The Wizzard and the Pony
Rincewind had thrown up his arms in what he knew to be a futile effort at self-defense. What else could he have done? There was a torrent of sunlight cascading down over the city of Ankh-Morpork, and that was new. New things, in Rincewind's experience, were seldom anything other than things to be horrified of. Drowning in sunlight would be just how he would die, he figured. Unprecedented and somehow humiliating.
The world was awash with light, golden and viscous and blinding. There was no sound but the roar of torrential lightfall, and behind it, an angry hissing sound like thousands of serpents being whipped into a lather.
It was, upon reflection, a surprisingly comfortable demise. Like basking on a rock on a particularly torpid Summer Two afternoon.
Slow, too, he thought. Come to think of it, he wasn't so much drowning as... breathing normally, albeit in panicked gasps. Upon further reflection, he thought that was fairly normal as well, so he could just as well strike that descriptor and just say "breathing normally."
"What was that?" a voice called out through the sound of rushing sunlight.
"Erm," said Rincewind. "I'm... surprised, is all," he said. "I rather expected to drown in that."
"What," said the -- now amused -- voice. "In the sunlight?" Belatedly, Rincewind identified it as that of the larger equine, Celestia.
"To be fair," said another voice -- Conina, he ventured a guess -- "there is rather a lot of it."
"It just keeps coming!" said Nijel, awestruck.
Rincewind looked around. He thought he could make out the shapes of his companions, and beyond them, what looked like perhaps buildings.
The sunlight drained away into the river Ankh, leaving behind...
Well, something was definitely wrong, Rincewind decided. Ankh-Morpork could be described with a number of nouns, pronouns, adjectives, adverbs, and even, on some nights, verbs. None of them were anything like "splendour" or "shining", and yet...
He looked around in awe. The streets were not so much clean as sparkling. The residue of filth on every cobblestone had been washed away in sunlight.* Rincewind had, a few times before, felt the touch of true awe and beauty. Never before, however, had he felt it when looking upon these streets.
Conversely, he had never felt less at home in the city than he did right then. He was unsure if this was because of the change wrought on the city by the advent of so much sunlight, or because something in him had changed. He rather hoped it was the former. The latter, like many things**, frightened him in its implications.
"Ook," said the Librarian, softly. That rather summed it up, Rincewind thought.
Rincewind looked over at his companions. Strike that, he thought. Though he rarely, if ever, used the term, he revised his thought and looked over at his friends. Awash in the slowly-fading sunlight, they looked positively majestic. Star Swirl's somewhat ragged mane and beard were, without a hair being altered, not so much ragged as charmingly eccentric. Nijel looked heroic. Conina looked... Rincewind swallowed, hard, and wrenched his gaze away. He wasn't going down that path again. Even the Librarian looked like something out of a tapestry woven with more thought to poetry than reality.***
* This, in fact, left a number of residents surprised to find that they had doorsteps, and even, in some cases, whole stoops that had been forgotten for decades, if not longer.
** Some would say "everything". They would not be wholly wrong.
*** This was a particularly Ankh-Morporkean perspective on the subject of tapestries. Where other cities might commission a tapestry to commemorate a hero's triumph over the hordes of bog-dwelling creatures that had terrorized them for years, only Ankh-Morpork would commission one to commemorate the fortnight of gastrointestinal distress the hero suffered afterwards from being forced to drink bog water.****
**** This would then be protested until a third tapestry was commissioned lauding those who had to clean up after said distress. The third tapestry would be protested by those who claimed that no one ever bothered to clean up after heroes, and, eventually, the whole thing would be scrapped. Ankh-Morpork is not, precisely, awash in tapestries.
Turning away from the Librarian, Rincewind found himself looking -- staring, really -- at Celestia and Luna. They were different. Substantially, incredibly different. It wasn't just the lingering effects of the sunlight, which was washing off. Celestia's mane, pastel and flowing in an invisible wind, was now a pale, luminous rainbow. Luna's mane was the same dark color, spangled with stars, that it had taken on when she had acted to save Star Swirl. In addition, they each seemed to have been branded by their ordeal.
