Trauma Anvils
CHAPTER SIXTY-TWO - TRAUMA ANVILS
In all chaos there is a cosmos, in all disorder a secret order. - C.G. Jung
Over the last few months, I'd touched a whole bunch of lives. The hundreds - liberated from the mines of Trottica. The innocents - slaughtered on the floor of Sub Mine F.
The hard won peace that sparkled over the trenches of No Mare's Land as the gates of the Crystal Empire opened wide. The fear in Kettle Corn's eyes when I tackled her down a hill for accidentally reminding me of the horrors of those very same trenches.
A changeling girl - redefining friendship. Cliff Diver redefining family.
I used to think that all that stuff added up to who I was. That the sum total of anypony was nothing more than what they leave behind. The good. The bad. The weird.
It was that notion that helped me sleep some nights - that idea that kept me wide awake on others. That principle that drove me to tear down the Sapphire Shores poster in my bedroom, and erect, in its place, stacks of picture frames and diaries and trinkets to honor all the Roses that came before, alongside the popsicle stick timberwolf made by my wonderful, loving, out-of-her-mind mother.
I lit a candle to it all! To remember what they had left behind in the world, and in me - the inheritor of the Rose Family blood curse - the Rose Family duty to hold the duckyverse together, or go bonkers trying.
But that idea of self - hinging everything on legacy - it's still only a half-truth.
I never knew my mother. Not really. I knew stories.
And the Safety kids? They didn't know Pinkie Pie. They knew a giant mouth that swallows you into a theme park/military base. And a creepy sign on the wall that watches you as you sneak. And the monstrous pink balloons that belch centuries-old popcorn smoke into the night.
But that wasn't who Pinkie Pie was. It's just the crushing weight of the trauma that she left behind.
* * *
Us new initiates stood on the platform that led to the mirror house's entrance. Cliff, Foster, Misty, Scribbles, Lime-o, and me. The seasoned Super Secret Safety Sneaker Society kids closed in further. Gathered 'round beneath us.
Fwoooosh!!! The flame from the Pinkie Pie balloon let loose. With the fun house blocking the way, all I could see of it was a squiggly lock of rubber hair and two bulging, balloonitty eyes.
But the heat licked my cheeks. The crowd of Super Sneakers glowed orange. And a few reflections from the shattered glass deep inside the house sparkled like tangerine stars flashing briefly, and burning out against an inky sky.
Meadow Blade, the Red Eye soldier / Safety School graduate, was busy making a little speech - the kind that Iris and Lucky had tried - and failed - to pull off. Way back before we even entered the tunnel. It was a fervent monologue full of wonder and ritual. It had an air of ancient ceremony. Secrets. Pride. Power.
But I didn't hear a single word. My ears, my nose, my fucking hide - all of me felt the nagging call of the mirror house instead.
It muted everything else.
I clutched my head. Tried to figure left from right, and up from down. But all I saw was a herd full of Safety kids - looking up at Meadow Blade, eyeballs twinkling in awe like rows of sparklers.
WoOoOOooOo!!! The wind carried smoke across the valley. It bit the inside of my nostrils - hard enough to finally snap me out of the carnival attraction's spell.
I found Misty beside me on my right, staring zombie-ishly at the entrance to the mirror house - just like I had moments before. His chest throbbed like his heart was trying to kick its way out.
Foster stood to my left. Shivering. Her hide - white with terror. She felt it too! Even though she didn't have time hornets in her brain like me and Misty did.
Fuck. What if all my stupid sorceror quest bullshit was bleeding over into Foster's hive mind? She was gonna get smacked with an axe-to-the-brain every single time that I got brain-axed.
Foster didn't have any experience with ducky mojo, missions. Voices and stuff. Not like me, or Misty, or even Cliff. All she ever knew of the duckyverse was horrific shadow tortures.
As Bananas Foster stared down the mouth of the mirror house, her face grew paler and paler and paler. Her chest tightened into shallow little breaths. Her eyes shimmered with tears that she refused to shed.
Till I reached out and put my forehoof on hers.
She startled at first, casting her eyeballs in every possible direction, as if awakening from some confuesitty dream. But then they fell on my charcoal hoof. As it patted her.
"It's not that," I said.
Foster sighed, and leaned against me - her complexion slowly warming back to a healthy yellow hue.
Meanwhile, Cliff pressed in close to Misty. Set a hoof on his shoulder. To calm him down. To break the spell of…whatever the hell was going on.
"Good luck!" said Meadow Blade, outta nowhere. He raised a foreleg to salute.
A hush fell over the entire herd.
"What?!" Foster and I cried out in unison.
But he wasn't talking to us. Lime-O saluted at Meadow, and crept past me, muttering nervously to herself as she slunk toward the House o' Screaming Mirrors o' Doom n' Magic.
With a shuddering breath, Lime-O stepped over the threshold. Step by hesitant step, she crept deeper, and deeper, and deeper into the attraction. Till she was nothing more than a vague shape, absorbed by the dull shimmering inside.
I stood in silence, listening for screams. But none came.
"Did you see that?" whispered Cliff.
Nopony said a word. We were all too stunned to answer.
"Rose!" Cliff whisper-shouted.
"Huh? What?"
"Did. You. See. That?" Cliff Diver pointed to the lands beyond the mirror house. More broken chain link fences on the other side. An exit ramp that petered off into darkness.
"See what?"
"When the fire went all, 'wooOOOoOrRrRsShH'," Cliff explained. "There was a path leading to a sealed-off fountain."
"The parasprites," I said.
"I'm not sure," said Cliff. "It was covered in, like, steel and stuff. There were a bunch of stairs opposite it. Giant stairs. On the other side of the road. Like...weird, curvy indentations and stuff."
"Curvy?" said Misty, pulling his eyeballs away from the creepy old fun house long enough to gaze out into the flickering marble notebook valley. "Cement stair? Ees shape like crescent moon?"
"Yes!" Cliff bounced with excitement.
"Down dee road?"
"Yes!"
"Halfway between mirror house and fountain?"
