Epilogue
"Ah don't know why you keep stopping here," Big Mac said as he and Fluttershy pushed through the front door of the Carrot and Stick. "We've got better stuff at home for half the price."
Fluttershy gave him a quick kiss. "Sorry, honey. It's a deep, dark secret. Now have yourself a nice mug of cider. I'll just be a minute."
She walked around the corner of the bar, kicking up a puff of sawdust with each step. She scanned the dimly-lit faces in each little group clustered at the bar or around a table. Halfway down the length of the bar, she stopped, one hoof suspended in mid-air.
The murmur of a dozen indistinct conversations, the creaking of stools, faded away until she was aware only of one face in a group at the other end of the bar, a unicorn stallion. His colors and details were softened in the haze of dust and smoke, but he had a distinctive twinkle in his eye as he set his empty mug down and laughed. She took a deep breath, then walked over to the group and quietly slipped up next to him.
"Hello, Nosey."
The dark-blue unicorn turned to her with a wide smile on his face. He paused, confused, then the smile crept out again. "Butterfly! Long time no see!"
She smiled back at him. "We need to talk."
His head, mouth, and ears all stopped halfway on to some other expression of pleasure, waiting for his mind to come back and tell them what to do.
"Excuse me, everypony," he said, standing up. "I'll be back in a minute." He took a step towards the stallions' room.
Fluttershy stepped back to block his path, still smiling. "We need to talk now."
The two stallions he'd been talking to raised their ears to catch this new conversation.
"You know, I meant to write, but—"
She raised one hoof to his mouth. "No, you didn't. Now be a good boy and come over here and sit down."
He flicked his ears, but followed her to a table just out of earshot of the others. Nosey sat drawn up tightly in his chair like a colt taking a test he hadn't studied for. Fluttershy gave him another little smile, then looked down at the center of the table between them and began speaking quickly.
"I didn't get pregnant."
He let out a breath like a pony just acquitted on a technicality.
"But it hurt me. I was so lonely."
"I'm sorry," he said, a little too quickly. "I just wanted us both to have a good time. You said you had a good time."
"I was afraid," she went on without looking up. "I was afraid other ponies wouldn't like me. They'd see I wasn't like them. And then, you were so nice to me at first, and I thought…"
She swallowed, and blinked. This was the part where she'd imagined him leaning forward in his chair, his eyes widening as he realized what he'd done. But instead of looking downward in guilt, he looked relieved. Instead of drawing closer in sympathy, he kept glancing away as if he wanted to escape.
She could feel her mental focus pulling back into just the space behind her eyes, churning violently there. The salt shakers, the table, Nosey—they seemed far away, unreal. She had to plant both forehooves on the table to steady herself.
She hadn't realized she was still so angry.
She felt the words rise in her throat like vomit: She'd thought he loved her. She'd thought she loved him. As she imagined herself saying them, here in the bar, they sunk back down in leaden shame.
She'd loved her mother. Anypony who knew even that much about love had no excuse for such stupidity.
What she wanted most was to explain everything to him, make him understand how badly he'd hurt her. And that meant she mustn't explain it at all. This wasn't supposed to be about her.
She took a deep breath. "Well… I shut myself away for a long time, and almost missed everything. Everything." She glanced back towards the bar's entrance, where Big Mac was just a big, dark silhouette leaning over a mug.
Nosey frowned. "But you're okay now, right?"
"Yes. I'm okay now."
"I'm glad it worked out for you. That's great. Great. You moved on, I've moved on. No hard feelings." He leaned back in his chair, glancing around as if he were looking for someone to rescue him from this conversation.
She looked up. The bar had grown quiet around them. She stared over at his two companions, who quickly turned their heads away and started talking loudly to each other.
"I'm not asking for an apology," she said. "I'm trying to help you."
"I don't follow."
She sighed. "This isn't going right at all."
He nodded. "It's okay. Forget about it." He put his hooves on the table, ready to stand up.
"Wait." She indicated the other two stallions with her nose. "Are those ponies your friends?"
"Yeah, they're my friends."
"Good friends?"
He looked back over his shoulder at them. "Yeah, sure."
"Why don't you introduce me to them?"
He studied her with half a smile and cynical eyes for a few seconds.
"Okay. I don't see why not." He led her back to the two other stallions, who were still sitting at the bar: a pegasus with a goatee and intense, deep-set eyes, and an earth pony wearing an improbably-tall black hat.
"Gents, I'd like you to meet Butterfly, one of the sweetest mares I've had the pleasure of knowing."
"Fluttershy," she said. "My pleasure."
"Fluttershy," Nosey repeated. "And Fluttershy, meet Boxcar and Enigma, my best pals in Ponyville."
Fluttershy nodded at them each in turn. As soon as they had all sat down together and gotten out the standard greetings, she turned and called down the length of the bar, "Honey? Would you come over here, please?"
At the other end of the bar, the big silhouette raised its head, then stood and began plodding towards them. Nosey watched closely, flaring his nostrils, and began tapping the edge of his empty glass lightly.
She turned back to the ponies she'd just met. "I just thought you'd like to know that my husband is coming over here to, um, trample, your friend. If you don't mind."
The other two stallions looked up at the big red figure coming towards them out of the darkness, looked at Nosey, then looked at each other.
"Though," she added with an apologetic smile, "I'm afraid it won't make much difference if you do."
