Dancing with Herself

by Punished Bean

Chapter 6, in which the last dance of the evening is had.

It was surprisingly easy to find Trixie. Starlight just looked for the angry gray earth pony who didn’t dance with anyone, sat by herself, and sipped martini.

“Shall we dance?” Starlight asked.

The earth pony measured her with her purple eyes and her nose furrowed. Starlight clenched her teeth. Of course, to Trixie, she must have been nothing less than a painful reminder of her companion vanishing for the evening.

“You may not!” she spat. Starlight’s smile grew wider. As she thought, she could tell Trixie by her inflection alone.

“Furthermore,” the earth pony continued, “I will have you know your disguise is an insult to both my friend and myself!”

Starlight blushed with regret. She shouldn’t have left Trixie alone. But if she hadn’t… she shook her head.

“Oh yeah?” she asked. “What if I told you I was the real deal, Trixie?”

The earth pony blinked.

“How did you –” she blurted out. “Starlight?!”

She stood up and frowned again.

“You left me –”

“Yes, I know,” Starlight replied. “I left you hanging. I got confused, thought you were somepony else.” She closed her eyes. “I’m sorry, Trixie,” she said.

“I lost track of you after the transformation," Trixie muttered. "Somepony bumped into me and when I looked, you were gone..."

"That somepony was me," Starlight laughed. "I should have realized it was you by that glare alone."

"That was you?" Trixie's eyes widened, and then she frowned. "You turned into me..." she said slowly. "Was that intentional?"

Starlight chortled. “No,” she admitted. “But I’m glad I did. I’m myself again, as you can see. I had a very, very long evening, and I’m sorry I didn’t come sooner. I was setting some things up with… an old friend.”

“A friend more important than Trixie?” the other pony asked flatly.

“Never,” Starlight replied firmly. “I don’t know anypony as Great and Powerful as you.”

Trixie gave her a little smile.

“Look, Trixie,” Starlight said. “I… did a lot of thinking. I want to talk to you. Alone.”

“We can leave,” Trixie offered. “You know how much Trixie despises this place.”

“Let’s not,” Starlight shook her head. “Not yet. I have a better plan.”

Trixie cocked her head and squinted.

“Which is?”

“Let’s make sure this evening ends with a real bang.”

She reached out with her hoof.

“But first,” she asked again. “Shall we dance?”

---

“Trixie has to admit,” the earth pony hummed, “you are not a bad dancer, Starlight.”

“Thanks, Trixie,” Starlight replied softly and gave a small chuckle.

She pushed her partner away, each mare balancing against the other’s front hoof, and stepped forward, pirouetting Trixie into an embrace.

“I had some practice tonight,” she added.

“I see,” Trixie replied. Her voice sounded deeper, huskier, and she leaned into Starlight with eagerness. The purple unicorn pulled at her partner’s hoof and sent her spinning clockwise. They separated again and continued with simpler steps while they both caught their breath.

“Should Trixie be jealous of this… other pony?”

Starlight moved in closer. Even though she didn’t smell or feel like Trixie, Starlight couldn’t help but blush.

“The other pony?” she asked stupidly.

“The one you danced with before Trixie,” the magician clarified. Her eyes pierced Starlight again.

“Oh no,” Starlight snickered. “I actually stepped on a few hooves back then.”

“Poor filly,” Trixie said mockingly. “Or was it a stallion?”

“A mare,” Starlight said. “About my age. Maybe a couple of hours younger. Don’t worry, she stepped on my hooves too.”

“Will you dance with her again?” There was jealousy in her voice.

“One last dance tonight,” Starlight replied softly and felt Trixie stiffen. “It’s all part of the plan. You’ll like it. And I promise I will take you dancing next time.”

“Go on…”

“About the dancing or the plan?” Starlight asked.

“We can talk about dancing later. You asked Trixie for a smoke bomb?”

“Yeah,” Starlight nodded. She pushed and turned them, then moved across the floor. Trixie followed her lead. While obviously out of practice herself, the magician was surprisingly steady on her hind legs. Must have been all the pose-striking.

Starlight stopped and turned them around.

“Do you see that sign?” she asked. “Back in there, over my shoulder.”

“Trixie sees it. Bathrooms?”

“I will dance with the other pony around the middle of the room,” Starlight said. “I want you to stay close by, between us and the bathroom. Be ready for a swift exit.”

“Is that why Starlight needs Trixie’s smoke bomb?”

“Yes,” Starlight nodded. “I want to show these nobles an evening they won’t forget.”

