that was peak comedy
Wow... The ending was amazingly written in how absolutely depressing it was. Good job.
A very well written story. A bit sad (the situation that is), but engaging story. I guess all you could do, is hope that Twilight can work through this. Excellent work Flashgen
Gorgeous.
Good story. You did a great job depicting Twilight's loss of sensation. I think this story could have been expanded further, showing how Rarity and Twilight's relationship is years into this condition, and how Rarity feels about this, but I still thought it worked at this length.
Poor Twilight.
Bwah! You capture Twilight so well with that sentence.
Now, the story as a whole: Sad and well done.
I love the whole "We'd hidden the truth of alicorns from the rest of the world" bit. It's good to hear that it will return, but knowing that it will be, effectively not just decades, but the lifespan of all those that you know?
It's like this is the immortality curse starting to show up. When you outlive everyone around you, when you outlive everyone you know, when "lifelong" friendships become temporary, passing things, then everything in your life changes.
And here it's showing up as a loss of senses. And Celestia basically says it will return once she adjusts to the immortality and the change in how she deals with all the important (but now temporary) people in her life.
Meaning to or not you captured the struggles of one going through depersonalization. It was uncanny at times. If you don't suffer from this condition you must know someone who does because you nailed it spot on. Especially the detail about rarity not coming off as sincere despite twilight logically knowing she is. It's impossible to tell when the associated emotions are so muted you practically become autistic.
Bravo.
10156557
It took a while before my sarcasm detector started ringing like crazy.
10156557
Hey man if you think that i wont judge
Yeah I just don't see it. I've never been able to see Rarity and Twilight be a couple. There just so obviously not THAT in the show, that it just takes me out of it every time I try to read one these things.
I just realized: this also explains the difference between their preferences in the show. Celestia is going through her phase, and so she looks for higher thrills and extreme things to counter the numbness. Luna meanwhile is on her regula phase and wants to re-experience the little things she is going to lose the ability to feel.
Right in the feels.
10157215
Yea not gonna lie I almost stopped reading right then and there. It always seems incredibly forced when there's any couple between the mane six. Fluttershy and rainbow dash are the only ones that work even remotely and even then I usually don't wanna see it
I'm in the verge of tears. One of the best stories I've read on here. Beautifully written!
10156684
I was originally thinking of whethetr or not to add more in the middle (instead of past the end), but I couldn't really come up with a good scene idea that carried more than just "Twilight fretting over it without saying anything." For me, I think the ending carries a bit of hope and sadness about the situation, so it feels complete.
That said, there could be room for more, I'm just unsure where to take it beyond the eventual conclusion. I can imagine years after this moment, the two of them relaxing on a rare day off from their duties, when Twilight catches a hint of some long forgotten scent before they all come flooding back to her.
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Story about not feeling.
Actually full of feels.
This could have been a bad fic. There was a lot of room to wrong for sure. However, your excellent command of prose and great characterization made this into one of the better fics I've read on this site, if not one of my favorites.
A story about the loss of sensation and feeling, so... why am I crying?
A good short story dealing with immortality.
I love it, it's beautiful, and the like button isn't letting me add more likes. Can someone fix that last one, please?
10157333
Bruh
10158276
Dunno why people got so angry my first comment was a glowing review I just think shipping in general doesn't work for this show. There was like 1 romantic anything in FIM and it was twilight and sentry and almost nobody likes it. I can never ever see any of the main six dating each other logically.
The only reason flutterdash is even remotely possible is because they had a deep childhood friendship in the show that's obscure enough to play with. It's not even that I like them as a couple it's just the most plausible out of any which isn't saying alot since the plausibility factor is permeantly stuck at nothing.
10158354
Tbh I ship what makes me happy for that moment
10157572
You figured out my ruse, it was for a joke all along!
Arg you POS, you're making me feel sadder than Aviators song, Friendship, why yall gotta make me cry
10157433
And now I'm actually getting ideas after writing that comment. I'm supposed to be writing scary stories right now!