Their bar-stools were still rolling and clattering on the floor when they disappeared out the front door. Nosey sat up very straight, holding his breath.
Fluttershy shook her head sadly and turned to Nosey, who was opening and closing his mouth like a fish. "They weren't very good friends after all, were they? Oh, honey, this is Nosey. He's an old friend."
"Howdy!" Big Mac offered, looking down on the pair. "Your friends sure left in a rush."
"I was just telling him how frightened I used to be of meeting ponies."
Nosey said something choked and squeaky.
"What was that?" Fluttershy asked.
He coughed. "Sounds rough," he said a little more loudly, still looking up at Big Mac.
"Eeyup," Big Mac said. He looked down at the floor. "Fella dropped his hat."
"But," she went on, "you can also be afraid of getting close to them. Of sharing your secrets. Of getting caught. Afraid that the best thing in the world is behind one of the doors you haven't opened yet. Afraid of choosing. Of settling."
Nosey rapidly nodded his sincere and heart-felt agreement.
She looked up at Mac and smiled. "I've never had that problem. But I can imagine it could be scary."
Nosey looked back and forth between Fluttershy and Mac, who both had gentle smiles on their faces. "So… you're not angry with me?"
Fluttershy considered her answer carefully before answering. "I am angry with you." She frowned a little. "But that's not why I'm here. I hope."
"Look, Fluttershy. I appreciate your concern. But that's not me. I'm having a good time. I've got lots of friends."
"I saw," she said.
He waved his hoof dismissively toward the door. "Oh, forget those guys. I've got others. All over this part of Equestria."
"How many of them know your name?"
He snorted, just a breath, and pushed his stool back. "This conversation is getting needlessly personal."
"So you're going to run away again?"
The three ponies looked at each other in silence.
Big Mac cleared his throat. "I'm gonna go settle my bill."
"Okay, honey. I'll catch up to you in a minute."
"Don't worry," she told Nosey as she watched Mac walk away. "He wouldn't hurt a fly."
"Good to know," Nosey said, "but I'd still rather leave before he gets back." He stood up.
"Unless he thought it had ever done anything to hurt me."
He sat back down.
"So why are you here?" he asked.
"So you can see that I'm happy now."
"So what is this, some kind of passive-aggressive revenge?"
"Oh, no. No." She drew her head back and frowned. "At least, I hope not. I wanted you to see how happy my husband Mac is. But I think we scared him off."
Nosey swirled the ice cubes in his empty glass. "Ironic."
Fluttershy looked down to her right along the bar. Mac was waiting quietly in the background, while the bartender polished a glass and listened with a polite smile to a shaggy earth pony, three empty glasses before him, telling a story about a cow that was afraid of squirrels.
"I guess Mac and I aren't very expressive ponies," she eventually said. "But he is happy."
Nosey said nothing.
"Oh, it's hard sometimes. You wouldn't think we could shout at each other, would you? We do, sometimes. But not very much."
Nosey slumped his shoulders and started playing with his glass. "I'm glad to hear it."
She stared at him intently.
"A lot of ponies say a lot of silly things about marriage." She clicked her tongue. "No, that's not what I mean. Marriage isn't even what I'm talking about." After a glance at Mac, she lowered her voice and said, "I don't want a promise from Mac. If a day came when he'd be happier without me, I'd want him to go, and be happy."
He raised one eyebrow. It was the first sign of interest he'd shown. "So what are you talking about?"
She wrinkled her brow, thinking. "It's the most amazing thing... Sometimes, if you try hard, for a long time, to see what another pony sees, and feel what they feel... you do."
Nosey sat up straighter on his stool.
"It was horrifying the first time. I'd just gone out to the field to bring Mac his lunch, and he was holding it and looking at me, saying thanks, but I saw this look in his eyes that he gets when something is hurting him but he won't admit it. He was looking at me. I was hurting him somehow."
Her eyes unfocused, and her nose drifted down, pointing vaguely toward the bar's glossy surface. "And then I remembered him telling me that his mother always brought lunch out to the fields at noon on the dot, no matter what, and smiling when he said it. I'd decided I'd do the same thing, only then I didn't. It was much more efficient to feed all the animals at the same time, you see. And it took so long sometimes. Each day I said to myself, 'Tomorrow,' until I stopped doing even that."
By now she'd drifted so far into the past that Nosey could have slipped off unnoticed. But he sat stock still, his empty glass forgotten.
"I'd gotten so used to seeing him and talking to him that I was just seeing him and hearing him. Not feeling him. Like he wasn't as real inside as me. And now my husband was looking at me, not complaining, but I saw what he saw. The pony he loved, who couldn't be bothered to feed him before her animals. I felt him feeling… ignored. Ashamed. There was another… another I there, as alive and real as me, hovering somewhere near me, looking out through its eyes like I look out through mine, and suddenly I saw what it saw. I saw how phony my smile looked. How I'd handed him his lunch like I was just getting rid of it. And he didn't even know how easy it would have been for me to step away from the animals and bring him his lunch on time, to show he was important. I was even worse than he knew."
Her head drooped slowly as she said this, her eyebrows squeezing together in an inverted V, until she looked like she might cry. "And all the while I kept remembering other things I did, or didn't do, and every one of them felt heavy. He had just gotten used to carrying around all this weight. And I could feel him still loving me from underneath it."
