I winced, shivering trying to trot in a straight line, an impossible act. The library was filled to the brim with equine bodies, breaths, and bellowing voices. Loud music throbbed in my ears as I stumbled my way into a punch table, nearly knocking ponies into the bookcases.
"Dah! Sorry! Pardon me! Ooof—My bad!"
"Belle. Your heart rate—"
"I'm sorry, Dalton. There's just... uhm... there are a lot—and I do mean a lot—of ponies in here."
"Is it a social gathering?"
"It's a party of some sort." I trembled, gnawing on my lip. "You know I-I don't really do well with crowds..."
"You or the subject you're sequencing with?"
"I... I..."
"You've almost communed with her personality already. Try and concentrate. Feed off of her emotions. For the time being, don't think of yourself as Bellesmith the timid unicorn. Think of yourself as 'Rainbow Crash, the daring pegasus.'"
I took several deep breaths. "I'm a daring pegasus... a daring pegasus... a daring..."
My body froze.
With burning ruby eyes, I glared at the thick crowd.
"Pfft!" I heard myself exclaim in a raspy voice. "Screw this!" I flapped a pair of blue wings and hovered above everypony's head. "I'm watching the Princess raise the sun outside!" But just as I pivoted about to fly out the window—
"Hiya!" a pink face grinned at me upside down.
"Daaah!" I flew back, slamming into a bookcase. The floor was littered with several thick encyclopedia volumes as I watched an earth pony with fluffy pink hair swinging back and forth on a chandelier, her opal eyes locked on me.
"You must be Rainbow Dash! The local weather flier!"
"And you must be... really, really creepy..."
"'Creepy?' That's no name for an earth pony, unless of course she was born on Nightmare Night, and then it wouldn't have been a birthday so much as it would have been a birthnight and nopony ever celebrates their birthday at night cuz then everyone would be too busy sleeping to bother coming over for a party and—"
"You're... the..." I squinted at her swinging form. "...the child of Mr. and Mrs. Cake from Sugarcube Corner, aren't you?"
"Heeheehee!" She giggled, snorted, and smiled my way. "I'm their niece and I'm twenty-two!"
"Yeah. Sure. Is that in Caneighdian years?"
"Hahahaha!" She kicked her legs, swinging precariously from the chandelier in dangerous little circles. "Oh, that's rich! Ha! I wish I thought of that one!"
I couldn't help but smirk. "Wow, you're pretty easy to make laugh."
"Haha! Why not?! Laughter is like a cupcake that never runs out of frosting! It's the best gift given to ponies!"
"Really?" I smirked. "This one time, a horse walked into a bar and said 'Ouch!'"
"Snkkkt—Ha ha ha ha ha ha!"
I rolled my eyes and smirked at her. "I can't row a kayak. Canoe?"
"Hahahahahah!" She wiped a tear from her face and grinned my way. "Oh, you're such a crack-up, Rainbow Dash!"
"I've had teachers at flight school call me something similar, but they used a different word besides 'crack.'"
"My name's Pinkie Pie!"
"Of course it is."
"And I'm glad you could make it to my super special surprise party for Twilight Sparkle!"
"Oh yeah. I know that name," I remarked. "She's... She's..." I blinked. "Eh, who's Twilight again?"
"She's a crazy smart unicorn from Canterlot who came to make sure the Summer Sun Celebration was in top shape!"
"Oh yeah. Like, where the heck is she?"
"She should be on her way here! Word is that Fluttershy's roped her dragon buddy into relating his whole life story..."
"Heh. She's gonna flip once she sees so many ponies here, crashing inside the library."
"Remember! She gets the first slice of cake!"
"Cake?!" I exclaimed, suddenly beaming. "I love cake! Since when was there—"
"Shhhh!" a drawling voice flew across the room. "She's comin', y'all! Turn the lights down and get real quiet!"
I blinked, my wings freezing. I felt myself plummeting, spiraling, melting through the noise and color and heat of that place.
"Belle? Belle! What's going on?"
"I..." I looked across the library. The room had stretched for millions of miles into the blackness, and yet i could see a figure on the other side, as bright as a morning sunrise, with blonde tresses and emerald eyes. "I'm not sure..."
"Another sphere is colliding with yours! We have no idea where it came from! Hold on tight! We're pulling you out!"
"Don't... Don't want to..." I was murmuring, spinning, falling. I felt tears squeezing out of my eyes and they were hot as candle wax. "B-beloved?" I wimpered.
"Belle, concentrate on my voice! You're falling too deep within the sequence!"
"I... can't go back..." I hissed, my lungs tearing. "Must... fly..." I whimpered. "I'm dying. There's nothing left. There's n-nothing..."
"Bellesmith! Try to hang on—"
A giant claw pierced my hoof.
"Aaaaaugh!" I spun over, screaming into the stone and the blood and the crimson pits. My eyes rolled back.