"More like sixty percent...but yes!" squeaked Cliff Diver. "You know it, don't you?"
Misty fought back a smirk. "Perhaps."
"Are the parasprites–;" I tried to ask.
"No!" Misty exclaimed with glee. Out loud. "There are no–;"
"Sorry," said Lucky.
The Safety kids below all advanced - pulling even closer to the platform. Their eyes turned into cannonballs, and shot at us - all at once.
"Really sorry," Lucky repeated herself. She could barely even muster the courage to look in our direction.
"What?" said Misty Mountain.
"Beggin' yer pardon, but 'No' ain't an option no more." Lucky hung her head. "I'm afraid you've passed the point of no return."
"Yeah, my little ponies," said Meadow Blade. "If you run away now, Pinkie Pie will have a claim on ya. She'll come to collect you…after you die. And your ghost will never know a wink of peace."
Bananas Foster broke her silence - busted out laughing. Lunatic laughter. Like that time Pinkbeard and her crew landed in the haunted Chuckle Patch, and had to escape its perilous spell of making you laugh yourself to death for no reason.
The balloon let loose another flame, and we all caught sight of Meadow's face. Waxy. Mirthless. Milky white. He wasn't joking. He was dead fucking serious.
"Ckk!" Foster choked on her own cackles, pursing her lips in sudden serious-ity.
Misty pressed himself up against me. Shoved his muzzle in my ear. "Dee sewer," he said. "I see it. Ees safe. Thees one never connect to Parasprite Fountain."
"You sure?" I asked.
Misty stepped forward to the very front of the 'stage.'
"We'll go!" he leapt gleefully into the air, and exclaimed. "I haff no fear of dees Pinkie." Misty whipped around, and stabbed us with his eyeballs. All of us.
"Oh, uh, yeah," I said.
"Totally," said Cliff. "Let's do it."
Foster looked to me again, and gazed at my evil hoof. She paused to take about two-and-a-half deep breaths - maybe two-and-three-quarters - and then, nodded sternly to Meadow Blade below us. "Okay," she said. "Let's go."
Foster spun around and charged straight toward the mirror house.
I rushed to follow her. Cliff and Misty too.
But Iris hopped up onto the platform. Leapt in front of us. "Whoa, whoa, whoa, wait." He held up a hoof.
We all skidded to a halt.
Like a filly with a checkered flag at a race track, Iris stood there, hooves up high, (eyes on the fun house), waiting for just the right moment to let the flag drop.
So we stood there too. Quietly.
We waited, and waited, and waited, and waited, and waited. I looked to Foster, and Foster looked to Misty, and Misty looked to Cliff and me.
All four of us shrugged at one another. There was no sign what-so-fucking-ever of what we were supposed to be waiting for.
Till at last, Scribbles emerged from the other side of the mirror house. Broken. Sad. A silhouette stumbling over the dancing shadows of the Marble Notebook Valley.
Oof.
We'd been so enraptured by Pinkie Pie Stuff, that I hadn't even seen Scribbles go in. I didn't get to wish her Good Luck or anything!
Scribbles' shadow hung its head low. Its knees wobbled as she walked.
It pissed me off! That she'd been put through that. Why?!
I turned, looked right past Iris, and got into a staring contest with the entrance of the fun house. What the fuck did it want? What had it done to poor Scribbles? What ancient magic was in there that had somehow managed to fuck up the reputation of Pinkie Pie's own ghost, and turn her into a boogeymare? And why-the-shit were these Safety Sneaker kids subjecting each other to it?!
"Excuse me." Meadow Blade galloped off. Circled around the labyrinth of platforms; clank clank clank - stomped over a bed of fallen fences; and came all the way around to the fun house exit.
His shadow knelt down beside Scribbles'. Hugged her. Ushered her away, through the darkness - in the direction of the fountain.
Lucky led about half of the sneaker kids to go follow them. She didn't even have to say a word.
In a mass of gray undulating bodies, the herd rounded the fences and drifted down the valley like a log rolling on a gentle river of shadow.
The rest of the S.S.S.S.S. stayed behind to make sure my friends and I didn't chicken out - didn't run away, and get our souls gobbled up by Pinkie sorcery.
"It's another kind of emotional education," said Foster, studying the body language of the silhouettes in the distance - Scribbles and Meadow Blade. "A trauma-based bonding ritual."
Just then, Lime-O slinked out from behind the fun house, her once gigantic poofy mane sagged now at her shoulders. Already, she was surrounded by friends. Dragging their hooves, they too made their way down the long shadow that the fun house cut across the Marble Notebook Valley - and disappeared into the dark gash it carved across the landscape.
"What's actually in there?" said Cliff, gesturing at the mouth of the mirror house.
"I don't know," Foster replied.
"I'm fucking tired of trauma," I said.
"Life ees trauma," said Misty, gazing into the deep dark funhouse attraction. "Whatever eet ees, let us get over with, and move on to part of life that ees more fun. You know. Crime."
My friends and I all nodded in agreement.
"Can we go?" Foster asked super-mega-loudly, turning to face the mass of Secret Society kids below us.
The herd nodded in return. Like rows of bobblehead action figures teetering in the flickering light.
Foster then spun to face Iris, who still stood beside the doorway. Playing gatekeeper.
"Yeah." Iris bowed his head and stepped aside. "The rest of the new kids are done. So, I guess…in you go. All of you. Together as friends. We don't separate friends. It's not The Safety Way."
The last thing I saw of Scribbles was a gleam of light catching her eye. Like a sunken diamond sparkling in the deep dark depths of the ocean. Refractions from Luna-only-knows where.
She seemed to be judging me. Even now.
With a collective sigh, Cliff and Foster crept along the platform, toward the entrance without a whole lot of ceremony. But I made one step - just one tap of a hoof on busted concrete - and the angry mirror demons inside my brain started screaming at me all over again.
I squeezed my eyes shut. Stumbled another hoof forward. And oomph!
Bumped into Misty, who was rubbing his temples just the same.