Nosey leaned towards her, raising a hoof uncertainly toward her shoulder. But she took a deep breath, and raised her head up straight. "When that happens, you've either got to shut it out and run back to the safety of your own head… or you've got to do something. Mostly just little things you never bothered to, or didn't really think mattered. But you've got to keep on reaching out for that other I, trying to feel what it feels, and keep on doing, until you can stand to see yourself through those eyes. And then, strange things happen."
As she spoke, Nosey's jaws slackened, and his hoof dropped slowly to the bar.
"You start saying 'we' more than 'I'. You care about twice as many things. You notice twice as much as before. You don't have all the same opinions, but you can sort of understand them all, twice as many as you did before. You do twice as much. You feel twice as much alive."
There was a long silence. Then the other pony let out a breath, leaned back, and rubbed his chin. "I admit… it sounds nice."
"And when you try to imagine—and sometimes you do—what it would be like if you left them, you can't. Because it wouldn't be 'you' anymore. It would just be that half-pony you used to be."
Nosey scowled abruptly. "Now that's romance-novel talk. It's creepy. And it can't happen."
"It could have," she said. She looked into his eyes. "I would have given that to you. Everything I am, for the rest of my life."
He shifted uneasily on his stool and ran one hoof over his mane. Looking closely, Fluttershy noticed the hair around his eyes and horn had begun to turn gray.
"I'm glad I didn't," she said. "I'm too quick to love. I'm the opposite of you, that way. You closed that door, not me. But you didn't even stop to see what was inside."
He slumped all the way forward, laying his head on his hooves and not even looking at her. "Congratulations. You win. I made a mistake. Is that what you wanted to hear?"
"No." She reached over and touched his foreleg. "I wanted you to know that it can be worth it. Really, really worth it. I want to help you not be afraid."
He stared at her, opening his eyes wide, as if she had just now appeared next to him. "Who are you?"
"Just another pony who's been afraid."
He looked down at the bar. "It's too late."
"It's too late for you and me, that way," she said. "But it's not too late for you. And we can still be friends. I think you need a friend. A real friend."
He said nothing, so she got up and set the stools back up that his friends had knocked over in their haste. Then she turned to leave.
"River Pebble," he called after her.
She turned. "What?"
"River Pebble. That's my name."
She smiled. "That's a lovely name."
She rejoined Big Mac by the front door. "Don't tell me you been looking for that fella all this time," he said as they left.
"Okay."
They blinked in the sunlight outside. Big Mac snorted lightly, in the way that Fluttershy knew meant he was annoyed and amused at the same time. "But we're not going back there again, are we?"
"Ee-nope," Fluttershy said as they walked away.
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basically reprinting what I said in correspondence ...
You've hit the nail on the head as to why River Pebble, aka "Nosey," is really a much more pathetic character than is Fluttershy. "Nosey" catches Fluttershy at a moment of weakness and need in which he is able to deeply wound her psyche, but (unlike Fluttershy) he is unable to achieve anything himself, he cannot evoke or properly respond to the deep love and loyalty Fluttershy can from others. From a purely cold-blooded viewpoint, he has tossed aside the opportunity to be the lover, or at least the good friend, of somepony who becomes admired and of high status in the Realm, what Rarity describes to herself in my story as "a goddess, slumming." He could have had this -- could have at least had her friendship -- just by being halfway decent to her. And he could have had true love from her, had he truly loved her in return.
Nosey thinks he has a lot of friends, but he doesn't. Fluttershy's friends are willing to stand by her against invading armies and mad gods and demons from Tartarus. Nosey's supposed friends aren't willing to stand by him against the much milder menace of a possibly pissed-off Big Mac.
Fluttershy recovers from the harm Nosey does her and goes on to be a heroine of Equestria. Nosey is still a pathetic traveling salespony, getting what comfort he can from the cheap, the desparate and the occasional naive innocent who doesn't recognize him for what he is.
I think the key part is this:
She's not angry, not rubbing his face in it, merely being honest. If River Pebble had treated her with love instead of scorn, she would have fallen for him for the long term, and he is very much less than her.
Which means that your Fluttershy has come to agree with my Rarity's conclusion:
Fluttershy would be the most terrifying Mafia don ever.
I have to admit, I'm kind of disappointed that Big Mac didn't simply disassemble Nosey
Also,
might want to fix that.
I'm going to have to think for a while about how I feel about this epilogue. It certainly transforms the story. I thought that the original was very effective in what it did — telling a tragedy, to provoke empathy and anger. Now I don't know what it's trying to do. This isn't revenge porn, though it teases it. This is about forgiveness, but not really about forgiveness, which would look more like something that doesn't make a story at all (her working through her internal issues and gradually forgetting over time). It's more viscerally satisfying, but it's less clean. It feels like, and I say this in a meta sense as well as an addressing-the-character sense, stirring up something that shouldn't have been stirred back up, except perhaps it always needed to be. And for that, it seems like it's doing exactly what you designed it to do, which is provoke further thought. I guess? The only solid stab I've got, off the top of my head, is that it feels like great writing and poor meta-writing, or perhaps exactly vice versa.
As I've said, I'm going to have to think about this for a while. Just thought it was worth sharing in the moment.
Also, taking a Sad story and giving it a moment of redemption? Who are you, and what have you done with Bad Horse?
I'm holding myself for ransom. If you ever want to see me again, leave ten thousand bits in tens and twenties behind the featured box.
