New Endings, Old Starts

by David Silver

183 - Direct Questions

Twilight smiled from the front of the room. The room had all of one student, a cheerfully smiling draconeques. "Comforting, I'm told you've been working extra hard, taking notes for all your friends."

"Yes." Comforting pulled out a thick notepad and slapped it down. "For each of them." She spread the book, causing several more to appear, copies. "It's my fault they're away. The least I can do is help them with these notes."

Twilight wrinkled her nose. "Hm. When I'm sent on trips, nopony..." She bit back her complaint, shaking her head. "That's very good of you. I did want to ask, if I may? What is the purpose of this trip? You already said it was important to harmony, and I took you at your word... but, please?"

Comforting considered a moment how much she could tell. "Well, you're not on the mission... Telling you shouldn't hurt anything." She floated from her seat and drew a square in the air that became a panel. In that panel appeared Cracked gently encouraging Lily along. "These are wolfponies."

Twilight smiled at the image. "Aw, look at them... The family love is powerful, you can feel it from here. That one." She pointed at Lily. "Is clearly wounded and, from a practical viewpoint, a liability. But it doesn't bother Cracked at all. Anycreature that can care that deeply..."

"Exactly my thoughts." Comforting landed between Twilight and the floating animation. "But those are two lady wolfponies. The students are on the hunt for one of the last guy wolfponies around. Hopefully they'll get along..."

Twilight cocked a brow. "Comforting."

"Hm?"

Twilight waved a hoof between the two wolfponies. "Even if that works out entirely well, the odds of a successful rebound for this species is quite low if you start from a population of three. They're far too... large... for ponies to help, even if they did find one that was interested." She rubbed behind her head softly. "I think you may just be improving their life, and prolonging the end of their race."

Comforting set her hands on her small hips. "One step! I'm still a chaos critter, don't ask me about way future steps. We need guys and girls, so we're getting guys and girls. Then we can worry about the next step."

"I see..." Twilight tapped at her chin thoughtfully. "Well, conservation efforts are still worthy, so I'm not trying to discourage you, just putting a realistic lens on this."

Comforting was suddenly in Twilight's face, eyes to eyes. She didn't look angry, but the look was intense, her eyes swirling with colors. "'Realistic' lost its meaning a long time ago, Professor."

Twilight gently pushed Comforting back. "Point... Which leads smoothly into what was really on my mind." Twilight took her attention entirely off the image of the cute huge wolves being adorable. "You. You are not a pony. I don't say that in any offensive way."

Seeing ruffled feathers, she quickly clarified "I don't mean that negatively! But evidence piles up that you're...something more." Twilight tapped her hooves gently. "Who delivered you here originally if I may ask?"

Comforting tilted her head curiously. "Princess Celestia brought me to Mom as a tiny baby foal. Why?" Sudden wariness darkened her swirling eyes. "You think I'm too chaotic for Ponyville?" Had resentment secretly festered among those she cherished most?

Twilight waved her hooves placatingly. "No no! But Celestia doesn't ferry foals lightly. And your talents exceed even my gifted students..." She met Comforting's gaze earnestly. "I just want to understand your unique role better."

She offered a hoof, smiling. "You inspire with your compassion daily. But you inspire questions too. Will you help me solve those riddles?" Twilight let out a soft sigh. "You were a curious foal, but after this..." She waved over Comforting's form. "It was like you... hatched. I want to say hatched. You emerged, as something different. Still you, but also something more."

Comforting twirled left and right. "Well... Um..." Dang it. There was the downside of being a spirit that hung out so close. Questions, they came, and how did she answer them? "Twilight, I respect you, a lot."

"Good?" Twilight rubbed at her cheek. "But is that a prelude to not telling me?"

"It's a prelude to an offer." Comforting returned to her seat and sank into it. "I can tell you, but it will change you. I guess all knowledge does that... Do you really want to know?"

Twilight took one step forward. "Yes! Please?"

Comforting smiled at that. "I doubted you'd say anything else. If you had, I'd wonder if I was really talking to Professor Twilight... Twilight, I'm dead. I was dead before I got here. It just took a while for me to remember I was very dead." She tickled herself along her throat, claws scratching. "I lived, I died. I was a spirit, fading away, tired and spent."