The call of the fun house grew louder. As soon as I motioned toward it, I lost all control. My legs started moving on their own. As though the very platform we stood upon was some kinda conveyor-belt-a-majig.
I drifted and drifted, and drifted, and slid, and slid.
Till thonk! My hooves hit a two-inch ledge on the floor, I tumbled forward into the mirror house, somersaulted - like, eleven-hundred times - and klonnggg! - knocked my head against a wall.
"Rose!" Cliff bounded in, and rushed to my side. But I threw my forehooves in the air.
"I'm fine," I said, as the ceiling poofed out a gentle cloud of dust and plaster overhead. "Really!" I exclaimed, coughing up centuries-old soot. "I'm okay."
Cliff stood back. While I rose to my hooves, and tossed my eyeballs all over the place in search of danger.
There were dim shapes. All around me. Winding walls. Cold air.
But no shadows. No more mirror voices shouting at my brain either. Just the dust, misting the ground like snowfall, caught by a single dagger of light.
Most of all, it was quiet in there.
The air grew frosty in that weird way that cabins in the woods do when you travel to them in the dead of winter, and open up the door, and step inside before anypony else has had a chance to kindle up a fire.
Everything in that fun house was like that. Silent. No sorcery. No Pinkie Pie. No magic. Nothing at all but log-cabin-cold.
The doorway to the outside - the one that I'd just stumbled through, was maybe only ten feet away, but already, it looked like it was miles off. It cast a soft, fluttery glow on everything. Lighting up a message that had been painted - blood red - on the walls: FOR A GOOD TIME, CALL 718-623…
Another painted message exclaimed in big gold letters: SUGAR SHAMROCK RULEZ!!!
A third note cut through them all. It was brighter. Recent paint. A great big, metallic-purple arrow, with a single word scrawled above it in pink: FATE.
Iris rushed to the doorway, and ate up all of our light. "Everypony okay in there?"
"Yeah," I coughed again.
"Good." Iris' haloed silhouette ran a nervous hoof through its shadowy mane. "Hey, uh, listen. Something you should know. It's totally cool that you all go in together. You know, as friends. That's great, actually! It is The Safety Way, after all." Iris snorted out a fragile little laugh. "But, it's not the Pinkie Way."
Cliff looked to me in broken hearted horror - like a foal who just found out there's no such thing as the Tooth Breezie.
But Foster didn't take her eyes off of Iris. She just stared him down - totally calm from the belly up, even as her legs furiously ground a hunk of chalky plaster into the floor. Ckkkkkk! Ckkkkkk! Ckkkkkk!
"It sucks, I know," said Iris, super apologetical-like. "But you all gotta face the mirror, well…alone. That's just how it works. So make sure each and every one of you touches it!"
"Understood," Foster said through gritted teeth. She raised a hoof to salute.
Iris turned to me. I gave a hooves-up signal. (Though I had no idea what the fuck he meant by any of this).
Next, he turned his interrogationy gaze to Cliff. And Misty. Then back to me again.
We all gave Iris a Dude-get-the-fuck outta-here-already nod. Till he obliged, and backed away. His prosthetic leg tonk-ing against the platform step-by-step until it faded to a muffled clamoring outside.
Then down to nothing.
We were left, puzzling over Iris' cryptic words. The Pinkie Way? Wanting us to act alone? 'The Mirror'? Singular? Was there really only one of them?
And why should we have to touch it? That didn't make any sense at all.
* * *
Alone at last, my friends and I, once again, shared that single beam of sickly light that oozed in through the doorway.
Cliff Diver eased me up off the ground with his shoulder. And pomf pomf pomf! brushed the dust right off of me.
"Ready?" said Foster, looking up at the great big shiny FATE arrow painted on the wall with dripping letters.
"Yeah," I coughed. "Ready."
Misty Mountain stepped forward. Nodded that he was ready too.
All four of us huddled close to one another, and followed the silvery purple-ish arrow around one bend, and then another. And another. And another. And another. Until the wall ran out.
After that, the fun house was nothing but rows upon rows of flimsy metal frames. Shattered mirror walls. Jagged edges.
"Well," said Cliff. "'You must face the mirrors alone,'" he did a bad impression of Iris. "That's not creepy at all."
Misty snorted out a feeble little chuckle. But I couldn't. Foster neither.
"Mirror," said Foster. "Just one."
Misty stopped. Gagged on his own laughter. And mused on this.
We were being warned. Not against the House o' Mirrors. But one mirror in particular. None of us had any idea what kinda 'Pinkie Sorcery' was hiding in that singular mirror.
But it was bad news. Really bad news. The kind of news that could fuck up everything.
What if it woke up the shadows inside my leg?
What if the mirror magic shattered Misty's equilibrium-or-whatever, and catapulted him back into the duckyverse without us?! What if it turned us all into starfish like the Ancient Ruby of Starfishia did to Pinkbeard and her crew - only we didn't have the Pearl of Katzarh'dongrath to undo the spell!!?
I checked my evil leg. Again. And again. And again.
Nothing.
So the four of us tip-hooved forward. Shattered glass glistened dimly on the ground all the fuck over the place, catching little flashes of light like sinister shooting stars. But a path forward had been swept aside. And we followed it.
Clonk, clonk, clonk, went our hooves against the stone slate that passed for a floor. Clonk-clonk. Clonk-clonk. Clonk-clonk. Clonk-clonk. Clonk-clonk. Sad castanets moaning out a mournful samba as we inched our way into the dark. Till finally, one of our hooves stumbled onto a crrrrrunch.
We stopped - all four of us - and listened. But the air was still.
Slowly, we backed up into one another. Instinctual-like. Flank to flank to flank to flank. So nothing could sneak up on us. And like a living compass, we peered outward at the four corners of the room.
But there was nothing there either. Just silver gashes in the darkness, running up and down - metal framework where mirrors once had stood, and the glittery floor beneath it. Playing tricks on our eyeballs.
At the far end of the broken-glass-room, was another hallway. Lit by more of that shimmery arrow paint, (though what light it could possibly be reflecting all the way in there - I still can't imagine).