4494181
Ah, but I think the point is how irrelevant Nosey is in the larger sense to Fluttershy's life, once she's gotten over the pain he caused her. He's not her nemesis, or anything like that -- she's a heroine of the realm who is loved by her friends and husband (whether they are legally wed being irrelevant, given that Big Mac is very obviously loyal to and in love with her); and Nosey / River Pebble is just a pathetic aging Casanova who wanders the land doing some kind of sales job and hangs around in bars hoping to pick up mares of easy virtue (and the occasional naive young mare like younger-Fluttershy, when he gets lucky -- and I think that younger-Fluttershy was probably the luckiest he ever got in his whole life).
She just wanted to talk to him to put a close on that loose end in her story. Maybe to give him some good advice. Maybe (because Fluttershy isn't perfect) to make it obvious to him what a mistake he made by treating her cruelly all those years ago.
The joke of it is that given only her canon abilities, Fluttershy could have hurt him far worse than Big Mac -- Big Mac could at most have killed him (and isn't mean enough to do any such thing on purpose). Fluttershy could have shattered his mind. And though River Pebble may not know this (I'm guessing The Stare is kept secret), Fluttershy most definitely does.
4494335
There's a cruel edge to Fluttershy's kindness at the end, for which I don't blame her at all, given how shabbily River Pebble treated her all those years ago. She's in a way flaunting herself before him and saying to him "I'm beautiful, successful, happy and well-beloved -- and how are you doing?" making it obvious to him that she's grown far beyond him.
But then, what's she supposed to do if she meets him? Reward him for his previous treachery by throwing herself at him? Be willing to befriend somepony she alreadly knows is willing to treat her like garbage? Why would she even want to make him at all a part of her life again? She's found a good and honest stallion who sincerely loves her -- why would she want to hang around with a bad and false one, even as a friend?
Fluttershy's nice, not self-destructive.
As for physically attacking Nosey, what purpose would that serve? At best, Fluttershy and/or Big Mac would be lowering themselves to needless brutality, while at worst they might get in real legal trouble doing something like this. And by doing this they would be confirming that Nosey's important to them.
Does Big Mac know the backstory? Probably. It's the kind of thing that would very likely come up at some point in a long-lasting love-affair or marriage. He probably hates and despises Nosey for hurting Flutttershy, but he's also decent, mature and restrained enough to know that physical violence isn't always the best answer. Which is a good thing, cuz the stallion is built like a freakin' tank!
If he were the violent type, he'd be very dangerous to be around!
4494437 To paraphrase an old joke, to teach a mule, first you have to get his attention. Nosy was giving Fluttershy more attention than he had ever given anypony else in his life, and she didn't even have to break a 2x4 over his head first.
This chapter feels more like a separate story entirely than part of the story which preceded it. Not that it isn't obviously related to it, just... I dunno. Feels almost like a fix-fic, where we see that everything is alright with the character we really care about.
4494681
Part of it is that we already knew that Fluttershy turned out well in the end. Her character development during the show shows that she better. This was more a fix-fic for 'Nosey.' We never see him again in her story up to this point, and people don't change unless acted upon by an outside force. Fluttershy decided to be Newton's outside force and teach Nosey a (friendship) lesson.
What have we learned?
1. Fluttershy didn't need fixing. That was already done by the writers of FiM.
2. 'Nosey' did. And it comes out as a show-worthy Character Establishing Moment for Fluttershy in the meantime.
4494175
huh?
4494767
Thanks -- fixed the quote!
If you had asked me back when this story was written what I wanted when the show ended, I would've responded like everyone else did: Twilight becomes a princess and all my favorite sadfics get a redemption ending.
This one definitely worked out better than the other.
4494681
4494335
Quick note regarding this feeling a bit oddly optimistic given what came before: The original story is before the show, and we know that Fluttershy gets better. The tragedy was always about how she felt at the time, not her eventual state. And this is the only way the story can continue, too. We know what happened to Fluttershy, we know that she must get better[1], so the question now is: who is Pebble? How did he come to do what he did? Sure, it's easy to imagine him as just this villain and loathe him, but that's the easy way out. He has a story of his own, all characters do[2].
So in a way this does end in a bleak Bad Horse-y way, just not for Fluttershy. Instead the bleakness is intended for Pebble. It has been shown to him just who he is and what he is. All self-serving justifications were plucked from his lips because Fluttershy isn't accusing, she isn't threatening either[3]. Where he expected recriminations she offers pity. And that cuts the deepest.
[1] Via friendship. Which is magic.
[2] Or they do in stories with competent writers. And Bad Horse is nothing if not a competent writer.
[3] The Big Mac thing being there to prove a point, of course. Because if Fluttershy wanted physical vengeance... sweet Celestia full of grace there would be a queue of ponies and beasts alike all willing to turn Pebble into a fine, fine paste.
4494969
Oh, I don't doubt that it is still bleak in its own way (though a lot less so, really, mostly because we are much more emotionally invested in Fluttershy than we are the OC), but the story of Fluttershy's Night Out, or at least the first three chapters thereof, was about Fluttershy, so it felt a bit odd to make it suddenly be so focused on Pebbles in the epilogue.
As Doctor Manhattan once said, "Nothing ever ends," but stories do end at various places, and it felt like the story ended at the end of chapter 3. Chapter 4 was related to the story, but wasn't really the same story as was told in the first three chapters.
4495012
Yeah, I agree; I think that's part of my restlessness about the chapter. In the original, Nosey was sort of a force of nature; you always knew what he was going to do, the story was about Fluttershy caught in the storm.