Trixie’s response was a subdued, evil laugh. “Trixie likes that plan…” she muttered, then looked up. “But what about the other mare? This whole thing doesn’t seem nice to her, even though she stole you from Trixie for the whole evening.”

Starlight bit her lip and thought.

“She’s…” Starlight paused. “Let’s say she’s in on the joke. Or she will be, at least. She pranked me like this before.”

“Oh? You never mentioned anything like that…”

Starlight felt the music wind down.

“It would take too long to explain,” she said. “I will tell you the whole story – later tonight. Right now, I want you to trust me. Do you trust me, Trixie?”

The music stopped and they separated.

Trixie, in the guise of a gray earth pony, smiled and produced a small round pellet from behind her back. Like a magic trick.

“Always,” she said. “Make it count.”

“Consider it done,” Starlight took the smoke bomb and headed back to her younger self.

---

Starlight found herself still at the same table.

“It’s time,” she said quietly, and smiled. “Thorax will dispel the illusion after the next piece is done.”

She reached out.

“Would you like to be my last dance for the evening?”

Her other self smiled at her sheepishly.

“Yes.”

It pained her a bit to set herself up like this.

But without the mad scramble and journey to the past, without talking to herself and dancing with herself, Starlight might have never come to terms with her feelings. And without being there for her younger self, she would never have found it in herself to vow to reveal those feelings to Trixie.

And without Trixie…

She didn’t want to think of a life like that.

She let the other pony lead. The one-step waltz was a bit more involved, but it was growing on her. The younger self counted under her breath and the older complimented her skills.

“It’s not easy if you can’t lean against the other person,” her younger self noted.

“But you can look them in the face,” Starlight replied. “In fact, you should.”

The pony looked up with Trixie’s face. Behind her, Starlight saw the real Trixie, loitering at the edge of the dancing floor. She smiled back at her. Trixie rolled her eyes.

“But what if I don’t dance right?” her younger self asked.

“Don’t worry,” Starlight said gently. “You will.”

They danced more. The younger self shared her worries about Trixie not wanting to dance, and Starlight assured her she would love to.

“You don’t even know her,” the younger Starlight rolled her eyes.

“Maybe I don’t, maybe I do,” Starlight replied.

“Do you think your love would like to dance?”

“Oh, I know she would.”

They both blushed again.

“I have something else to tell you before we part,” Starlight said. “Do you know what the real Trixie would enjoy even more than a night of dancing without you?”

She smirked.

“Here and now, I mean.”

The younger self frowned, then smiled and replied: “She would enjoy a bit of… mischief.”

Starlight laughed.

“That is a good way to put it.”

The dance ended, and Thorax – disguised as reverse-maned Celestia – delivered his closing speech. Starlight couldn’t resist – she toyed with her younger self for just a few more moments.

The time drew closer. Starlight felt her heart beat fast as she checked her mane. The smoke pellet was still there.

Showtime.

“I know who you are,” she said firmly. “Starlight Glimmer. You’re not a good liar.”

“Does that mean…” past Starlight swallowed. “Does that mean you love me?”

“Oh Starlight…” the older unicorn chuckled. “You really shouldn’t make assumptions, you know? But I’m sure next time, you’ll have the whole context.”

“Wait, what? I heard you in the bathroom lamenting how you turned into the pony you love!”

Starlight chuckled again and shook her head.

What a dummy I was. And probably still am. Ah well.

“Now, dear guests,” Thorax spoke again. “It is time for… revelations!”

Starlight stepped to the side as her counterpart’s confused face drowned in cold green fire. She glanced to the side, towards the bathrooms. The gray pony came ablaze as well. When she looked back, her younger self had regained their shared form.

The past Starlight looked at her older counterpart and froze in shock. She couldn’t help but grin like an idiot.

“And now you know,” Starlight said. “Good luck!”

“Wait, what –”

Starlight reared back and shouted theatrically. “You call that an illusion? Behold! The Amazing Doubled Mare Trick!”

The crowd murmured as she pointed at her doppelganger. Behind her, Trixie’s eyes were wide and her mouth was agape.

“And now I will make the two mares one again!” Starlight declared, took the smoke pellet from her mane, and slammed it into the ground.

The smoke filled the vicinity and began dissipating almost immediately, but she was ready. She side-stepped her blundering younger self and jumped forward, her horn flaring up with magic. The room exploded in chaos as Starlight bounded towards Trixie and held her close. She felt the unicorn grip her and smiled.

The moment froze as her mind rushed into overdrive, calculating a pathway through space.