We broke our formation and edged forward. Into the next hallway.
At the end of it came a tiny gleam. Way off in the corner. Like when you shut your eyes and vaguely see the shape of whatever had been in front of you a moment before - a weird blob of an eyeball ghost left behind.
Misty's horn lit up the path. But the little gray light up ahead withered away, rather than grew. It liked the dark. Whatever it was.
We made our way to the end of the hall. Till the four of us stood in the final doorway.
Misty dimmed his horn without having to be asked.
Gazing at that pale silver glow in the corner, none of us dared to move. We just…listened - to each other's breaths - to each other's heartbeats - to the rustling of the straps of our saddlebags as they slid against our hides.
"Still no voices," whispered Misty.
"No undertow either," I added.
There was nothing at all. Not even ducky mojo. Just more of that freaky silence.
"I'll go first," said Cliff Diver.
"You don't ha–;" I started to protest.
"If this magic is the kinda magic that's gonna throw off your ducky-compass or whatever," Cliff reasoned. "Then it's gonna mess you up - you and Misty Mountain both. Foster too, because of her hive mind."
Cliff pointed an accusatory hoof at each of us. One at a time.
"You don't have to–;" I repeated, but my voice trailed down to nothing.
Cliff was already ahead of us. He was not interested in a debate.
Misty shut his horn down completely. But we weren't in total darkness. Something in there had a strange gleam of its own. The very sight of it made all of my hairs stand up. Like a porcu-pony.
Cliff made his way toward that light. The floor creaked and moaned and clanked with his every motion - a sheet of aluminum, sliding and scraping and warping against the slate below.
Till at last, his murky Cliff-silhouette came face to face with, what had to be 'The Mirror.' He reached out a quaking hoof, and tapped it. As instructed.
I felt a chill. And an unnatural quiet. Like my ears had fallen out, and taken all of my inner ear guts with them.
Cliff didn't move. Didn't speak. He was utterly transfixed by whatever the Hell he saw in there.
And for a long, long while, the Mirror House, too, was quiet as it had been before…
But then the plaster debris on the floor took to tremolo'ing - clonking beneath Cliff Diver's shiver-y hooves.
"No," he whispered. And stumbled backwards onto his flank. He scrambled away, flank against the floor - legs flailing and dragging him all chaotical-like until he hit the wall.
But he didn't shrivel, or turn his gaze from the mirror. He didn't tuck himself into a little ball or anything like that. His eyes were fixed upon the looking glass the whole damn time. Like ocular trout struggling against a line and hook that refused to let go.
Misty Mountain leapt forward, and lit up the room, revealing a floor full of skid marks. Streaks of dust that had been swept toward the back of the room by all the poor fillies who'd skittered away from the mirror over the years, reeling from shock at whatever…Pinkie Sorcery…it held.
Foster threw herself between the mirror and the rest of us. She reared up, forehooves wide apart, and formed a living shield.
But Cliff looked right past her.
"No," he whispered at the mirror again - this time through gritted teeth. "That's not me."
I rushed forward, and dove onto the ground beside him. "Cliff! Are you okay? What's wrong?" I begged him. "What did you see?"
I spun around to look at the mirror. But couldn't catch Cliff's reflection in it. Just Foster, blocking the way with her body, tossing her head around, scouring every corner of the room for shadows.
But even when she shifted, and I finally caught a glimpse of the magic mirror, it showed off reflections of the whole room. But no reflections of ponies at all. Like we were all vampires or whatever.
"It's nothing," answered Cliff at last. "I'll be okay."
As Foster's flailing forelegs parted yet again, something else in the mirror caught my eye. A twinkle of light that hadn't been there before.
I inched forward.
"Be careful," Cliff called out to me. But his voice sounded muffled and dull. Like I was underwater.
I eased my way over the streaks of dust left behind by countless Safety Society kids before me. Toward that ancient gray light - dim as the memory of some half-forgotten dream.
My friends and I were like moths. Not interdimensional moths like Gary. Regular moths. Moths who didn't know how to look away from a light.
"Foster! Misty! Cliff!" I tried to call out to all of them. But my lips were still. My throat - dry. And my eyes refused to let themselves get pried from their mirror trance.
'This is crazy,' one Rose Voice reasoned at me from inside my brain. 'That mirror is dumb. Why should we give it what it wants? Why not just walk away?'
'Nopony'll ever know. Just fake it to the Safety kids,' said another Rose Voice, more assertive than the first.
But still, my hooves kept moving on their own.
Slowly, my own voice returned. From somewhere deep inside my gut, I felt the words come roaring to the surface, even though my throat felt like it was full of sawdust.
"Yeah," I whispered to myself. Out loud at last. "What am I doing? This is crazy. I should turn around. I should walk away. I should…"
Thonk!
"Ow!" I walked right into the damn thing. Muzzle first.
"Stupid mirror." I backed off, rubbing my face. Peering deep into the glass for signs of whatever-the-fuck Cliff Diver had just seen.
But Cliff's reflection still wasn't there. I found no sign of his teary eyes, nor his cherry red face, nor his teeth bared with indignation. No sign of Foster's watchful eyeballs either. Nor of Misty's…anything.
The only reflection was my own.
I plopped my flank down. And sat there. In the dark. Thinking about an old slumber party game I once heard about, but never got to play. You're supposed to stare into the mirror and say Nightmare Moon's name seven times. And then she's supposed to appear, and, you know, eat you.
Nightmare Moon may not have been inside the fun house mirror. But it felt like some kinda monster might still leap through it, and gobble us up.
The light behind the glass began to swirl. Like the surface of a pond, disturbed only by a single flick of a mosquito's leg.
When the ripples cleared, I finally saw myself.
I was wearing a reeeeeally stupid outfit. It had a big droopy hat with lots of bells on the end. Pointed slippers too. I rose to my hooves (in real life). And saw, in the reflection, my-silly-old-self in full, floppity, colorful regalia. Just like the card that Pinkie Pie had drawn for me.
"The Foal?" I whispered to myself.