4494437
That's the thing, isn't it? The story makes pretty clear IMHO that she doesn't know — that she wants to improve him, to forgive him, to threaten him and feel him squirm for that moment before she claims the moral high ground, and that she vacillates between them on the spur of the moment rather than having a speech written out.
And yet it makes equally clear that she's been searching for him for years.
4494400
But you're the only one who knows where my wife and colt …
… oh …
… oh. You magnificent bastard. (runs to the bank)
I like this. It doesn't detract from the original story, and it makes the important point that kindness is not weakness.
I find this really strange...
I wrote a story called Vinyl's Night Out...
Not that this wasn't a great story before, but I really like this ending. It's nice to know Fluttershy didn't remain in denial about what happened to her and learned from the experience. A truly excellent story.
I agree with what JediMasterEd said:
4494400
NOBODY MOVE...
screeninsults.com/images/blazing-saddles-gun4.jpg
...OR THE DARK HORSE GETS IT!
I read this after following the tagged story from your blog post about this, and I must say that it is very well written, and that I enjoyed reading it. I especially enjoyed this bit:
Yes, I see what you did there, and I like it.
I have some mixed feelings about the final chapter, though, for some of the same reasons as Titanium Dragon expressed; though I feel that this is more a semi-redemption of Nosey/River Pebble and not a fix-fic for Fluttershy. Yes, we get to see Fluttershy achieve the closure she has apparently been seeking, and she does it by showing that sometimes you have to be kind to be cruel; but for reasons I can't quite place at the moment, it feels as though the emotion in the preceding chapter has been diminished by the final chapter's inclusion. This may be due to the time-gap in the writing of the original three chapters and the epilogue: reading the first three alone, readers can ponder their own preferred closure for Fluttershy; reading all four chapters continuously, there's a slight jarring, a shift of tone, in the final chapter that, at least for me, detracts from the overall "feeling" of the story. My apologies if I'm not explaining it very well, but that's because I just can't quite put my finger on it at the moment. I guess I have my own ideas about how I feel the final chapter should have gone, and there's something about what *is* there that doesn't feel quite "right" to me. As always, opinions may vary, and probably do.
Overall, though, I still greatly enjoyed this; thank you for writing it.
Respectfully as always,
The Ponytrician.
Eeyup. Funny, how adding more can take away from what came before. It is in a different mood; I didn't even try to match the tone of the earlier chapters because it wouldn't make sense to.
I wonder how I could have transitioned between them. Maybe I could have handled this better with a CYOA? (Choose Your Own Adventure, not Cover Your Own Ass, for those of you in govt work.)
One aspect of the original story that I found compelling was that River Pebble didn't completely feel like a villain. Bad Horse seems to emphasize this point when Fluttershy gets flustered at his advances and instead of forcing himself upon her, Pebble walks away to take a look at her flowers. Indeed, I almost felt sorry for him in the morning when Fluttershy starts talking about writing letters and gives him the crysanthimums. My reaction to this at the time was that only in the morning did he realize how innocent Fluttershy is and how his actions would hurt her. He was just a guy in search of a one night stand, but she obviously thought it to be something more. Thus, the tragedy of the story is in pairing the innocent Fluttershy with a charming stallion looking for casual sex, and the inevitability of the events from the time they meet. (The story is somewhat darker if you think Pebble is cognizant of Fluttershy's innocence well before then and is manipulating her throughout the story. Indeed, he probably steps over the line when he invites himself to follow Fluttershy home after she weakly hints at wanting to part for the night). Regardless, unlike a typical sadfic with this premise, Bad Horse strove to make the villain at least somewhat relateable. Indeed, had Fluttershy held the same attitude as Pebble and was at the bar to find somepony for a quick roll in the hay, both ponies would been completely satisfied at the conclusion of the story.
As others have said, however, the epilogue completely transforms the story. The tone of the story shifts dramatically as does the direction of the story, making it feel somewhat disconnected from the rest of the narrative (and indeed, it seems to have been influenced by another entire story written in the intervening time between the publishing of chapters 3 and 4). At first, I was uncomfortable with how the epilogue departs from the story, but upon further reflection, I am coming to appreciate the epilogue more. As originally written, the story focuses squarely on Fluttershy and thus narrative begs the reader to consider how her actions led to the tragedy. Thus, the story is about her naïveté and her failure to heed the advice from the brown stallion in chapter 1. The epilogue, however, shifts the focus to Pebble and along with it, responsibility for the tragedy. I think that this shift in blame was the source of some of my initial discomfort with the epilogue, but in this case, the story should aim to make the reader uncomfortable.
For the epilogue does not criticize Pebble for manipulating Fluttershy or taking advantage of her; rather, it points to some of his cultural assumptions as the problem. While I had thought that the story would not be a tragedy if Fluttershy were just looking for a one night stand like Pebble, the epilogue questions that very view and seems to take the stand that a culture of casual sex and shallow relationships is the source of the tragedy. While I do not entirely agree with that view, it's a compelling idea, and it addresses a very relevant subject, given society's recent focus on issues of mysogyny, entitlement and rape culture in the wake of the federal investigation of sexual assaults at many colleges and the Elliot Roger killings. But given how important these ideas are, I do wish they figured into the entire story and did not feel like a non sequitur tacked onto the end.
That's a great analysis! You described what I tried to picture as the root of the problem in both sections, but somehow it never occurred to me that I was breaking the theme with chapter 4.