A paper appeared with a pop, a floating quill taking notes furiously. "And then?"

Comforting chuckled gently. That Twilight was doing that, somehow comforting. "Another spirit, of this world, noticed. She sent an agent to rescue me. I think she was lonely. That agent brought me to Fluttershy, where I knew life again. And it was a wonderful and dear life..."

Twilight blinked, though the notes continued. "Are you implying Princess Celestia is a spirit's agent?!"

A message arrived, icon flashing in Comforting's view. She sighed, reaching for it. Was she in trouble?

Tell her.
--Amity

Oh. "Yes. Not... directly. She is only visited in dreams."

Twilight clopped her hooves with a look of understanding. "That explains so much!" The notes redoubled in intensity, including her thoughts and musings. "I don't have prophetic dreams, so I assume I am not an agent."

Comforting didn't correct Twilight on that one. "I lived and learned to laugh and play and just... live. But then I died again."

Twilight rubbed her hooves lightly together. "As all things do eventually, but you were still a filly. You certainly didn't die of old age."

"No, it was my fault. I got myself squashed flat." Comforting snorted, remembering that absurd series of events. "Oops... But Discord took hold of me and yanked me free. I was a spirit, but not fading and grey." She waved over her chimeric form. "As you can see! I am a spirit. I look Discord and that other spirit in the eye. I'm... a force of nature, but one that smiles and loves ponies, and other creatures. Seriously, the creatures of this world are 100% adorable and I love them."

Twilight sank to her haunches. "Well... I had thought just asking might get me answers. But this far exceeds my expectations."

Twilight ruminated over truths that redefined her perception of the cheerful student before her. "So you became an immortal embodiment related to Discord himself, yet your heart remains gentle despite wielding such power..."

A startling possibility sparked to mind. "Have you perhaps communed with the phantasmal sphere before? Glimpsed worlds beyond ours through the veil?" Her scholarly instincts buzzed with intense curiosity.

"Constantly, once I learned how," Comforting confirmed cheerily. "But I'm not sharing things you don't need to know about. Your life is better without that."

Galvanized by stunning insights, Twilight catching her quill mid-air without even glancing away from her fascinating informant. "Can other spirits do this?" she pressed eagerly. "Could you teach me to perceive past that barrier as well? Oh, just imagine what secrets we could unveil!"

Twilight bounced in place, mind positively cartooning with epiphanies and theories on magic's deepest nature thanks to this unprecedented wellspring. She had to share these truth-quakes with Starlight at once!

"Thank you for illuminating your story's mysteries," Twilight praised fervently. She levitated Comforting into an impromptu hug.

Comforting returned the hug gently. "You're welcome, but I just said I'm not telling you things you don't need to know. That wall is there for a reason. You have a lovely world right here." She smooched Twilight on the end of her nose. "Let's make the best of it, hm?"

She dropped to the ground. "And now... the hard part..." She shrugged softly. "I still want to be a kid. I want to learn and do homework and tests and things."

Twilight inclined her head. "And date Diamond Tiara?" At Comforting's coloring, Twilight leaned in. "All I've heard is that you two are a picture-perfect little children couple. But... part of me wonders, if you are actually what you just said, doesn't that feel... odd? You're dating someone not even half, possibly not even a quarter of your age." She brought her hooves farther apart with each time increment.

"It does." Comforting twirled in place. "But not a bad odd. I like her, a lot. I want her to grow into a wonderful mare. Maybe, at that point, I'll grow too. Not sure yet. Maybe we'll drift apart, or stick together. Don't know. Right now, I'm a filly. Please treat me like one. When I do something dumb, tell me, chastise me. Don't treat me any differently."

Twilight rubbed at her cheek. "I... think I'll pass on informing the others. They don't need to be fully aware of what they're leading classrooms for."

Comforting winked at that. "Now you understand a little of why I'm not telling you some things. It's not because I don't like you. I like you a lot!" She bounced back several steps. "Thank you, for listening, for not panicking... For just being you."

Twilight ruffled the top of Comforting's head with her magic. "Of course... Goodness, this brings up so many more questions... but I've bothered you enough for one day." She arched a brow. "When you asked me things, were you asking just playing the part of a filly, or did you...?"