"Why do I hold stupid candle?" Misty Mountain exclaimed.
Candle? The world was suddenly real to me again. Foster and Misty were both beside me, each staring into the mirror. Cliff was alone in the corner, dusting himself off, watching us all nervously.
But I couldn't see their reflections.
Any of them.
"Candle?" said Cliff Diver. "You're holding a candle?"
"Yes," said Misty. "And I wear stupid robe. Like moron."
"A cup!" said Cliff Diver, sparkles in his eyes. "Is there a cup in front of you? And…Ooh! Are you pointing up with one hoof and down with another?"
"You can see me?" Misty turned to Cliff Diver. Then back to the mirror again. "Why can't I see you? "
"No, I can't see you," Cliff wiped his tears away, and chuckled. "You're just The Magician!"
"The what?"
"The Magician," I said, thinking back to Pinkie Pie's card game. "The Magician always looks stupid."
"What ees going on?" snapped Misty. "Ees thees dee magic card game you were making tell of me about?" He looked to me for answers.
"Yes!" Cliff laughed and squeaked with joy, even as his saddened eyeballs grew soggy with tears all over again.
"You see–;" I started to explain.
But before my brain could even rub two thoughts together, I heard a dark and reverberant sound…The bark of distant dogs. Just like on my first night in the Wasteland! (And again, when I fell from the platform in Trottica's mines, Misty's tail hair still in my teeth!)
"Fuck!" I cried out loud.
And tackled Misty - swept him toward Foster. And Cliff Diver too! All three of them complained as we mashed together to form a sixteen-legged friend-blob.
"Hey what are you–;?"
"What the Hell?"
"What's wrong?"
But I held my friends close. In case the dogs swept me back home. Like they'd swept me into the Wasteland the very first time.
…
…
…
Only there was no sweeping at all. Everything was quiet again. No dogs barking. No portals full of screams.
Huddling there amongst my friends, I spun around to get a better look in the mirror. But the Foal was gone too.
There was nothing left in that mirror but grime. And a tiny light behind the surface.
"So that's it?" I said aloud. "That…Is my 'who I really am'?" I reared up. Made sarcastic quotation marks with my forehooves.
"What ees going on?" said Misty.
"I heard dogs," I replied.
"Dogs?"
"Dogs!" I repeated, and let out a great big old sigh. "There are dogs on my stupid tarot card, okay? So, I hear them whenever I tumble into a mission."
"So...everythingk's card?" said Misty.
"It would seem so," Foster answered on my behalf.
Though it occured to me then that I had not heard any dogs when I'd charged through Misty's door, and fallen into the Wasteland. But that just made everything worse somehow - that those dumb dogs had managed to find me. Here, in a busted old fun house. In the middle of Equestria's biggest slave compound.
Misty whipped around and glowered at the mirror. Got into a staring contest with it. Even though it was…empty.
"These missions. Fate." He spat upon the ground. "I do not like thees game."
"Nopony does," I said. And scowled at the stupid Self Mirror, drawing myself closer and closer and closer and closer and closer. To stare it the fuck down.
It shone no lights. Gave no clue about 'who I really was' - whatever the hell that was supposed to mean. My Mirrorsona didn't haunt me like it did Cliff, or Scribbles, or Lime-O.
'Cause that stupid piece of glass didn't see me as a living, breathing pony at all. Just a card that gets dealt out of the Universe's deck. Played and reshuffled again and again.
'I'm a pony too, damnit,' a Rose Voice screamed at the Mirror House, all the way from the darkest depths of my Rosebrain.
'Show me my deepest fucking fears, you stupid mirror,' the Rose Voice ranted. 'I'll set them all on fire! I've done it before. Send me all the shadows you've got! I'll punch them in their shadowy eyeballs - even though they don't have any eyeballs! I'll make them GROW eyeballs just so I can punch them there. I'll prove that I can conquer them. Again.
All the voices inside my head convulsed. I wanted nothing more than to scream.
But Cliff Diver interrupt-ified them. He leapt forward. Inappropriate-ishly and totally outta nowhere. "Don't you see?" he said, laughing, wiping yet more tears from his eyes. "The mirror doesn't think you matter...As individuals. It just picked up on your role. You know, in the game."
"How is that good?" I grumbled.
"Rose!" he exclaimed. "Listen!" Cliff leaned in reeeeal close - a huddle - just Foster and Misty and Cliff and me. Super mega secretive. Even though there was nopony near us who could possibly be listening. "Rose!" he whisper-exclaimed. "Listen. If the mirror sees you and Misty as your cards...That means that fate, or the Powers-That-Be-or-whatever, are still with us. We might actually stand a real chance." Cliff turned to Misty. "Maybe it's even fated that we save Xenith!"
Cliff had to fight to catch his breath. He huffed, and smiled a weak and desperate smile.
But Misty just averted his eyes, and shrunk away.
"It's possible," said Foster to Cliff. "...We shouldn't count on it of course, but I'd like to hope so." Foster rubbed Cliff's shoulder, reassuring-like with her forehooves. But her eyes never left Misty Mountain, who still recoiled. And twitched. And, oddly enough, kept his eyeballs to himself.
"Are you alright?" I said.
He didn't answer.
"Misty?" said Cliff. "You okay?"
"Yes," answered Misty, gazing over our shoulders - looking in the mirror with new, narrow-eyed suspicion. Like it was gonna leap off of the wall, grow hooves, and start kicking him. "We should go."
A tiny streak of light licked Misty's face - spilled from another hallway beyond the stupid fate-mirror - (a hallway we'd all somehow missed before).
Its busted-up walls shimmered meekly with more of that metallic reflecty paint. Another arrow. The exit.
The magic mirror lost its glow entirely now. And the whole room felt sorta dull and dim, and normal.
"We should go," Misty looked to me, and said.
"Yeah," said Foster dryly, still side-eyeing Misty. "...Let's."
Misty slunk off ahead, leaving us all what-the-fuck'ing in his absence.