There it was.

A bubble of cyan magic enveloped them.

She heard Trixie exhale and smiled.

They dripped through space and appeared on a small hillock a few hundred yards due west. They landed on soft grass with a wet thud. Trixie coughed. Starlight gently put a hoof around her withers and pointed towards the dance hall.

Creatures of all kinds were exiting the building. Hasty but orderly, chatting and gesticulating vigorously. A few moments later, Starlight finally heard it.

The distant sound of their laughter.

“That was so irresponsible, Starlight,” Trixie hummed and nuzzled her. Starlight reached around her and smiled.

“It was,” she said. “But it made you smile.”

Trixie didn’t say anything else. She just smiled as she watched the creatures forming into groups outside with changelings darting between them confusedly. Their disjointed, joyful chatter carried all the way to the unicorns.

“I wanted to tell you something,” Starlight said finally.

“Yes…?”

Starlight swallowed. She thought it would be easy. But even with the whole evening behind her – twice – it wasn’t. Her chest tightened and the fire blazed once again in her heart, reminding her of the promise she gave herself.

Before the fire could consume her, she whispered:

“I love you, Trixie.”

A gust of wind blew past…

“And I love you too, Starlight.”

…but it didn’t tear their love apart after all.

Comments

[Starlight Nova]

How come Trixie isn't in the cover art?

[Alchemik]

Well played! This is very nicely written, and your use of setup and payoff is really good here. The way you handled that twist! I was kicking myself for not realizing for the rest of the story, which matched nicely with Starlight's own reaction to the reveal. The lack of longer paragraphs leaves the formatting feeling a bit odd, perhaps, but it works for you here. It plays into the pacing. 10/10, would melt into a puddle again.

Major spoilers: Wow, the cover art though. Seriously, nice job. Having two Starlights there is a hint so obvious in hindsight, as is the hourglass shape they form. The self-reflection we got to see Starlight go through here as she interacts with her past self is a lot of character development you packed neatly into a small space. It was fascinating watching her realize things with the context of both sides of the interaction, especially after wondering who this stranger actually was for the first half.

[KingSombraTheTyrantRuler]

This is very nicely written. I loved every second of it.

[Punished Bean]

11148014
She is in the background. :)

11148055
Thanks! I'm a sucker for details and foreshadowing. Even the name is quite literal. :D I did find the formatting a bit of a challenge. But it used to be much worse, believe me. I concatenated a lot in editing and it still shows in several places.
Stories about self-reflection can get kinda sluggish when it's just that - despite it being crucial for self-improvement. But I find the internal world often more important than the external. After all, you are always with yourself.

11148256
Thank you, I'm glad you liked it!

[KingSombraTheTyrantRuler]

11148343
You're welcome!

[Redwolf777sg]

Sorry, I cannot help, but think of this song after reading the the story title and cover art! The song is close enough. LMAO!

[LysanderasD]

This was fun to edit; always a joy to see stories about Starlight doing a little self-reflecting. Time travel is headache-inducing fun! Keeping track of tenses is also fun!

Glad to have been of help, and glad to see this in the box. In retrospect I probably could have been still-heavier with condensing paragraphs, but the final product is pretty good if I do say so myself.

[Punished Bean]

11148916
Thank you again for your help. I will try to mitigate the problems for the next time.
And yes, it was fun. I'm happy how it turned out.

[forbloodysummer]

This is a terrific idea, full of potential and with some great moments, but for me it ultimately doesn't live up to its promise.

I think it suffers when it goes over the same events twice. Any time a story goes back to re-cover events from a different perspective, it's repeating itself and retreading ground the audience is already familiar with. To my mind, this is only worth doing when the new perspective offers something so incredible it outweighs the drag of being told things we already know. Often this incredible thing is in how the new perspective twists things we saw before, putting them in a new context. And I think that's what you've gone for here, which was a good idea, but I think the execution caused some issues.

Firstly, you're recapping a lot of the evening. The new perspective is the sort of thing that a film might handle with a montage, but here you're going through it all, repeating almost all the conversations we already saw Starlight have earlier. And the new perspective, to me, just isn't revelatory enough to justify that? The other mare being future Starlight I think is a great move. But once that's out there, at the halfway point, the story then needs something else. And the conversations they then have together aren't really reframed in a new context all that much, I don't think?

All that's really added in the second half is Starlight's musings about stable time loops. But, as Starlight is the first to acknowledge, we know that stable time loops absolutely can exist in FIM, because Twilight already did it. So it's not really a dramatic subplot. And it's then kind of quietly dropped at the end, ultimately going nowhere.

