Across the Universe

by JewishKamikaze

A Most Innocuous Evening

Across the Universe

For Douglas Adams, who taught me that the Narrator is a character, too.

The mission was not urgent, but Fluttershy pressed forth because it would have been a pain to get up in the morning and devote precious sleeping-time to a task such as the one she was completing. The assignment gave her motivating direction in the forested expanse of frightening variables. “It is worth the effort,” she told herself. “My dearest Angel won’t eat his pancakes without blue berries,” continuing into her mind, it’s a chore to have to go to such great lengths to satisfy that bunny, though. She gnawed her cheek with a sense of unwanted duty and continued on.

Without warning, a thought seeped suddenly into her head and asserted itself rebelliously. I am getting pushed around by a small creature. Fluttershy became fearful at the materialization of the machination and felt the need to counter it with her own retort. Angel is just a picky eater, that’s all! A rebuttal oozed uncomfortably, alien and yet self-generated. You’re just scared of him! Although the assailant could not be hidden or escaped from, the mental duress forced a quick withdrawal to the far side of the nearest tree.

Discontented with the way she had been thinking as of late, Fluttershy made an effort to cleanse her mind and quested on. She was content helping her little friends, even if it required her going to great lengths to do so. It was reluctantly confirmed in her subconscious that helping the little animal friends was indeed enjoyable and worthwhile.

It was a brisk night over the Everfree Forest. Clouds blanketed the waning moon in a smooth duvet. Sharp, whirling gusts brewed a shivering odor of sweet pine and churning static that marked the advance of a gale. Braving the elements was a pony whose direction was clear and who cantered along gracefully. She longed to be back in her snug abode, for the animals were restless. Fluttershy would have preferred less tumultuous weather, but the day her reserve of blue berries became insufficient was the day Dash and her fliers had orders to induce a periodical deluge, a coincidence not uncommon in Ponyville.

Caterwauling eerily through the branches, the breeze blew back her curly-q of a mane and stung her eyes, bombarding them with particulate matter. The draft coursed through her hair all the way down to her skin, breaching many layers of velvety down and chilling her flanks. Her soft, feathered wings instinctively contracted and conformed to her sides in an attempt to shelter the shivering flanks.

The ground smelled strongly of must and was littered with innumerable twigs, leaves, and fungi. Each hoofstep either yielded a crunch or a snap, and in places, the forest litter was knee-deep. Every so often, she encountered patches of desiccated roots that curved erratically, bursting from and then diving back into equally parched soil that was in dire need of a rainstorm. Although Everfree’s weather was not directly dictated by the pegasi of Ponyville, the part she traversed constituted the outskirts of the forest, a section more affected by the town’s weather patterns than the true wilderness’s.

It was caliginous enough that Fluttershy could not see her hoof in front of her muzzle. However, this was one of the parts of the forest she could negotiate blindly, despite the extreme tenebrosity. Moreover, she had made friends with all of the creatures, great and small, that inhabited the area. The nebulous surroundings regularly caused panic to formulate in her gut and impose terror in her hooves, but the screeching of the local bats dispersed her fears at sporadic intervals. When she had nobody around her, she felt helpless; when others were there, she felt safe either in being protected or protecting. Just having someone there calmed her.

As her mind wandered, she recalled a few incidents where she learned what courage meant, most prominently the time she faced the smoke-monster who had endangered her friends. But being brave day-to-day was difficult. She remembered that incident with a shiver because the smoke-monster was a—a— Deep breaths, Fluttershy.

Furiously fighting hyperventilation, she stopped, heaved once, and then exhaled deliberately. A recollection of the Iron Will incident materialized in her energized conscious as she started to tiptoe along. Although she learned a great deal from that particular chain of events, including how to assert herself in the face of unfairness, she was ultimately wary of being too assertive. In both trials, Iron Will and the occasion she faced the—deep breaths—a strong force of will engulfed her, making her either commit valiant deeds in the face of adversity or go from a pony who stood up for herself to a bully who mistreated her friends and neighbors. This force of will was a mysterious quantity to Fluttershy. She feared it most, only unlocking the metaphysical chains constraining it on specific occasions, those being times when all other possible resources and avenues were exhausted.