Foster tossed her eyeballs back and forth. First at the hallway Misty had disappeared into. Then at Cliff Diver. Then at the hallway. Then Cliff Diver again. Then at the hallway.
"Listen, Cliff," she said at last. "This mirror - the things it shows. It's not–;"
"Misty's acting weird," said Cliff. Stiff as iron.
"Yeah, but–;"
"I'll be fine," Cliff interrupted.
Foster looked to me. I reared up and shooed her with my forehooves. Misty was behaving oddly, and Foster had a good chance of using her bug intuition to figure out why. And Cliff? He'd just shut all himself down. On purpose. Before our very eyes. The one thing he didn't need was someone smelling all of his emotions. Even a friend.
"Okay," said Bananas Foster, saluting us both. "I won't be far."
Foster trotted ahead in a hurry, and disappeared into the next corridor - determined to catch up with Misty.
Which left Cliff and I alone. He sighed in relief the moment Foster was gone, but still didn't say a word.
And neither did I. 'Cause I couldn't tell what was worse: asking Cliff what was wrong, and reopening the wound; or not saying anything at all. So we just stood there. For a good solid minute. In total silence. Even as the air between us seemed to scream.
But eventually, Cliff licked his lips. Turned his head. Shuffled his hooves. Opened his mouth as if to speak, and then...nothing came out. His words had lost all momentum. Like a windup toy slowly grinding to a halt.
"Hey, Cliff," I said. "Listen, if you–;"
"I won't let you down," Cliff replied.
"What?" I said.
"I won't let you down." He looked me in the eye this time. Resolve-ishly. To him, this was a sacred promise.
"I know that," I said. "Why would you think anything different?"
"I'm sorry," Cliff averted his eyes again. "It just needed to be said."
The room grew dim again. The sound of our friends' hoofsteps dwindled down to a muffled pulse. Misty Mountain and Bananas Foster had rounded some distant corner.
"Hay, Cliff," I said. "Are you okay?"
"No," he replied. "But that doesn't matter right now."
I opened my mouth to protest, but Cliff cut me off.
"Don't–;" he said, holding up a hoof. "I'll tell you all about it. I promise. Just not here. I've gotta keep it together till we're someplace safe. I am not gonna be a whiny pirate." A fragile smile curled at the ends of his lips, and a frightened little laugh escaped them.
…
…
…
Aaaaaahhhhhhhh! My heart screamed silently.
I couldn't bear seeing Cliff in pain. (Or hearing my own damn words used against me!) But he also had an irrefutable point. Whatever was going on - whatever the mirror had shown him - we couldn't afford to deal with it right now.
"Yarr," I said softly.
"Yarr," said Cliff warmly in return. And gesturing with his head, he led me toward the exit - which was way smarter than, you know…standing around, hugging, and talking about feelings like I wanted to do.
The light all but disappeared from the mirror room. Foster and Misty were winding further and further along the labyrinth ahead, and taking Misty's glowing horn with him.
"Come on," said Cliff. And we hurried to catch up.
* * *
The corridors weren't all that long, but they zigged and zagged a lot. We wouldn't have been able to see at all if not for all the holes in the busted up walls, scattering beams of Misty's light from up ahead.
Cliff and I moved quickly, and didn't say much. Except for when I, you know, tripped on rubble and smacked my face into a wall, and exclaimed, "Ow, fuck!"
"Hold up, you two!" Cliff hollered.
"Sorry," Misty hollered back, several turns of the fun house maze ahead of us.
An orb of light suddenly floated above us, drifting over all the holes in the hallways, way up high, where the walls didn't quite meet the ceiling beams, and cast its glow down in all directions - a chandelier that splashed weird shadow shapes over everything.
"Thanks!" Cliff called out to Misty. And knelt down to help me off the ground.
"Thanks," I said.
Together we peered down the Hallway o' Jagged Darkness.
"Hay, Misty?" Cliff called out. "Can we get our own orb?"
"I can't make dee light follow two targets," Misty replied. "Only one at a time."
"Darn," said Cliff.
He and I continued on, passing through beams of purple light, and pools of shadow. Weaving our way around fallen planks, and shuffling over little mounds of crumbling debris.
It was weird when I thought about it: this was the first time that Cliff and I had really been alone together since this whole Safety business started. It was nice, oddly enough. Fumbling around. Choking on ancient plaster dust. Just the two of us.
I only wished that Cliff didn't have to struggle so hard. To hold himself together.
Bloorrb. His stomach grumbled. Loud enough to echo against the hollow walls. He hadn't eaten all night.
"Hay, uh, Cliff," I said.
"I'll be okay," he replied.
"No, not that," I said. "I just wanted to, you know, tell you something."
"Oh, sorry."
Our crunchitty hoofsteps rung out. As I struggled to think of what that something should be.
Crunch-crunch, crunch-crunch, crunch-crunch, crunch-crunch, crunch-crunch.
"Hay, Cliff?" I said at last.
"Yeah?"
"I'm, uh... I'm really really really glad you're here."
Cliff Diver leaned up next to me, and pressed his side against mine. I rested my head on his shoulder. As we stumbled over more stupid rubble. Together.
* * *
Misty and Foster's hoofsteps up ahead finally stopped. A strobing light appeared from around the bend. A breeze whipped down the corridor and whistled through the little swiss cheese puncture marks in its walls.
Cliff stopped. Licked his lips. Swallowed his throat apple down real hard. "Hay, Rose, can you do me a favor? Like, a big favor?"
"Of course," I said.
"Keep them off of me."
A soft commotion spilled down the hallway. It was the sound of Safety kids outside. Urging Foster and Misty to come out.
"Give to me one minute!" Misty called out to them.
Next thing I know he's galloped back around the bendy halls to me and Cliff. "Are you ready?" He turned to each of us, one at a time.
I nodded. But Cliff didn't move or answer.
"Aqdhcisbfifhsjpidpbeizksbagyehdn," the Safety kids rumbled inarticulately outside.
I tilted my head up, and put my muzzle awkwardly right into Cliff Diver's twitching ear. "I got you," I whispered to him.