I saw that this was written for your writing group - I couldn't see anything on the group page about time limits, so don't want to assume anything. But I think an idea this intricate requires very careful planning and studious execution, and I fear writing it for a prompt may have got in the way of that?

That said, the characters were all rock solid, the slight melancholy of Starlight's older self was well balanced, the idea of the event and its changeling origins was a great thought, the dances were written clearly without being annotated diagrams, and I absolutely love the idea of a character going back to meet their past self. Particularly in this context where there's something of a romantic element. Lady Cassandra was always my pick for Doctor Who villain with the best ending. The cover art is magnificent.

But I think this was a very bold idea to go for, and, while I enjoyed the story, I don't think it quite pulls the idea off.

[Eddy13]

Well, that was an interesting story. I was expecting the other Starlight to be Trixie, but you certainly threw expectations for a loop. So, I take it that Starlight tricked her past self into using that spell to go back in time? In any case, this was a pretty interesting story.

[Punished Bean]

11149095
Sorta. If she hadn't, the time loop would not close, and therefore the timeline would not exist.

11148703
I'm pretty sure that's what was on the mind of the person who had suggested the topic, too. :D We did "The Winner Takes it All" as a previous prompt, after all.

11149054
That's very valid criticism - thank you for taking the time to provide it!
I'm glad you enjoyed the aspects of it that you would, and I agree the story can feel fairly sluggish in chapter five. I hope you found the story worth reading overall.
The group's prompts run for two weeks and I tend to start fairly late. Not counting the deliberation and notes, from putting pen to paper, it took me about five days to finish the first draft. Another six days were spent on-and-off on back-and-forth with the editors, as well as making the cover.

My thought process for the events after the loop was to split them into five five major parts:
(1) The confrontation in the bathrooms, where Starlight (and the audience) quickly realizes what happened, and it's shown how relatively inept at fakery Starlight actually is. The future self's actions are reframed from from toying with her to humoring her. And the numerous blushes, pauses, and stutters are recontextualized from what (should) seem at first to be the "fake's" infatuation with Starlight to a mix of shock and dealing with the growing realization of her love for Trixie.
(2) The explanation of the mechanics of the loop. The point isn't for it to be a dramatic twist - it's a confirmation of the previous scene. Twilight's episode is used as a building block, but Starlight ultimately arrives at a viewpoint of hard determinism. This is important, because it should cue the audience that the rest of the evening will indeed repeat as is and the significance lies outside of the actions.
(3) The dances with herself. Here, the reframing once again gives context to body language and dialogue. Future Starlight's resolution to reveal her love changes from being vaguely threatening (young Starlight still thinks the older one is in love with her) into being the solidifying of her determination to face Trixie. The pace slows and allows the reader to absorb the journey and get to the significance of future Starlight's promise to herself.
The story stumbles here, but I cut out a lot already. With more truncation, I feel like the buildup to determination would be made less significant. And cutting it out altogether would rob Starlight of the apex of her self-reflective journey - or force the readers to look for it in retrospect, which might be asking too much.
(4) The dance with Trixie. Starlight is way more at ease and sure of herself and her emotions. Loose ends are tied in a way that the original Starlight would be unable to do.
(5) The (repeated) end of the Ball and the confession itself; final payoff of the plot and the falling action, basically.

I'll grant you the story can feel repetitive in the third part (chapter four). But some of it is by design; the reader was meant to look for the shift in context and enjoy the significance of Starlight's promise to herself. The large amount of repetition was also meant to serve partly to slow down the pace of the story and allow the reader to think about the changes Starlight had gone through. Of course, it can't work for everyone and it wasn't exactly perfectly executed. :D
Once again, thank you for your criticism. I will definitely try to keep it in mind for the future.

[Shadow Star]

11148703
you beat me to it.

[Scotishbro]

That. Was. GREAT... and powerful...

[Reviewfilly]

Very nice story, I hope it'll stay in the box for quite some time. I wrote a review about it, but it hasn't yet popped up on the aggregator, so I'll just paste it here:

'Dancing with Herself' is a fourteen thousand and five hundred word romance shortfic. Starlight is tormented by her feelings towards Trixie and a ball where everyone changes into someone else might just be the perfect opportunity to open up a little. That and perhaps something else.

It is impossible to really talk about this fic without spoilers, so I'd rather just preface the review by saying, this is an excellent story with clever writing, quaint and comfy prose, and an ending that ties together everything beautifully. If you like soft romance and clever stories, you'll not be disappointed.