I still feel like there ought to be a way to do that--that a foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds. Why must a story take a single point of view? Would it be better if I told chapter 4 from Nosey's point of view?
this chapter title fits the update date
This is a rather nice epilogue. The middle does get to be a bit confusing as Fluttershy dances around the issue, but that seems to be flutters being flutters. I think you hit the nail on the head though when it comes to relationships.
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I agree that a story can take both points of view, though perhaps not this one as presently constructed. A strength of the original piece is in the tragedy's inevitability: from the moment Nosey and Fluttershy meet, the reader knows the night is not going to end well. Indeed, in many tragedies, anticipation and inevitability are powerful devices, which is summed up well by this excerpt from a NY Times piece that has stuck with me:
I don't get that same sense of inevitability from the epilogue, however. As I mentoned before it feels like a non sequitur, and does not follow logically from what happened previously. Nothing in the story foreshadows Fluttershy's reaction to seeing Nosey again nor the thematic shift. Whereas the sense of inevitability heightens the tragedy of the original story, the lack of narrative momentum backing up the epilogue lessens its impact on the reader. The epilogue may have benefited from additional context, especially given the fact that the message is not so straightforward. What happened to Fluttershy between chapters three and four that led her to take this point of view? (I suspect some of this may have been covered in "A Robust Solution," which I have not read yet.) Indeed, there is a considerable amount left unexplained given how meek and submissive she is in the first three chapters versus her quiet assertiveness in the final chapter. A more ambitious alternative may be to give Nosey's story and show the reader the shallowness and loneliness of his life as a way of building toward his conversation with Fluttershy at the end. Either way, these seem better suited as sequels to the story, rather than an epilogue.
Also, I think you've invented a new subgenre here:
Fluttersly.
I was very surprised to see my name in the author's note, especially attached to a story I hadn't written. I'm flattered, my dear Mr. Horse, but you've never approached me for pre-reading, and I can't take credit for Jordan179's story.
4508599 Doh! Your names are too similar. I'm afraid that, to avoid confusing me, you'll have to have a deathmatch with each other.
4508881 I accept your terms, and will begin immediately, so no one has a chance to tell him first.
Man, you're stories always have the best comments threads. Especially seeing Horizon and Ghost talking about it. I wanted to say many of the same things, but looks like I didn't get to this one soon enough.
This chapter is certainly more of an epilogue than just a fourth act, and one could argue either way whether or not the subversion of tone/theme/focus weakens or strengthens the story. It was certainly enlightening to read said arguments! But considering that the original three chapters were always meant to lead into the show anyways, I really want to call more attention to how believably and effectively you've crafted a more matured, developed Fluttershy who has grown for her experiences, though. The course of action that you chose to have her take, and even just the word-choice in how she speaks, all point to a stronger person/pony but not one who's lost touch with the core aspects of her character. You hit the nail on the head when you said "how the element of kindness would respond to it" since she's still clearly a little shy/scared/unsure, but her drive and desire to help and empathize and to be kind and knowing just how much better she can make, well, life through those actions is really the driving factor here.
What I'm getting at is that I still really like your writing :-)
But man did I like the way Chapter 3 ended when I read it all that time ago... I mean, wow. It wasn't the same hard-stop as Burning Man Brony had, this one was more of a slower burn that welled up inside the reader, but I think much more effective in its own right. I mean, damn that ending just hit you with the empathy-brick and made you feel how Fluttershy felt and it came so clearly from her point of view and as she saw things... Like Horizon said, I'm worried how much different I'd feel if I'd read this chapter at the same time I read all of the others, rather than reading it an age later. And the original story was something to really chew on, but this new chapter provides a closure which is liberating to me now but I worry how it impacts the original story I love so much.
I'm so happy that I read this, and it's great, but I think I'm even happier that I read this chapter over a year after reading the original story. But Ghost and Catalysts are so right in their comments, too, that I can't be mad.
Dude, I just love what happens around you on this site. This is great.
I find this story relatable, in a good way.
This new chapter gets Fluttershy's character just right, which it has to do in three ways in order to succeed:
1) It has to match canon. Her behavior is exactly as we saw in Episode 1, with the manticore. She recognizes a creature in pain, even if it's ill-seeming and ill-meaning, and she knows just what to do to help--even if that entails risk for her and pain for the creature.
2) It has to match fanon. The fandom has developed Fluttershy into a budding naturalist, so of course she would know that the way to find a certain animal is to seek out its favorite watering hole--and wait. It's a basic technique known to any wildlife biologist. Or hunter.
2) It has to believably extrapolate the character's development. In this story we see a character who's still recognizably Fluttershy, but with greater mastery of herself and others. This we can attribute partly to the passage of time and the accretion of day-to-day experience, partly to the events of the show--you don't save the world a half-dozen times without leveling up--and partly to Mac (being in a healthy, intimate relationship is like gentle, daily exercise for one's self-confidence, an effect that is almost unnoticeable except in its absence).
The first two reasons we can assume naturally, without any explication in the story. Mac's effect on Flutteshy is the only one of the three that the author has to in some way show, and he does so very deftly.
I was reading something on Livejournal the other day (it's like going back to the 90's without the need for a flux capacitor) in which someone was opining that all the feminist F&SF seems to focus its attention on the gun-slinging, wise-cracking heroines, with nothing left over for the quiet, gentle sorts. And the response in the comments section was "Yes, but those characters are SO HARD TO WRITE."
