> Her Hidden Beauty
>  by Ps3luver
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

> Her Hidden Beauty
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

	I've always been an observer.  Across all aspects of life, I prefer to sit back and analyze, instead of rush in without first knowing what I'm getting into.  As I walked slowly down the street, the heavy guitar riffs and ravaging vocals coming from my earbuds, I looked all around me.  Due to the music playing in my ears, somepony yelling my name sounded only hazy, distant, before I looked up to see a familiar cyan blue with a spectrum of colors around it.  My pale hands moved out of my black skinny jeans to pull out my right earbud, and I flipped my hair out my eyes.

"Hey Cole!" called Rainbow, landing briskly next to me.

"Why hello there, Dash."

She softly licked my cheek in greeting, and I smiled, feeling the moist part of my skin absentmindedly and slowly, "Was there something you wished to discuss?"

"Well... Pinkie and her family had a short visit here, for just one lousy day, not even enough time for all of us to really see and meet them," she began, rolling her eyes, "Or enough time for me to show them just what a pegasus from Cloudsdale can do! I'm sure it's way more interesting than hauling around rocks all day and night!"

I nodded slowly in acknowledgement, chuckling at her sky-high self confidence, and asked, "That's unfortunate, but you seem as if you have something pressing on your mind, relating to this."

"Sheesh, can you read my mind or something! Yeah, I was going to get to that! Well... I didn't mean to pry into somepony else's business or anything but..." she started, looking bashfully at the ground.

"...But you did anyways, I'm guessing?" I inquired, playfully nudging her side.

"Well, yeah! Anyways, it's her younger sister, Marble, I think she said her name was.  She reminds me of you, except, you know... as a mare."

This was intriguing, I had seldom seen anypony with a style as dark as mine; most of the ones I had met were the living embodiment of different positive aspects of life.  Most were cheerful, happy to be alive.  And who could blame them?  

"And, you know I'm no expert on this deep emotional stuff, but she didn't seem to be doing too good, at all.  I thought maybe you could talk to her?  I mean, yeah, she does have the element of laughter as her sister,  but I don't think fun and parties will do anything to help her.  Do you mind talking to her for me, for Pinkie?" she finished, knocking her hoof against the ground.

I didn't have to even think of my response to that.  Of course I would.  In my mind, everyone, and everypony, was worth something.

"What do you think?" I told her, grinning.  

She giggled and embraced me, squealing, "Oh thank you thank you thank you! Also uh, I should probably mention, they're scheduled to board the train back to their farm in five minutes.  Good luck!" she yelled as she sped off into the distance, before I could even ask her anything.

"What a time to remember that..." I grumbled to myself, putting my earbud back in and hurrying to the bustling train station.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I quickly bought a ticket, not minding how I had to pay extra for doing so at the last minute, and stepped onto the train, my eyes scanning for the mare she had only described as a female pony version of myself.

I spotted a long ashen tail draping over the corner of a seat, limp, as if the owner of it were lying down on her side and not bothering to get into a more comfortable position, and made my way towards that end of the train.

I nodded at the fillies and colts who gave me odd look; they were not used to seeing such a being as myself, and some even huddled against their mothers' sides.  A few even mumbled something about a "frightening one eyed monster" as I strolled past, and those few got a scolding look from their parents.

A few of the less common creatures in Equestria gave me looks of awe or approval, admiring my ability to handle such labels and reactions as if it were nothing.  A grey-furred griffin with white feathers with black tips even gave me what could only be described as a talon's up.

A pink blur whizzed past me, bouncing around the sides of the train car, causing pinball-machine sounds of an unknown source to become audible, and I snatched her by her tail, giving her my "Not right now" look.  I thought a foal must have deflated their balloon, but then I noticed her mane was now hanging limply over the side of her head, and she melted out of my hand, climbing back up onto her seat with a defeated look on her face, somehow taking the form of a bunch of slime.

I apologized, scowling at myself from within for how I handled that, and looked over at the pile of disappointment that was barely identifiable as Pinkie Pie on the seat.

"...No offense?" I asked, tossing a pastry at her from the Royal Canterlot Bakery.

Her sky blue eyes rolled to the front of her sludge-like form, and the seat started vibrating, before she magically popped back into her typical eccentric earth pony form.

"None taken!" she squeed, unwrapping it and staring at it with awe, and I left her to devour it.

Finally, I had arrived at this far end of the train, and peered over into the seat, seeing a slate-colored young mare with her long mane over her right eye, and a look of absolute nothingness on her face.  

Not wanting to scare her, I cleared my throat, putting my black jacket-covered arm over the seat across from her, and asked, "May I sit here?"

She jumped violently and banged her head against the window, before blushing and looking back at me, nodding.

"Mhm!"

I smiled, and sat down across from her, the train lurching as it began to move.

"So... may I ask why you're not sitting with the rest of your family?" 

This alone caused her to shake again and look away from me.

Nice going, Cole.

"Oh, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to..."

She shook her head and looked back at me.  I took this as "It's okay" and continued.