Rincewind wondered about that. He also wondered whether staring at their rumps was some sort of etiquette breach.
"Well!" Star Swirl said jubilantly. "Congratulations are definitely in order! First, that was the most well-executed eclipse I have seen in, oh, decades at least! And with just the two of you!"
Rincewind frowned at the unicorn. "And, the, erm..." He gestured at the two alicorns' rears with a delicate cough.
Star Swirl chuckled. "I know!" he said. "I mean, granted, most ponies are younger when they discover their Talent, but I doubt anyone will ever have a more memorable Cutie Mark story!"
Celestia and Luna blinked at Star Swirl, confused. They looked at each other, then, with dawning realization, craned their necks to look at the new marks on their posteriors. On Celestia's thigh was the image of a yellow sun with eight orange rays of light, representing her, Luna, and their new friends. Luna's own mark appeared almost as a blot, apart from the clear crescent moon it framed.
"This is..." Celestia prodded at her rear with a forehoof, curious. "This is normal where you are from?" she asked.
"Quite," said Star Swirl. He hitched up his own robe to reveal his own mark: a five-pointed blue star on a background of pink whorls. "It's a coming-of-age thing, you see."*
"Hah!" Luna laughed defiantly. "See, Tia, I'm grown up now!"
Celestia chuckled, nuzzling the smaller alicorn. "You'll always be my little sister, Lulu," she said.
* In point of fact, Rincewind didn't see. He would later, but that is a story for another time.
Life in Ankh-Morpork soon returned, if not to normalcy, then to something resembling it. Within a few days, the freeze, near-Apocralypse, and eclipse had become a subject of gossip more than anything else. Within a week, it was barely even that. It was just another thing that had happened. The trio of talking equines could be seen in and around the city at any given time of day or night, more often within the walls of Unseen University than not.
Nijel and Conina returned to the Shades, where they were visited frequently by Star Swirl, Celestia, Luna, and even Rincewind (when he could be talked, or more frequently, tricked into visiting that part of town). The Librarian and Rincewind returned to their duties in the University, and life in Ankh-Morpork became decidedly tranquil for a change.
Rincewind loved it. All the peace and comfort of home, except this time there was no looming event on the horizon waiting to ruin it.
Well.
One looming event.
"Any ideas?" he asked Star Swirl one night when the two of them were alone in the library. (Celestia had gone to bed and Luna off to sample the night life.)
"None as yet," Star Swirl said with a sigh. "Don't misunderstand," he said. "It's not that I want to leave you." He snorted a laugh. "I'd take you with me if I could. I think you'd like it where I come from."
"I might at that."
"But I just..." Star Swirl shook his head in frustration. "I don't belong here."
Rincewind sighed. "I know that feeling," he said bitterly, then shook his head to clear it. "There has to be something."
"Ook," said a quiet voice from behind him.
"Oh," he said, turning towards the Librarian. "Hullo, you."
"Ook," the Librarian repeated firmly.
"Just, how to get the ponies back where they..." Rincwind grimaced. "Where they belong," he finished bitterly.
"Ook."
"Really?"
"Eek."
"And you never mentioned this before because...?"
"Because we never asked, I suspect," Star Swirl said.
"Ook," said the Librarian, laying a hand on Rincewind's shoulder.
"Well," said Rincewind. "I... Well. I'm touched. Really." He squared his shoulders. "But I think we'd better put their needs first, hey?"
"Rincewind," said Star Swirl gently. "I think he was." Before Rincewind could respond, the pony wrapped his forehooves around the wizard in a fierce hug.
I forgot how absolutely fantastic this story is. More people need to read Discworld, and you've done a damn fine job representing Pratchett on FiMFiction. Almost sad to see it end!
Oh... *hides defibrillator *
You cleaned up Ankh-Morpork.
You cleaned up Ankh-Morpork.
I mean, seriously? That's a feat that's up there with... okay. I don't know if anything is up there. We're talking at least a thousand years* worth of crud, waste, and occaisional citizenry ** to clean up there.