The most recent incident, the Iron Will one, caused her to withdraw any trace of that powerful will down into the depths of her subconscious for fear of turning into a monster once again. The thought of hurting things was another fear of hers, being the pony who devoted much of her time to caring for woodland creatures. However, tremors of frustration quaked here and there, originating from the antipodes of her mind where the bulk of her valiance and willpower was shackled alongside Huxley’s transcendental illusions. Doors of Perceptions aside, Fluttershy was afraid of her untamed side that carried traits she never knew she could possess. Uncontrolled hypothetical thoughts of malice obviously were not uncommon, but thoughts of that variety were becoming more frequent. Oddly enough, it seemed to her that it was more difficult for her to push away insecurities raised by her own self than by even the malevolent trickster Discord.

Padding down the forest path towards her prize, often scraping against a twig apathetic to her cause, she remembered how every time it was the help of her friends that drove her to accomplish such feats of bravery. She suffered a minor laceration on her right shoulder as a result of a collision with a newly fallen branch complete with an array of splintered twigs more than willing to catch flesh unawares. She compensated for the unforeseen obstruction with a minor detour.

Without her friends, she was unsure of who she was. Tonight, without them, she was just little Fluttershy on a simple chore getting some berries for one of the animals in her care, Angel. By now, her wings had warmly melted into her flanks. Despite the relative warmth, she felt the wind’s chilling bite engulf her delicate face, but she noticed it not. She focused more on her path to the oasis of bushes that yielded the precious blue berries nestled quietly amongst the thorns and burrs that grew on the majority of the forest’s real estate.

The screeches had grown distant and the most acute noise became the gentle aural discharge of the leaves as the multitudes of them buckled under the wind’s force. The best way for her to describe the sound was as a roar of sorts. This really frightened her. The word roar was hard for her to think of due to its tendency to remind her of a certain “super-scary” reptilian beast that was “super-scary” and “really big and dangerous”.

Deep breaths, Fluttershy. Forgoing the urge to hyperventilate slowed her heart rate and her darting irises. With her friends, it was easy to feel safe, but alone in the big, dark, frightening woods amongst the worst horrors, those of the imagination, she began to feel helpless. She shook her head and reminded herself that she indirectly correlated fire-breathing beasts to leaves, an unfair comparison to the logical part of her mind shut out by the abounding panic. When the adrenaline wore off a moment later, she kicked at the dust, making a short cloud that dispersed along with her self-confidence.

Oh! How will I ever learn to be brave and self-sufficient and have courage? Why can’t it just come to me? Why don’t I have it? Tut. I’ll be brave. I’ll learn. No matter what happens, I’ll learn to face my fears alone—somehow. I’ll do it. Well. In whatever way I can. Someday I’ll find it in me. Someday.

She trotted along the invisible path guided only by memory and felt better as well as more secure while the ground shifted into spongier dirt beneath her hooves. Now, the leaves’ mass-crinkling that had frightened her soothed the residual feeling of alarm. At this stage in her development, she had learned much and found some sense of direction with the help of her friends. Even so, there were a number of steps to be taken on her journey towards courage.

Comments

[CallMeStraws]

It goes without saying that your vocabulary is something to admire. I really do enjoy your word choice and cannot wait to delve into this story some more.

It's hard to come by a fan fiction nowadays, mlp related or otherwise, that has an author who understands basic setting and developmental creativity. I think this most certainly deserves more attention than it is currently getting.

That being said however, it does seem like our ideas of "chapters" are different in terms of length, or rather, word count. I understand sometimes it can feel daunting, but I think it's a good choice to make such a well written and wordy fic into small sections. Gives the rest of us some new words to take the time and learn.