"I asked questions of things I wanted to know." Comforting rocked on her feet forward and back. "The first world I'm from wasn't like this one. Closer to the one Equestria High is from, but not that either. I try not to ask questions I already know the answer to, unless I think asking them will get someone somewhere they need to be."

Twilight smirked gently at that. "Spirits... Go on home them." She shooed Comforting off. "Thank you again." She pensively began sorting her notes with fresh motivation. She had students to inspire on seizing each day's potential. What new realms might open by simply unveiling imagination's hidden doors? She couldn't wait to guide them seeking out their own worlds of possibility!

---

"Who said this was a good idea?!" Gallus ducked under the glistening barb of the scorpion's tail. "Because it wasn't!"

Silverstream grabbed the same tail, wrestling it as it thrashed around in her grip. "Yona! Smash!"

"Smash!" Yona crashed into the side of the oversized scorpion, knocking it clear onto its side.

The students cheered as one as they fled, the disabled scorpion unable to follow them for long enough for them to be gone. Ocellus landed beside Smolder. "So, you're sure we're headed the right way? The wolfpony's somewhere around here?" She waved out across the vast desert. "I don't see them."

The dragon winced guiltily. Earlier bravado over sniffing their target out had clearly backfired in this trackless void.

Before Ocellus could continue, Yona grunted irritably. The heat and fruitless plodding through sandy wastes wore her patience thin.

"Why we wander blindly?" she grumbled. "We ask big ponies for help yet?" In their zeal to prove themselves, the painfully obvious path had gone ignored in favor of repeat missteps.

The group exchanged chagrined looks. In their eagerness to follow cryptic clues solo, the most sensible route had been overlooked - simply asking a local guide!

"You're totally right," Sandbar sighed, wiping sweat from his brow. "No clue why we didn't just do that to begin with. Maybe one of those towering horses knows where we could find more, er...big wolves?"

Silverstream clapped excitedly, their humbling stumbles instantly forgotten. "Ooh and they could give us a ride to speed up the search!"

With restored enthusiasm, the reoriented team struck off anew with hopes rising.

Author's Note:

Comforting comes clean, and the Young Six are still on the case!

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Comments

[Dravkwn]

Regular Scorpion and not Scorponies? Where's my crossover love?

[David Silver]

11782006
Scorpan is not in this fic.

[Theresa hall]

She is a reincarnated soul who due to bad luck got to be spirit and a force of nature. Twilight needs to understand that whatever the road may bring spirits get to know more about things because it helps them do their stuff plus if people knew half of everything spirits knew they probably blow their minds. Twilight needs to accept comforting. isn't trying to find something wrong the wrong thing to do. The first time it was understandable but now she getting to be rude with it. You're supposed to accept people for they are not what you can understand. Maybe this why discord didn't really feel like anyone but fluttershy friend.

[Emtu]

I feel a quote from another unrelated story fits this situation quote well.

"I found out the hard way that there are Things Pony Was Not Meant to Know." The others, save Pinkie Pie, blinked at being able to hear the capital letters.

"Like what?" Applejack asked skeptically.

"Oh, you weren't meant to know them," Twilight answered cheerily.

[Amethyst Dragonfly]

It is clear that Twilight is one pony that won't change how she treats Comforting even after knowing Comforting's origin.

Will the Saddle Arabians be touchy about being asked to give a ride?

[Cyana Flame]

[Quirky View]

I had thought they knew where she came from before becoming a draconeques, and I also thought why she became a draconeques was also explained to Twi, or at least somepony

[Theresa hall]

11782597
Most folks I assumed heard about the accident and most likely what discord did for the kid. The news about fluttershy sweet child being hurt and changing species is something nobody wouldn't gossip about.

[David Silver]

11782746
Everypony knows she became what she is. Few know how it happened. She got in an accident, became that, and seems pretty chill about it, even happy. What's to argue?

[Theresa hall]

11782748
Twilight seems to be work up over it slightly even though she hasn't changed who she is on the inside just got new tricks to go with her new looks. Plus who besides discord could pull off something like that and he friends with fluttershy and nobody thinks that he might try to help in his own crazy way.

[uis]

Why Twilight don't just ask pony with two peas and three eyes?

11782110
Pinkie is the smartest pony.

[Twinkie Sprinkle]

Comforting's continuing interactions with Twilight are both interesting and cute.