Magnificent chapter, as always.
* Odd, how a thousand years pops up so often, or it would be were it not for Narrativism, which likes simple even numbers in it's legends.
** We shall charitably overlook the opinions of one Captain Samuel Vimes, who at the time noted that he personally couldn't really tell the difference between crud, waste, and citizenry. His perspective was, understandably, skewed.***
*** Accurate, but skewed nonetheless.
I missed this but I find that this chapter was worth the wait for you simply CLEANING UP BLOODY ANKH-MORPORK an event that probebly has the disk Gods scratching their heads in confusion.
Excpet of course Lady, with Rincewind being her favorite avatar and game piece.
It will be a shame to see this end but then depending how you end it it could all be just the start of a new chapter.
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The clean-up was a last-minute addition, but I couldn't help it once I started writing. I started thinking of Timeheart from Diane Duane's Wizards books, and how it manifested, and things just sort of happened from there.
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Is that an appropriate response to a moment like that? Hiding the defibrillator? Isn't that kind of... mean?
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As I said in the Author's Notes, the next chapter is to be titled "Apocrylogue: The End of the Story. Sort Of." Take that how you will.
THIS....THIS...
THIS IS RELEVANT
TO MY INTERESTS
Knowing Rincewind, she got him thinking of potatos. A steaming baked potato filled with chili and sour cream, and sprinkled with the cheese of the gods themselves and dangit, now I'm hungry.
Well, that raises a number of questions. And the possibility of a sequel.
In any case, glad to see this updating. Eagerly looking forward to the Apocrylouge and whatever may come after.
you know I completly forgot this was in my favourites....
now I remember it is. I remember how awesome it is. well worth the wait
I love pratchett and his writing style and you pretty much hit it spot on. not A* but A+.
I LOVE IT.
3849644 Yeah thanks for making us all hungry.
This is one of the most hilarious stories on FF that Ive ever read. I apologise that its not The most hilarious, as I have, currently, the entire works of main story Discworld, plus many of the alternate works of the region.
Im wondering, given Rincewind spent time in the Dungeon Dimentions, how would he be up for a nice, quiet, holiday in Equestria, hanging round the Castle Of The Royal Pony Sisters? Maybe plant a tree made from a chip off a certain chunk of sapient pearwood?
It might explain why DisQuord hates it so much.
It's back! And it's glorious!
Don't feel bad about ending a story. Stories are meant to end. The alternative, namely leaving them hanging, is way worse
Yes! Great to see that a story didn't die!
What a wonderful fic. Hope you eventually get to finishing it off.
This is a lovely story and I do hope to see the last chapter soon.
and it would be wonderful if you'd make a sequel to it like Rincewind and the other bearers of diskborns getting to Equestria. And maybe establishing a portal so they could visit each other. (And Rincewind would have a better place to run and hide )
Dragon
Brilliant story. I do hope you'll find the time to write the Apocrylogue soon. And I kind of hope that Rincewind finds his way to Equestria, even if Narrativum may not permit him to see Starswirl again.
This appears to be missing an ending...
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I've been very busy over the past -- jeez, it's been over a year now -- with the Elements of Harmony podcast. The only thing really missing is the denouement, but yeah, it irks me that I haven't wrapped this up or, in fact, worked on any of a number of fics I put on the back burner back then.
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Ooooh, yes, I know that niggling feeling of something left incomplete when there's something else so shiny and new to work on...
As a whole, this story was really good so far. There were a lot of parts I really liked - the description of the Harmonic Teleport stands out, as well as the digression with respect to Nijel's sword skills and how he and Conina had found a way to use them to best advantage. I also enjoyed the running joke with regard to Rincewind's pony reputation.
And I really liked the solution to the Ice Giants problem (though I do hope Luna and Celestia put the sun and moon back where they found them - though, on the Disc, they'd only need to be approximately correct in any case)
...I'm still wondering where that stained-glass window in the Tower of Art came from, though.
Well, all things must come to an end.
I don't know why they can't just come and go though the Library, really.