I really love all of the emotion you put into this piece! I could easily imagine it being the start of a much longer story, too.
This story is so wonderful I reviewed it here!
10157333
10157215
Then don't read romance stories. Why do you bother coming into a story about Twilight and Rarity with the Romance tag and then say how much you hate the shipping?
10160889
...Have you even read Biff The Gryph's other comments? Like this one: 10158354 Or his first one: 10157092
10160902
Whatever he/she praised the story for doesn't matter. He/she was complaining about the story having shipping when it's clearly tagged as such. It's like clicking on a story with the Gore tag and then says "I almost stopped reading right there because of the blood". You knew you're gonna get shipping and you still clicked on the story anyway, then don't complain why the story has shipping.
10160977
Well, alright. Suit yourself.
10157215
Awfully bold thing to say for someone who shipped Twilight and Spike...
Fantastic. Absolutely fantastic! Amazing... it was kind of like... it felt like a bit of horror, but personal horror. I was reading it and thinking "what if I couldn't feel my daughter's hugs, or my son's laugh. What if my new born daughter's birth cry sounded like it was happening away from me, like down a tunnel."
Made me think of The Caretaker's Everywhere at the End of Time.
I am not a fan of this ship, normally, but this fic made me feel something, so much so that I think, despite my misgivings on the ship, Rarity was the right pony for Twilight in this story.
I have to wonder what sort of effect a serving of extremely spicy chili would have on poor Twilight. Maybe she could win the habanero poppers challenge!
All I could think about while reading this was “this soundsexactly like what worshippers of Slaanesh go through.”
This is a stunner mate, but utterly heart-wrenching.
Your prose is as amazing as it always is, and your internal voice for Twilight is a particular highlight.
There's such a poetic tone to this, it's so vivid for a story about the loss of feeling. The way you describe sensation, and the lack thereof, gives it a raw relatability. Your writing makes it painfully easy to empathise with Twilight.
The ending as well was very strong, some mild comfort while not discounting the true pain of what Twi is experiencing.
All in all, I loved this completely. You smashed it mate
10160977
I wasn't just arbitrarily complaining about shipping. I was responding to another comment that was. And letting him know that I also agree despite having read the story and loving it, my first comment overwhelmingly positive.
I then explain why I agreed. You know having a fucking discussion on the subject? You should try this magical concept called tolerance. Because you lack it and any sense of decency with your borderline self conscious knee jerk defence mechanisms.
I personally would like to see the author explore these concepts without the weight of also juggling a fucking ship which will weigh down any narrative with a litteral sandpaper machine gun made of disbelief and forced relationships that don't make any sense regardless of the medium. If I was complaining about the shipping I would have ripped the entire thing apart starting from the second paragraph I'm not. That's because I'm not an asshole. I'm just blunt. I liked the story. But It would have been fantastic if twilight was trying to reconcile the loss of feeling and possibly emotion with her platonic love towards spike. Or just anything else.
Tldr everyone has opinions and sometimes they hold good or bad ones about the same thing. Also I didn't even read the tag the premise was better then 99% of the unfiltered garbage hose pouring out of this site on a daily basis.
10167275
First, it's funny that you talk about lack of tolerance and my knee jerk whatever, when it's the very thing you are doing now. I wasn't insulting or personally attacking you in my comments. Maybe you took it the wrong way, but my first comment was a genuine suggestion to you and TexasDragon1995, seeing how you feel so uncomfortable about shipping and then went around to cause discomfort to everyone else. Instead of taking it as a constructive advice, you turned around attacking me personally, while also still managed to take time taking jibes at shiping and many other things, like you're trying to insult as many as possible. And you talked about tolerance.
Second, I've already discussed why your positive comment didn't matter. Your second comment was not a discussion. It was a pure attack on this ship and shipping in general, talking about how it made the fic become terrible in your taste. If you really wanted a discussion, how about wording your thought more constructively and actually talking about how the fic could have been written without the ship while keeping your disdain of shipping to yourself (something like "yes, I believe the fic could have been written using the same concept but between Twilight and Spike, it would instead explore..." etc. etc.) to not offend anyone else, you know, many of whom came to this fic because of shipping. Even trying to (by your words) rip the fic apart and actually explain why the ship worsens the fic would have been more of a respectful discussion that your pure ship-bashing comment.
