Lost in Translation: Snowblind

by Cyanblackstone

2: And You're Out (of Town)

The various Crystal dialects are fascinating in their diversity. While cosmopolitan Crystal is very similar to Equestrian, requiring only modest knowledge to gain fluency in, this is largely a result of the extensive trade between the old tribes and the Crystal Empire—it’s more accurate to call modern Equestrian a Crystal creole with the old tribal languages than the reverse. The Empire itself has a halo of nominally-loyal towns that see little to no interaction with the capital or Equestria, and have evolved dialects that verge on being their own languages. These small, subsistence-farming communities consist of only a few hundred to thousand members, and there are dozens, possibly even hundreds, of variations on Crystal, some of which diverged from the main dialect centuries ago.

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Rosetta stood in awe for a few moments, amazed by what they’d seen. It had to have been a meteor, but they’d never heard of one so large, nor one in the daytime. As they returned their attention earthwards to note down the occurrence in their journal, Rosetta noticed a mare racing towards town.

“Fuller!” the mare yelled. “Did you see that?”

The door creaked behind Rosetta, and the smith emerged. “Snowhoof, what are you babbling about now?”

“The sky! It was on fire!” She bellowed back, skidding to a halt.

“What kind of nonsense is that?” Fuller grumbled, but paused as Rosetta nodded. “I saw it as well,” they said. “It must have been a meteor, but I’ve never seen one so large.” They bit their lip. “Something terrible must have happened in Canterlot to have Luna err so.”

“Well, I’ll be damned,” the smith said with a lopsided grin. “Not even a day in town and you’ve gotten tangled up in one of Snowhoof’s ‘things that totally happened that may-or-may-not-have-actually-happened.’ You’re gonna fit right in.”

Then the world exploded around them.

Rosetta came to sprawled on the ground, several feet from the porch they’d been standing on. Their ears throbbed, and a hoof came away specked with blood as they rubbed at it. Stumbling to their hooves, they cast a look around.

The mercantile store across the path was teetering, its walls knocked off its packed earth foundation. Shingles littered the ground and while the smithy’s stout walls had fared better, the roof was visibly damaged, stripped of its protective outer layer. The ponies with which they’d been speaking earlier were waking from their stupor as well, and as Rosetta attempted to help Fuller up, the other, who they assumed was Snowhoof, rolled upright.

The guard encampment on the riverbank had been flattened, tents sent flying. One pony, to Rosetta’s horror, was rolling on the ground, aflame. They must have been blown into a cookfire and came to in the flames. The silver lining to the deafness Rosetta was suffering was that they couldn’t hear the screams of the poor guardspony as other soldiers revived and smothered the fire with blankets and canvas.

A hoof nudged their side, and Rosetta turned to see Fuller mouthing something. They shook their head and pointed to their ears, mouthing back “Can’t hear a thing!”

As if summoned, the complete deafness gave way to a piercing ringing in their ears, driving into their head like a dagger. Rosetta grimaced, but internally they thanked Celestia for the ringing; stunning spells inflicted a similar noise, and generally hearing returned within a few hours of being hit with one. It was reassuring evidence that whatever had just happened was unlikely to be permanent.

But what had just happened? Rosetta had never heard of a stunning spell strong enough to nearly knock a building over, and in any case they were the only unicorn in town and most likely for a hundred miles or more.

It had to have been the meteor; that was the only explanation Rosetta could think of. They’d never heard of a meteor blowing buildings over, but meteors weren’t exactly common and its brightness meant it had to have passed overhead—close overhead. And that, Rosetta realized with a start, meant it had to have landed close to the northeast. An opportunity to study, maybe even recover, a freshly fallen star was something reserved for the Princesses themselves, or perhaps their proteges if they asked nicely. Even if Rosetta was a linguist rather than an alchemist or metallurgist, to pass up such a rare opportunity was unthinkable.

Besides, meteoric metal fetched a pretty bit for its rare magical properties and incredible hardness, and things made out of it floated around as relics for hundreds of years or more before they were eventually lost. A hoofful was enough to fully fund their next expedition without having to come to the crown hat in hand, begging for bits.

As they came out of their thoughts, Rosetta noticed Fuller staring at his stripped roof in dismay. Cantering over to one of the shingles now littering the ground, they picked it up and turned it over, examining it out of curiosity. The nails had pulled through the fastening, leaving small holes in the face, but otherwise the shingle seemed undamaged. If you flipped the shingles over, with some creative placement you could probably get the entire roof redone without issue. Squinting at the roof, they thought they could see the nails still embedded sturdily into the roofing.

Moving over to the smith, they tapped him on the shoulder, hoofing him the shingle. He blinked, took it and examined it as well, and then looked back at Rosetta quizzically. They mimed hammering, and he nodded in understanding, rushing into the smithy and returning with a light hammer and a pair of pliers.

Magically grabbing the pliers, Rosetta lifted them up to the room and after a few seconds of concentration, managed to pull a nail and bring it back to the ground. As she worked pulling the nails, Fuller produced a ladder from somewhere inside, leaning it against the building, and Rosetta started piling nails on the roof next to the ladder. Hammer in hoof and shingles in teeth, Fuller started making trips up and down the ladder to take shingles up and reattach them.

It only took a few trips before Snowhoof had grasped their intentions and started piling up torn shingles next to the ladder and hoofing them off to Fuller as he descended each time. Ears still ringing, the trio managed to hit a decent pace, and by the time the twilight was too dark to work safely, they’d managed to reshingle about a quarter of the roof.

Thankfully, the ringing in Rosetta’s ears had faded to an annoying buzz in the back of their head, and as Fuller descended the ladder for the last time, she called, “Might I stay the night, sir?”

“What?”

Shaking their head, Rosetta repeated themselves louder. “Of course!” Fuller yelled back, making them wince. “After the help y’gave me with the roof, it’s only fair.” Evidently, his hearing was not quite as recovered as their own.

Snowhoof sidled in with Rosetta, as if she’d done this a thousand times. Thinking back on the brief amount of banter between the two they’d caught, Rosetta guess she probably had wheedled her way into a night’s stay here more than once.

Fuller busied himself shoving things into corners and clearing some floorspace, before disappearing into the other room and returning with some thin thatch matting and a pair of scratchy blankets. “It’s not much, but it’s better than the dirt outside,” he apologized.

Snowhoof picked the far mat, laid down, and was seemingly asleep instantly—an enviable skill. Thanking Fuller once again, Rosetta settled themselves down on the mat, but rather than turning in they lit their horn and began to write by its glow, noting down everything they could remember about the meteor for future reference.

It was only then that they dispelled the light and closed their eyes.