In that moment, Cliff sighed the kinda sigh you sigh when you drop a saddlebag full of anvils.
"Okay," he whispered back.
Then, lifting his head up high, Cliff answered Misty, "Ready." He was suddenly back to his Cliff-self - so much so that he seemed to glow with Cliffness.
But I was left holding the sack full of anvils. Wondering how the hell I was gonna keep, like, ten kids off of him. They were gonna try to emotionally educate him. Trauma-based bonding. And that meant five-hundred-and-sixty-three-thousand hugs, and words of encouragement, and questions about all of the trauma-anvils in his heart.
We made it to the exit, and paused before stepping out into the strobing light.
"I'll go first," I said.
"No," he chomped my saddle bag. "I won't work up the nerve if I'm alone."
"Okay," I said. Prying myself off of him, looking straight into his eyeballs as they flashed with the dancing reflection of the lights up ahead. "On three?"
He nodded.
"One…"
'Oh, fuck. Oh, fuck. Oh, fuck. Oh, fuck. Oh fuck,' one of my Rose Voices said.
'Oh, shit. Oh, shit. Oh, shit. Oh, shit. Oh shit,' said another.
"Two…"
'How am I gonna keep them off Cliff?!' a third Rose Voice shrieked at me. 'I promised him, I promised him, I promised him, I promised him!!!!!!!'
"Three."
'AaAaAHhHhHhHh!' shouted all of my voices at once. As Cliff and I stepped outside together.
We were in the shadow of the fun house. It stretched out across the strobe light valley. But my eyes still strained. There were shapes out there. Huddled figures. A kid kneeling down on the floor. A dozen more silhouettes encircled around her.
FWOOSH! The balloon's flames licked the sky. Made my face all warm - even from afar, and cast phantasms of light and shadow across the giant Pinkie Pie who loomed over us now, more menacing than ever before.
My eyeballs recoiled at the shock. But a flash of what I'd seen below still burned its way through my irises, and into my brain.
It was Foster. On the ground. Drawing Safety kids to her like fruit flies to a sack of moldy avocados. While Misty stood off to the side. More or less ignored.
She was creating a diversion. Exactly the kind of thing that I needed to be doing. Right now.
I took a deep breath and imagined how it might go. I could see the whole thing play out in my mind's eyeballs! I'd rear up, hold my forehoof to my head, and cry out, "Oh, no! What horrors I've seen!"
And the Safety Sneaker kids would rush to me, and ignore-ify Cliff. I'd squirm and cry, and wail, and explode - literally explode - sending Rose bits careening all over the valley. It would take them weeks just to clean up all of the bone shards, not to mention the chunks of my pancreas and eyeballs; and to comb the brain-goo out of what little remained of my mane.
This would, in turn, give Cliff Diver enough time to sneak past the other kids, get it together, rescue the zebra, and save the day. The perfect plan!
But even as I sucked in that huge gargantuan breath - even as I got my lungs good and ready to wail, and cry, and explode--;
Foster's eyes caught mine. She couldn't hive mind her way directly into my brain. She couldn't know all the details of my plan - but still, she was on to me. Her eyes shot like arrows with an impassioned eyeball message tied to them: "Don't you fucking dare."
So I froze. Swallowed all my drama explosions and stuff. As the Safety kids' eyes all turned my way - little by little - two at a time.
With trembling hooves, and knocking knees, I took a few steps forward. Shielding Cliff as best I could.
"You can do this, you can do this, you can do this, you can do this, you can do this," I whispered to myself.
"Rose Petal!" a voice called out from the crowd. Iris sprinted forward. A few more followed him till he skidded to a halt, and…
Klunk. His prosthetic hoof drove into the crunchitty soil. Before I could even blink, Iris was right in front of me.
With a welcoming hoof, he escorted me and Cliff aside, bent his neck downward to talk to me eyeball-to-eyeball.
"You did it!" he said.
"Great."
"I know the mirror's rough," he said. "But it all gets better from here."
"Uhhhhh….." I replied. "It does?"
Iris smiled. "There's a party at The Fountain. Just a little further. You're gonna love it. We've got emotional education. Rum, (if that's your thing…no pressure)." He stopped to whip his cloak open, and proudly wag a swish-itty canteen around. "We'll sing songs. Flip's gonna juggle. Or you can just chill, or whatever, and watch the clouds turn colors from all the fires and lights of Fillydelphia. The fountain's got an awesome view."
I looked to the sky. Saw the cloudy ceiling change; blue and pink from the neon sign; white from the alternating spotlights; orange from the majestic bursts of flame that Pinkie periodically belched out.
These kids have seriously never seen the stars, I thought. Not even once.
A sadness fell over me. Not the fake kind of sadness you get from trying to make yourself explode in order to create a diversion. A real sadness. A flood of sympathy for all the ponies of the Wasteland.
Fixing Equestria was gonna take big work. Big aspirations. Big hope. It's no wonder the best anypony could rally behind was Red Eye. How could anypony be expected to learn how to dream if they had never even laid eyes upon the Moon?
"Beautiful, isn't it?" said Iris with a warm and caring smile.
"Yeah," I whispered.
"Listen, it's really close to midnight - I gotta go lead the way," Iris gestured vaguely in the direction of where we were headed. "Do you and your friends wanna walk up front with me, or hang back and–;"
"Hang back!" I answered in a hurry.
And Iris blink-bloinked at my panicked answer, while Cliff buried his face in his forehooves.
Damnit! I'd been stupid! Eager! Suspicious as a one-eyed, peg-legged sailor with a skull tattoo on her forehead, and a parrot on her shoulder, yarr-ing her way through a job interview with the head of the East Equestria Trading Company for totally-not-pirate-spy-related-reasons.
"I mean, uh, I need a minute," I said. "Some time alone with friends."
"Alright then," said Iris. "That's the Safety Way. Just gimme a second." He turned to Cliff Diver, pulled him aside conspiratorial-like. Whispering. Eyeing me the whole time. When he was done, Iris turned to me, and said, "Okay, see you at the party. You need anything, you gimme a holler, okay?"