A flank of violet leather.
My wing snapped in two.
"Haauckt!" I spat up bile and curled into a fetal position. There was something heavy hanging around my neck, and I felt my forehead melting in two places. "Hnnngh... Please... Please..."
A giant body leered over me, reaching with scaled fingers.
"Beloved. I j-just want to see you. I just... j-just want to love you..." I sobbed into my quivering forelimbs. "Please, hold me. Hold me. Hold..."
And the burning world dissolved into whiteness around me.
oohhh shit, more austraoeh references.
but that was waayy more recent.
megusta.jpg
Twilight Sparkle enters the libraryApplejack speaks, Rainbow Dash suddenly starts remembering the end of the fight with Axan.1480111
Actually I think RD got all 'messed up in the head', causing that... thing to happen again, due to Applejack speaking.
Or at least, that's what I gathered:
1480119
Right. Lots of things converging, AJ is the parallel for beloved. I'm not sure about "messed up in the head, though" more that seeing AJ (who we can surmise is Dash's "beloved") triggers that response in Belle.
This echoes the last few things Dash said during that fight, but with Belle's context of loneliness vis a vis her "beloved" as opposed to Dash's with friendship (and Applejack).
1480111
Actually, she reacts strongly right here:
Applejack's voice is the catalyst.
1480139
Also note, everything keeps coming back to the fight with Axan.
Almost as if it happened recently...
Extremely recently...
1480150
Yes, I initially misread.
1480153
I ser that now! Sorry, on my phone, it doesn't automatically update.
1480166
Nah, I was too quick to the draw and the gun jammed, an edit and a closer read put me back on the right track.
1480151
Yes, but the Prof. mentioned that Belle has accomplished what has taken other sequencers months to do, therefore there are different subjects (I doubt it) or there's a least mild time-skip.
1480184
I accounted for that.
My theory is this:
in chapter 6 (Professor Garnet) the professor says
Like it was a recent event.
So maybe they've been doing this 'sequencing' with other subjects (or just virtually) until now.
Which could mean that Belle is able to do things "that would take other sequencers months" not only because she's better than them.
But because she's sequencing with Dash, which affects the whole process (for any number of reasons from the Element of Loyalty to the Spark of The World).
Woaaaaah dude.
Well, that sphere just came on in like a wrecking ball. Looks like the Emerald Eyes of are coming up next.
Am I the only person who still thinks Rainbow is dead?
1480269
Emerald Eyes
[Adjective for ] Eyes
Major Themes: An Incomplete List
Pairs — Pairs are present through both the narrative and story structure. Two chapter titles, two updates/day, the second story and so on. Belle and Dalton are a pair, each are heavily motivated by their "beloved," and are after the meaning or purpose behind two combined symbols, and so on.
Eyes — Within "pairs" are the eyes. The third element here is that Belle is witnessing everything through Dash's eyes, an element of voyeuristic behavior that even extends to the readers themselves. More abstractly, Belle and the powers that be are attempting to gain understanding by literally seeing.
Identity — There are the obvious conflicts in living memories that do not belong to you, but through the lens of "Pairs" it's important to recognize how each character defines themselves through others.
1480304
About identity... I'm still getting vibes of Tartarus Zero from this whole "live the lives of somepony else" sort of thing.
Ermahgerd! Need more information...
1480349
I suppose you can chalk up Borrows Devices From Skirts-land as a theme, these two stories certainly share a lot of them: Beloveds, Ash, Matriarchs, Memory, Futility/Inevitability, Sci-Fi, Apocalypse, Disney Princesses... and Identity is central in nearly everything. Who are you? What makes you? What are you searching for? What makes you complete?
1480293
I doubt it.
Well, there's the correlation- Applejack was always implied to have been Dash's "beloved", so her appearance caused Belle to lose control, and the whole thing spiraled... back to the end. Poor Rainbow...
Guess who's getting a bill in the mail for all the mood-whiplash I've been going through lately? I was all, and then bam! Rainbow death scene after Applejack enters the picture. Its just so tragic. Maybe she's in a coma like state or something, but hasn't woken up so they're going through her memories? She is a pegasus after all, and so far there have been like none of them, so they'd want to do research, right? So far my powers of hopeful optimism have kinda sucked at predicting results, but I'm not giving up. Oh, and Applejack chapter next up, or Fluttershy?
Given how canon MLP has bought into the notion that you can have magical links with others without actually meeting them, I wouldn't be surprised if something like that is causing Belle's mixture of success and dangerous failure so far. Something along the lines of actually being Rainbow Dash, but in a different form. Perhaps her loyalty pony-sonified. Belle's longing for her beloved lends a bit of credence to that notion. I'm interested to see her reaction to memories of Applejack. Methinks it will be violent and painful for our newest friend.
I hope we find out how everything got screwed up in ponyville.