Well, here's a story with a heroine who doesn't sling guns or crack wise but still kicks ass. And maybe it was hard to write, but somebody managed to do it, and do it well.
What's up with all these comments? Guys, it's a story about a yellow horse who has sex with a blue horse before she starts dating a red horse who's named after a hamburger, there's really no need for the fancy talk...
I feel that the epilogue brought this fic closer to the show. Fluttershy got stronger — strong enough to try to help someone who wronged her. I'm not sure if the lesson I'm seeing is a good one, but I do know that this ending makes me much happier. I'd upvote this fic if I hadn't already.
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That's actually a pick-up strategy. Some guys call it "going cold," and it's intended to make her wonder what she did wrong, and try to win back his attention. I read this part as "this guy is really, really practiced at manipulating the ladies, especially the naive innocent ones." And with the ending, he didn't so much regret what he'd done to the mares (I'm sure Fluttershy wasn't the first, or the last, of the naive innocent young ladies) as he realized what he had given up so many times - like when you have to tell the nurse at the ER that it was your own fault.
I like this ending. I think it answers a very real question in the real world. Call it philosophical, theological, or hypothetical - whatever makes you happy. It's a good question:
Why does God allow bad things to happen, bad situations to continue, and pain to exist at all? Why not swoop in on a golden chariot, stop the bad guys, and make the world perfect?
Bad Horse gives us our answer through Fluttershy. You can only be saved when you are saving someone else.
She could have left him to wallow in his miserable loneliness, but she didn't. He was hurting, and in his pain he wounded others. Fluttershy chose to react differently, and it wasn't until she tried to help him (the choice is ultimately his, and always is) that she was finally redeemed.
It's a theme throughout MLP:FiM. Twilight was saved from her reclusive ways when she came to Ponyville and stopped Nightmare Moon. Rainbow Dash was saved from her nerves when she rescued Rarity (and the Wonderbolts) at the flying competition. Rarity was saved when she was generous in, oh, about every Rarity episode. Spike was saved from greed a second time when Zecora "helped" him give to charity, reflecting a real-world saying that "the church needs the poor as much as the poor need the church."
4550481 This is one of those rare user comments that helps me understand my own story better. From now I'm going to pretend that "You can only be saved when you are saving someone else" aspect was deliberate.
4550380 You caught me. It is a pickup strategy. After I saw the reaction to the story, I wished I'd made Nosey more sympathetic, so I wasn't going to point that out.
To be fair to Nosey, it's one of those pickup strategies that could also be interpreted as "be considerate", depending on how it's done.
If you caught that one, you probably caught several others.
Eeeeeh...I can't say I really enjoyed this prologue I'm afraid.
It's not like It's poorly written, far from it in fact, it just clashes a lot with how I enjoyed the last story, which was hooves down my second favorite Fluttershy fic ( After Nosflutteratu, though you could argue that's more Twis story ) and I can't lie, I thoroughly enjoyed the last scenes slow build of Fluttershys understanding of what had been done to her, and you see that new found social shield she had constructed start to come down. What made this fic so fantastic for me was how perfectly it captures Fluttershys character, and as something I see coming before the show itself, I had to perform all of zero mental gymnastics to imagine this as being canon while I read it. The epilogue just seemed like a sort of pointless affair making sure we know that 'shy is totally okay, and I found myself just eyerolling throughout. Plus, it was a bit hard to take Fluttershys assertions that she had moved on when she is coming to this place a -lot- just to confront this guy. I just couldn't take her seriously, and while that was far from out of character, it was too distracting. I suppose it didn't help that Nosey didn't strike me as more than just a dick and I couldn't bring myself to despise him.
So yeah...Amazing first three chapters, lacking epilogue. Definitely not going to stop me re-reading this one every now and then
4568668 Thanks for explaining. The epilogue isn't there to make readers feel better--it's to show her respond to Nosey, eventually, with kindness. But it is very different in tone, and wrecks the mood of chapter 3. Maybe it should've been a sequel rather than a new chapter.
4570030 Oh t here's no problem with it being where it is. It's not at all poorly written or anything. I'm just a little butthurt because I'm not sure I emphasized enough just how much I freaking love this fic
And y'know...this IS the internet, and no opinion may be left unspoken
Oh Christ... I haven't read the chapter yet and I know some sort of shit is going to hit the fan because Big Mac is right there in the first paragraph. For those who haven't been stalking me through the comments section of several of BH's stories and journals, I end up relating massively to Big Mac whenever BH throws him into the mix (spoilers!!!), whether it's the big red pony being illiterate[1], not caring for kisses from Twilight[2], and sacrificing himself to grease the gears of the status quo, even if it means never pining for the love of Twilight, which would be rather impossible in the first place[3].
Gee, I'm kinda wondering what new horror of relatability Bad Horse has thrown at me this time lol[4]. This should be interesting. Maybe this time it will have what Big Mac fears.
[1]Big Mac Reads Something Purple. I don't actually like the actual act of reading. Too much effort and crap like that. I view it as a tool, a shovel to dig up stuff that I do like. I guess that's pretty close to illiteracy? Ok, more like ignorance...