Not looking at the tag is not an excuse, as at the time you wrote the comment you must have already read the entire fic and known it's a romance fic. And yet, you still went around saying how terrible the ship made the fic, when you clearly knew it would offend many people. It's like coming into a Star Wars forum and say how stupid the idea of Jedi is, and the movies should have been better made like Star Trek.
Finally, if you want discussion, let's discuss. Your comment that you understand how good the fic is while bashing its very core concept - the ship - makes no sense. The very thing that puts weight on Twilight's condition is her fear of losing the love for Rarity itself, because she could no longer see Rarity's beauty, her warmth, her touch, you know, intimate things only lovers share. It wouldn't work if it was just platonic relationships like that with Spike or her friends. Furthermore, platonic relationships wouldn't work because there are many of them, it wouldn't make any of the relationship special. Why would Twilight considers losing relationship with Spike more important than losing that with her friends, or family? In the end, it would make the fic center around Twilight's fear of losing relationships in general, making it entirely about herself and how miserable she was afraid she would become. Using a ship, it makes the relationship special, and it shifts Twilight's focus on losing what special she had with Rarity and how miserable she fear Rarity would become, making it more genuine and considerate. That's the core thing that made the fic good, and you clearly didn't understand that.
This story fell rather flat, which is a shame. I was keeping it on my read soon list because of how lovely the art was and because I know you're a good writer. While what you want from the story is very clear in the text, it's hard to get anything out of it. The concept of Twilight suffering what is effectively a medical problem was fine on its own, be it a magical or real-world one. Trying to tie it as something that is inherently part of being an Alicorn just made it feel like a ploy to make being an Alicorn inherently sad in some way.
The kind of totally sensory numbness Twilight is going through is understandably devastating, but that decision really robbed the struggle of how personal it was for her and what kept it grounded. Instead, it became 'Random sad trait about being an Alicorn that is just supposed to be accepted #5,000'. There were even parts in here that came across as budding examples of nice metaphors for depression and struggling with more familiar mental health issues because of the emotional effect this has on Twilight. But it's overshadowed by choosing to include this. I'm not downvoting this, but I can't really upvote it either because of the apathy the story instilled so soon into it.
I also figured I should mention this, but aside from the depressive parts, it's very clear that the numbness you depict dulls physical senses as well. When I was reading the buildup to that, I was actually really interested. I actually have effectively no sense of smell; at some point, before adolescence, I just lost the sense. (For context, because I'm now twenty this means I've been unable to smell for over a decade; only a very short portion of my life had all five senses.) It never came back, it never got better. For a while, I didn't even notice it. I've never broken my nose and I don't have breathing problems or any other sufficient diagnosis as to why I can't smell... I just can't. I don't really remember what it was like and I'm unbothered by it, since people being able to smell and having this focus on it is more bizarre and confusing to me at this point.
Once your buildup was really shaping up, I thought this would be a story about sensory loss and touching lightly on the aspects of that disability. I didn't expect Twilight to just adjust to anything or be non-reactive, but as I said above, a lot of what happened in the story felt like straying and melding two unrelated pieces together.
10169935
I hadn't really considered it, but I do see that by making it something that just happens to alicorns, it comes off much less personal. I guess part of the contest it was a part of (being about a two-day writing period) made me just want to grab a reason so that there was one. I'm still glad to hear that the bits about Twilight actually going through it before then seemed to work well though (if I'm reading the critique correctly). I'll have to bear in mind that the cause probably isn't so important for the future.
Thanks for the comment.
10169992
You’re reading it correctly. The parts with Rarity were also extremely effective. I would just try and be careful with what origins you give an ailment. It could have worked very convincingly as a magical disability or curse-like affliction.