With that out of the way, let's talk spoilers:

I admit, though I had read previous works of this author, I was a bit worried around the halfway mark of the story. Everything was presented very nicely, but I felt just confused and wasn't sure where the story was heading.

However, this was all part of the ruse. I felt like a happy idiot when the time-travel aspect of the story was dropped. I mean, it should have been so obvious! The cover art is an hourglass. The description mentions "only time will tell." The author is pretty much laughing you in the face and I'm all too happy to accept I was completely got.

It's pretty damn bold to not only have characters act like other characters, but also introduce a notoriously complicated narrative device into your story. And yet, here it just works. The way older-Starlight's mysterious sentences get reframed as herself fumbling to preserve a timeloop is both a source of comedy and a testament to just how well planned this story is. Everything makes coherent sense and the "ending," which at first only confuses the reader turns out to be a really sweet and bombastic finale to the story.

I also want to mention how much I like the author's care for details. The way one must exhale during long-distance teleportations so that the air doesn't cause harm. How minor details get explained and woven into the narrative. How Twilight's warm yet distant persona is presented. I'm still no fan of post-finale Equestria, but due to the fact that it largely only serves as a background for Starlight and Trixie's personal drama, I'm not bothered by it.

However, for me personally Starlight's timeloop monologue didn't really hit the spot. Don't get me wrong, it's still very well written, but it just kind of felt detached from the main focus of the drama, that being her relationship with Trixie. I am a bit shaky about even putting this in the negatives, because fundamentally it's written just as well as the rest, but to me it felt like very high quality padding. I also feel like the whole shapeshifting aspect of the story could have been explored a bit more. It works nicely as a plot device, but we don't really get to see its effects at large.

Overall: 8/10 Clever, nicely written, funny, and heartwarming. Can definitely recommend.

The site I originally submitted this on has a character-limit, so I couldn't get any more in-depth than this, but I gotta say, you're one clever author. I'll definitely be on a lookout for your following stories and I also loved your CMC one.

[Punished Bean]

11150101
I suppose Thorax never outright said they didn't use it for the selection in some capacity. The "dark times" were mostly about general rule of Chrysalis. While the demand would be lower during peacetime, I can imagine the very best changelings would still be noticed.

11149857
Glad you liked it!

11150544
Thank you, I'll check it out.

11150458
Thank you for the review! I'm glad you enjoyed the story!

I do adore details.
I think it is the glimpsed effects of a wider world which truly allows the reader to feel the story is realistic, which in turn makes it easier to get invested in it.
Like how the long-distance teleportation is an evolution of previous magical technology, with the focusing diagrams being obviously a permanent installation despite the princess herself having to attend as a key part of the process. Tells you a lot about how important the dance is, and how Twilight is still trying to push the envelope even as the ruler, without spelling it out. Enough things are left to infer - and for the reader to enjoy pondering - without burdening the story with clumsy worldbuilding dumps.

Related to that, I do agree the time travel explanation section somewhat breaks this principle, and temporarily shifts the tone. But it was written more or less to clarify the mechanics and solidifying that Starlight is indeed in a stable time loop. Mostly to stop people trying to look for differences between the two timelines for still deeper mysteries. And also to show how Starlight deals with the questions of fate and determinism.
And of course, it was made to publish my own thoughts on the mechanics of time travel in It's About Time, and what I believe the wider implications are. :) For the dump-ish nature of it, that part of the chapter ends the chapter, too – if one reads the story again but does not want to go through the explanation, it should be easy to skip.

As for the hints, yes. I do love to foreshadow and hint, in all forms I can do it in.
A good mystery should have the reader's realizations be in lock-step with the explanation delivered by the plot - a natural step which seems like an obvious thing in hindsight. And for some, it should give the satisfaction of catching the culprit before the detective does - while never leave anyone feeling like the writer is hiding things from them.
I hope to get to that sweet-spot one day.

[Punished Bean]

11150971
:D Glad you liked it!

11152460
Nicely said. I hope you enjoyed it.

[marbles]

Hot new fic of my favorite ship? YeS please!

[Ryebuck Coppercap]

Oh my stars!
The masquerade ball setup was absolutely ingenious! And that twist... It was perfect!

It's weird how, even when you make us read the story basically twice with the pov shift, it still feels fresh thanks to the twist.

Expertly done Romance story, even if I'm only just lukewarm to ~Star–Trix~ myself, it's going right to my favourites!