[2]Moments. I ended up relating to Mac from his lack of response to Twi's kiss in the first chapter, before the Flutter's revelation a chapter later. It reminded me of the time a coworker tried kissing me while I was doing computer work and it didn't really register with me until a few minutes later after he left, prolly feeling dejected and hurt. I had kept on working, continuing to make barcodes scan again. Because that is more important than your fuck buddy trying to tell you something. Only during off time or break time. Jeez. I... kinda wish he were still at my store.
[3]Alicorn Cider. I relate to Big Mac through my work ethics and know what I sacrifice as a retail employee. Staying beyond my hours, unpaid (much to the chagrin of union stewards), going above what is expected, and viewing jobs such as security and office work not as real work (they don't do heavy lifting). It's all done because stubborn pride, eh? You just don't leave work unfinished. It ain't right. I end up happy with my sacrifice and being a useful member if society, never ever to step outside or above my station... *high pitch whine*
[4]He should've shoved Big Mac into All the Perfect Pony Princesses, too. Just for that extra kick of masochistic fun, eh? I must try to make a new interpretation where "Twilight" is actually !human Big Mac, who has gone delusional from sacrificing too much... shit, I made myself feel sad.
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BH, why are you so cruel? :/ You're like some sort of double agent, aren't you? Switching sides, only if it will benefit the forces of evil... wow, the Jaguar suddenly made a ton of sense. Secret agent, double agent... same difference.
The story reminded me of this thread when the story revealed Nosey's character. Those that play "the game"... perhaps it would be more productive to treat them with kindness rather than throwing accusations of misogyny at them. They're lonely... I'm referring to what the thread ultimately devolved to, and not the original news topic, which is sad and horrific. Although, this is real life, and since when are people known to be kind? It ain't in our nature, sadly. It's so rare that a gal would be so forgiving. It's so much easier to hate for trespasses.
...Yeah, I tried to derail the thread's new topic. I felt kinda sorry for the guy being bashed. A small bit.
Empathy :-)
Hmm... Big Mac relatability... it didn't lead to some mind shattering dark revelation this time. I've been called up like the way Big Mac was, although it wasn't until a few moments later that I realized it was for intimidation purposes (it was to kick a person out of the store) and I've rushed up to a friend's side when it looks like they were about to be harassed, usually without them signalling for it (I don't think they realized the hairy situation they were in). So, no sad complaints from me in regards to the story this time.
Yeah, I kinda don't like how this new ending absolutely neuters the devastation wrought by the last one because masochistic little ol' me loves writhing in emotional pain on the inside, but I like and very much appreciate that it shows the kindness resulting from a new point of view, and the growth Flutters has had. She healed ^_^
This is what I was talking about on that one discussion. Appreciating and loving the good and the bad, and being more open minded. I want to continue with the discussion. Just have a bit much on my plate right now lol.
Who was unkind to Nosey? The worst thing anypony does to him is when Fluttershy tricks Nosey into thinking that Big Mac may attack him. And while that was very marginally unkind, I think that it actually made the story more realistic because it shows that even Fluttershy's kindness has its limits.
(It also had the functional purpose of isolating Nosey to allow a real conversation, rather than him merely posturing to look cool for his alleged friends ... and showing him that those other guys weren't really his friends).
As for accusing Nosey of misogyny -- well, I'd argue that he is misogynistic, and so were the real Human versions of "Nosey" I've met in my own actual life (I can't speak for Bad Horse's life). Nosey's original actions were meant to defeat Fluttershy, not to share love or even pleasure with her. This is obvious because of the speed with which he departed in Chapter Three when offered a continued friendship.
Speaking as someone who actually likes women, and sex with women, I can say that if I'd been in Nosey's situation (with his own lack of scruples about using others) at the start of Chapter Three, I'd have been thinking "Oh great! This incredibly beautiful and nice female really likes me, and I can come back for more the next time I'm in this town!" And keep in mind that Fluttershy is an order or more of magnitude of class above the sort of mares with whom Nosey normally consorts.
The only real way that Nosey's avoidance of Fluttershy makes sense is if we assume that he sees sex as conquest and despoilation, and he's afraid of falling in love with her because that would mean in his own mind his own "defeat." In short, an entirely combative and predatory concept of sexuality; very much at odds with Fluttershy's concept of love and tenderness and co-operation.
But then, Fluttershy is the embodiment of the Virtue of Kindness.
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That's a good idea. Bud off Chapter 4 into its own story, and list the original version of Fluttershy's Night Out as the prequel. Will the site rules let you do that? It would work better artistically!
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I meant something much more than empathy. Empathy is trying to imagine how things feel from someone else's view. After being in a relationship with someone for a long time, I get something different: having the same feelings and reactions in response to things that they would, not because I'm trying to see things their way, but because I really understand their point of view--thoroughly enough that it has become to some extent my point of view.
I would have liked the ending better if Big MacIntosh would have held down Nosey while FlutterShy gelds Smiles while, the so called friends of Nosey, run away without even trying to help Nosey and the other patrons do not lift a hoof to help Nosey.
This reminds me of the idea of "shared consciousness" that Douglas Hofstadter wrote about in "I Am a Strange Loop". He argues that the nature of consciousness allows it to be literally held in more than one brain, although imperfectly. I wonder if you had read it?
5130333 I haven't read the book, though I've heard the title and have probably read a summary of it. I can't tell if he meant what I meant, but he's a smart guy, so I'll pretend he did.
I feel like all the pieces are there and I just can't put them together. I talked myself through an analysis in writing up a review for this; maybe it'll work out. :B Stay tuned.