Well I'm waiting to see if rd manages to get "revived" or found.
So this 'sphere' wasn't direct memory sequence of Twilight's party, it was a memory of the flashback of the party when Rainbow Dash was left for dead by Axan.
Hmmm, I'm curious as to the nature of the flash of light.
On one hand, it could be thought that this is RD dying, the flash of light as her life is extinguished, going from light to darkness. However, why then describe the light as "a bright and burning thing, like a sunrise."? It could just be a simile used to give it more impact, but something is telling me it's too simplistic.
Not the mention the fact that the light is a "bright and burning thing." reminiscent of Axan's flames. Just form canon, we can see that Axan's green flames are similar to that of Spike's, who can transport small objects across great distances. It makes it more than plausible that Axan would be able to transport RD eastward to this new setting. It could even be proposed that Axan is capable of healing RD, given that Spike in EoP demonstrates this ability - although that's stretching it a bit far, I think.
Basically, there is a heck of a lot to speculate about I'm looking forwards to the next instalments
1480293
Im positive she is
1484844
That would make sense. He did say her horn looked shorter- maybe it's progressively getting damaged as she explores the spheres?
1484529
Awww why??
I think she's still alive, however I'm not really sure how alive she is, or how she's still alive at this point.
1485201
Look dude, she was impaled like half a dozen times, smashed into rock walls, and had her wing pulverize. I can imagine hanging on for more than half an hour before fading away, and anypony capable of giving her medical attention was engaged in a last stand in some deep dark cave.
Plus, this story mentioned that the "subject" was terminated
But the good news is that if all the mane 6 were permanently dead, there would be no point in having the Part 2 that we see here
That means that there is some force capable of reviving Dash so that she can be a protaganist once more
And that means that there is a slim possibility that all the mane 6 will be ressurected . Because if you can over come death once, you can do it five more times...right?
1480404
The only thing that stops me from thinking that they're just the same person is that it would mean he would be writing an insane amount.
1485920
Which means that there really isn't anything to keep us from thinking that they're the same person.
1486647
Actually, looking at SS&E's most recent blog post....besides linking to this story with what could be a 'wink wink nudge nudge' or just trolling us, I also realise he's an Appledasher too. The plot thickens...
So whats in store for Bellesmith???? AND RAINBOW DASH?????????????????????????????????
Time for an hour and 30 minutes of this story with "The Wall"!
D'aww, that's cu- Oh. Well then. Suddenly, Axan.
1706369
You missed a comment on Chapter 11, buddy.
IIIIIt's Dashie's evaluation time!
It appears that the next few chapters will describe Dash's first encounters with each of the mane six. Also, I'm starting to sense a theme here with everything - the number two. Think about it - there are two words per chapter title, it's the sequel to Austraeoh, so the second fanfic, the pair between Belle and Dash, between Dash and Applejack, (WWWWWWWHHHHHHHHYYYYYYYY????!!!!) the pair and between the sequencer and the sequencee, and with this idea of each ponies' beloved. Maybe I'm nitpicking, but I'll just keep the number two in my mind going forward. Also, I think that I'm starting to get a better sense as to how this whole fanfic will play out. As Belle connects more and more with Dash, she will feel her emotions of love (FFFFFUUUUUUUUUUUUU-) for Applejack. The description for Eljunbyro says that Bellesmith is trying to keep her beloved safe. I think that Applejack will become her beloved which will launch her forth into a quest to find her. Unbeknownst to her, Applejack is dead. Perhaps she will find and save Dash from whatever peril she is in, harkening back to previous theory a few chapters ago, and the two will journey to the Midnight Armory together. It's certainly possible. These are my thoughts so far.
-MASH
Oh dear. I just finished
AustrailiaAustraeoh, damn it.Typical Dash right there.
and here we make the final leap.
Well after reading the comments.
I'm with Zappy for the time period this is setting in.
Now to get a confirmation for exactly where this is taking place.
It keeps coming back to Axan. The final moments of Rainbow's life, I suspect. The, ah, 'Red Moment,' to borrow a term from TES mythology. Austraeoh ended there, and I suspect Eljunbryo will too.
2029757
I don't think they're the final moments of her life. I have no evidence for it, but I am absolutely, stubbornly adamant she's not dead.
I think her 'beloved' is Applejack. It's rainbow asking for her beloved, not Bellesmith.
Unless I have missed something obvious
So Belle has jumped from the summer sun celebration to Axan killing Dash. Hopefully sequencing doesn't carry over physical changes that the subject expierences; otherwise Belle will end up with a hole in her hoof and a pretty beaten up body.
Also
fimfiction-static.net/images/emoticons/twilightsmile.png
>and yet i could see a figure
Lowercase is for chumps
Suddenly, dragon.
Damn it, Axan you idiot.
Jesus, that was sudden.
A wild Axan appeared!
4082958
That did not help.