"Okay."
"Awesome," said Iris, and galloped off.
The moment he was gone, Cliff started laughing. A snicker at first. But then a maniacal hyena cackle. Complete with heaving and snorting.
He stopped suddenly to catch his breath. Stared grimly at a random hunk of dirt on the ground. And wiped tears from his eyes.
When he saw my be-puzzlement, Cliff smiled meekly.
"What?" I said. "What did Iris say?"
"He wanted to make sure I was together enough, to, you know…'carry your emotional saddlebag'," Cliff made quotation marks with his forehooves, and did a terrible, terrible, terrible Iris impersonation.
"Oh," I replied. "Well, um..are you?"
"Yeah," said Cliff. "I got you."
PATREON
If this story, or my Heart Full of Pony essays have touched you, please consider supporting me on Patreon. 
For those of you who already are pledging, seriously, and for real, thank you. Your support means a great deal to me. /]*[\
The Patreon earnings from this particular chapter will be donated to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, since the plight of lost and exploited kids have been a consistent theme of Hooves of Fate since the beginning.
SPECIAL THANKS: As always, I would like to thank Seraphem for his tireless assistance providing feedback during the editing process, and Kkat for writing the original Fallout: Equestria story that inspired me to write Hooves of Fate in the first place.
This chapter, like the one before it, has involved rather a lot of editing, so double thanks to Seraphem this time around!
DEDICATION:
It's the 592nd anniversary of the execution of Joan of Arc. Like the author of Pinkbeard, she dressed in traditionally male garb; and like Rose Petal, she had rather a lot of brain hornets guiding her extraordinary feats that changed the course of history.
THOUGHTS:
It's been a rough couple of months for me personally, and this chapter has been developing slower than usual. Physically, Rose n' Friends are no closer to succeeding in their mission than they were last chapter, and I hope this does not prove frustrating to you.
Everypony faced some big questions that will be very important moving forward.
I look forward to hearing from you all.
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So the mirror's claiming naivete to be Rose's biggest weakness? What else is new? Did the mirror pin Cliff as a quitter or something? He seemed to feel the need to affirm his reliability as Rose's support, meaning the mirror either showed him being a failure or even a straight up traitor. Poor Cliff.
As for Misty, apparently he's a magician, so I guess that means he's not the kind of guy to screw things up the way Cliff might. The mirror seemingly didn't show him anything bad, so I guess he's the ultimate good guy?
As for Foster, seems she didn't say anything about what she saw or give any indication of it. Hopefully it wasn't really bad, but I'm willing to bet it was.
Great chapter lovin it
11597538
Yea, I'm really curious about foster. Not even a reaction.
Ah good.
My life has been much too devoid of Rose-isms lately.
"into starfish like the Ancient Ruby of Starfishia did to Pinkbeard and her crew"
"into starfish like the Ancient Ruby of Starfishia did to Pinkbeard and her crew"?
"hoofsteps rung out. As I struggled to think"
"hoofsteps rang out. As I struggled to think"?
"pancreas and eyeballs; and to comb the"
"pancreas and eyeballs, and to comb the"?
"lights of Fillydelphia. The fountain's got an"
"lights of Fillydelphia. The Fountain's got an"?
Thank you for writing!
I'm sorry you've been having a hard time, though; I hope things improve.
"Physically, Rose n' Friends are no closer to succeeding in their mission than they were last chapter, and I hope this does not prove frustrating to you."
I mean... their mission is doomed. We, the readers, at least those familiar with Fallout: Equestria, have known it was doomed since we found out what it was, unless the timeline drastically changed. I'm not reading this waiting to see how they'll succeed; I'm reading to see the journey, and how the failure plays out, and hoping they'll at least all not fail too badly.
Though on that note... I do wonder if Misty was in fact hoping to cause a drastic change in the timeline. If that was why the revelation that fate was still heavily involved in these events seemed to do the reverse of gladdening his heart.
I also note that we have details of what Rose and Misty saw in the mirror, and Cliff was obviously strongly affected by whatever he saw. As for Foster, though?
""So...everythingk's card?" said Misty.
"It would seem so," Foster answered on my behalf."
It would seem so, she said -- thus strengthening that seeming. And whatever she saw, it wasn't enough to break her composure -- of which she has a lot.
I suspect that whatever she actually saw was much less innocuous than the impression she's giving, and that that impression is deliberate; she has a role to play and a hive to help. But I worry if anything more, now, about what will happen to her at the end of this particular adventure...
...Oh. Hm. I...
Just had a thought, though.
Assuming the timeline can't be changed, Xenith has still be a slave here after the leave, so LittlePip can rescue her later. That is, a Xenith has to be, and if the only Xenith available is the one currently enslaved, she has to stay such. If, however, there were two Xeniths...
What would Foster rather do? See her hive and their ally fail and an innocent zebra condemned by fate to more suffering, and then herself return to spending the rest of her life in a small bubble? Or save the zebra, give her hive and allies victory, and stay in a world where she's free of the bubble? Play a slave for a bit, but with the knowledge that she's destined to be freed and become a hero?
There are some particulars that'd need to be worked out, but it seems plausible...
11598094
The Rose-isms are indeed one of the story's great charms. :D
I'm Caught Up! Ahhh what a glorious story!!!! Though gosh do I wonder what Thirteen saw! Was she the Inquisitor? The pony who's form she decided to take- was she 'Evil'? Or did she see... Foster's? Heh, what if she saw the others around her, her family? Nah, its more personal than that.
All in all, I just can't wait for whenever a new chapter is posted. Thank you for another great chapter!
Good things chapters have been slow lately.
I was totally falling back. But now I'm up to date.
Rose need to put some points in her speech, she's clearly messing things up everytime she tries to say anything other than what's up front in her brain. ^^
I really wonder what's this mission gonna entail, because this is Fillydelphia, things can go bad in seconds, and we know what happen to Xenith so we have a bit of insight on what will not happen. This might be a hard landing back to reality, hopefully with every friends intact.