• Published 29th Dec 2020
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The Trinity of Moons: Mending Shards - Cloud Ring



A story of distant Equestria, of past mistakes, dreams and mirrors.

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Chapter 42: Solution

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“We are always happy to listen and share a pie, companion,” Gentle answered warily, “After all, you are aligned to Black Moon akin to my friend here?.. Or, I suppose, you were.”

Dispassion did not answer.

Solid Line commented, “Alignment is complicated and incoherent here. Cursory Streak reports that she caught the fire. Since then I and Gentle both felt almost no link to our respective Moons even though we are Heralds too. I still feel this freedom. Never before have I felt clarity so thorough. I can solve everything, given time and space, and I need no Black Moon for that. As if I am aligned to somepony else, and don’t know to whom exactly.”

Dispassion waved her front hooves crosswise in the air, as if she was about to knock them against each other, but missed.

Gentle politely paused, but there was still no reply, so she continued, out of the corner of her eye noticing that Cursory Streak flew next to them; she did not risk to turn away from Dispassion even for a third of a beat, “When we band together the six as Black Moon asked us to do, we will have a chance to resurrect Her… I think. I believe She said so, and the Moons don't lie. This will help you too, won't it? But if you need something else, I am listening.”

“What do you remember from the time when we were unbounds?” Dispassion replied to a question with a question of her own. She directed her void-filled eyes at Gentle, and earth pony hesitated.

Cursory replied instead, “Nothing good. I am collecting stories to petition my Moon and revoke this age. It is useless and there are those who perish in it,” Cursory Streak winced, “And I feel that I need no petition. I can set the rule myself, if I just give in and dive into the White’s fire.”

Gentle, embarrassed, glanced at Cursory, and replied for herself, "Not much. We were together and were coming to the ocean. You had a constant desire to fix everything, and you often achieved it. We decided that we would not part even after we grew up. We found the dancing whirlwinds, we paid the due price and made our connection lifelong, and we were together ever after... until I was burned by the Red. After that, you were the first to stop visiting me in the hospital sector. I'm not offended!" Gentle added hastily.

She even managed not to turn and look at her right side; weak pressing pain resurfaced for a beat, and her coat there never since had been as it was before.

“It would be irrational to visit you. There was no way to meaningfully help you there at your bed. I needed to follow our oath in the most optimal way.” Dispassion said, "Once you were injured by the Red, I resorted to solve your issue from the very foundations instead, and I drew conclusions. The first conclusion: you suffered because you are alive, but this can be corrected by transferring you to a more robust form of being. The second conclusion: the Moons are destroying the world, but this can be corrected if we would find a way to erase Their words. The third conclusion: the Red is inevitable as long as there are Moons above us, but this can be corrected by destroying the Moons — not alicorns but the Moons as stellar bodies. And all the conclusions come together in a single solution that covers them all."

Solid Line did not even wait for Dispassion to finish, "The third conclusion is incorrect!"

Dispassion turned her metal head towards Solid Line, “If you want to convince me, you need to provide support for your claims. We can discuss; here and now. I have not forgotten the Black Moon's ways, little Herald. If you fail, I'll take your rig. It will serve a better purpose. I already knew that the other two conclusions were correct, but I am grateful for the independent confirmation."

Solid curled up and hid behind Cursory; the pegasus looked at her and raised her wing, protecting.

Gentle Touch felt dizzy. She didn't want to believe that these good, albeit a little strange, ponies were the enemies of the Moons. She knew not what to say, and did not even want to listen to any explanations — they could convince her mind, but she would still feel that the Moons are needed. Needed for herself, for Metropolis, all those who under Their light are never alone, and... she still needed to get the ‘Guiding Starfall-TX’. She clutched Signal, squeezed and meowing, and did not let go.

Cursory asked the question in Gentle's place, annoyed and weary but without malice, "So what can we do for you, since you, like the main character of a bad comic, knows how to save the world?"

Dispassion turned around in the air, her horn glowing with a ghostly blue methane fire.

“If you find it easier to process the data organised by images or icons, I can arrange them in that way too,” she said.

Cursory winced, Gentle smiled at her, trying to support her, ashamed by Dispassion’s jab. There was no Dispassion herself for Gentle's eyes, closed for a third of a beat, and for a moment too long she thought that real Dispassion is hidden somewhere far away and probably suffers.

There was her voice, though, “No? Then let me continue. One of my developments…” — a hidden shutter on her side moved inside, releasing a swarm of tiny metal spiders with crystals in place of heads; they tumbled and floated without the slightest will to move on their own, but under the gaze of Dispassion they gathered in a lilac sparkling ball. — “These creatures... according to lab tests they can erase and rewrite the words of the Moons on Their surface. Once again, I am not talking about alicorns. Or do you think the world just remembers everything They said?.. Then the world will assume optimal shape. It will no longer be under the pressure of the voices of many eras. The triangle is a very stable figure as long as it holds the load, and we could remove this load.”

“And what do we have to do with it?” Cursory hurried her up.

Dispassion did not answer immediately. She jerked as if from an electric shock, although why as if? Gentle thought. The metal unicorn then turned her head to the pegasus, “Ah! Yes, we were sending troops. We tried to erase these symbols from the soil of the Moons — one Moon in fact, the most hospitable one of three deadly and unwelcoming spheres. But they are themselves protected by a network of other words that bear this intention, and this, let’s say, ‘keyplate’ is hidden where we will not find it without knowing where to look.”

From behind the shutter on her other side, a small black notebook and a sparkling bottle floated up — Gentle recognized the latter.

“Give this notebook to the Black Moon. More precisely, in that future moment, to the Princess Twilight Sparkle. Neither Electra nor Starfall but Sparkle. When you call on the six for them to work the miracle, just make sure that Twilight opens it and reads it — or at the bare minimum, the first page — while she is still here. It explains why it is reasonable and necessary to remove this protection. If you agree, you receive your ‘Guiding Starfall-TX’ and your help is not needed anymore — for now. But then we have a new free and bright future before us!”

She took a short pause and switched to formal farewell, “I, Acute Dispassion, hold neither grudges nor levies towards you, Gentle Touch and your team, and your team’s paths are welcomingly anticipated to be intertwined with mine. We will act upon it, and nopony but us will do,” Dispassion smiled.

“And if we refuse?” Gentle asked warily.

“Then you won't get the medicine, companion,” Dispassion replied dryly.

Gentle turned to Cursory and caught her faint smile.

The leader answered for her entire team, even though Storm was not there, “We need to think and look around first.”

“Please do think, then call me back with your decision,” Dispassion twitched her ear; Solid looked from behind Cursory's wing and pulled the notebook and the bottle to her.

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