"Can you look at me?" I asked her, trying to sound as quiet and non-frightening as I could.

She complied wordlessly, and, despite giving a feigned attempt at a smile, I saw what Rainbow had meant.  Just by looking at her face, her absent-looking eyes and natural frown, you could see how she had no vibrancy, seemingly no desire to live.  She appeared to be the kind of pony that wouldn't mind if they lived or died; believed that they were worthless. This broke my heart to see.  I was not assuming all these things, no, I was staring back into the reflection of how I had been less than a year back.

I nearly began to shake my head from the sadness I was viewing, but then thought that she'd most likely take that as me finding something wrong with her appearance, so I stopped myself, and instead loosened up a bit, hoping a less stiff and firm posture would help ease things a little bit.  

I peered out the window, multicolored trees soaring past us as the train picked up speed, as well as many fallen autumn leaves with colors resembling those of a flame swirled around us.  The cool wind from the crack of the opened window suddenly blew with more force, pushing our hair out of both of our faces.  Right as this happened, we gazed directly at each other, secretly yearning to find out more about our exposed halves.

I saw a shuddering lavender iris in her revealed eye, that I related to her feeling of being uncomfortable from this uncovered part of her.  However, as she stared back into both of my bronze-hued eyes, her mouth opened a bit, followed by her shaking subsiding. I sensed that she had seen that I possessed nothing but sincerity with a dash of curiosity.

I gave her a reassuring smile, and held out my hand, relaxed, "I'm Cole."

"M-Marble.. Pie." she replied, in barely a whisper, barely touching her hoof with my hand.

After giving it an almost unnoticeable shake, I pulled back.

"This is going to be a long train ride, until we reach your farm, Marble.  And in that time, I'd like to help you.  From just your physical appearance, I could quite easily tell that you have no respect for yourself, and associate nearly everyone with fear and judgment... am I mistaken?" I began, not staring her down too much, so she could remain unintimidated, for the most part.

She looked down a bit, shamefully, and shook her head side to side, her mane swaying but never revealing her right eye.

"I was quite the same way as you, only a few months back.  I hated myself, thought that all of the judgment and maltreatment I had received was my own fault, and nobody else's.  That I was worthless and deserved what I experienced." 

My head was sore from all of those haunting memories that came flooding back in, but I was able to force them to recede, for now.

Marble only nodded, and listened, looking down at her own hooves, sighing.

"Ugly..."

I leaned up a bit.  "Sorry?"

"...Invisible, wimp, lame." she continued, a blank expression on her face, "Do you mean you heard things like that?"

She was beginning to let her emotions show just slightly, and I was glad.

"Yes, but, often much more severe.  Sometimes it even resulted in physical abuse from those unable to understand me." I told her, rubbing over my legs where I was often kicked after having insults hurled at me.

Marble nodded again, and turned, moving her mane out of her eye, and, with a trembling hoof, wiped off some hidden makeup that had blended with her fur.  What I saw next caused an intense rush of both anger and sadness to coarse through me.

There was a scar, from what appeared to be a burn, in what looked like a sideways letter M.  Sure, I had been abused, but never with anything that would leave a permanent mark.

I found my voice to be light, and muted by my shock.  "M-M... for Marble?"

She looked at me, shaking her head, "W, for Worthless.  I-it's sideways because I was struggling to get away from the fillies and colts who did it." 

I gasped softly and began to shake in anger.

"Who.. who could have done this to you?" I inquired, a subtle hint of aggression in my voice.

"Oh, there's nothing to be done about it now... don't worry about me, Cole. I'm not worth worrying about." 

"Marble, please answer me. I am worried, and not telling me will just leave me to wonder."

She gave a sort of smile.  "What's so bad about wonder? But really, I can bear with it... I was already hideous to begin wit-"

My hand on her cheek stopped her mid-sentence, and she looked up at me, clearly not sure what to expect, but from her expression, it seemed she had expected a form of punishment for what she believed to be wasting my time.

"Marble, you are not hideous at all; quite the opposite in my opinion..." I told her honestly, still leaving my hand there for a few moments more, before slowly lowering it.

Her cheeks flushed, and she looked away, before continuing, with a just barely different tone of voice.

"If you must know, they were the colts and fillies of a prep school my father had my attend. Normally, in such a heavily traditionalist family as mine, the fillies were not schooled.  However, whether he liked it or not, times were changing, and even our small town had orders from Canterlot that all foals must be educated, regardless of gender.  Reluctantly, he agreed, and it landed me in that.. n-nightmare." She said with a slight stutter, her irises shrinking to seemingly microscopic size as she remembered it.

I softly laid a hand on her side, and rubbed gently, "Please don't worry, those times are behind you now."

She had been staring down at my circulating hand for a few moments.  

"I do thank you for your reassurance, but I am wondering why you would want to touch such a creature..."

I remained calm, understanding that in many situations, the root of most severe depression was self-hatred, above all.

Almost out of character, her voice picked up in volume, just slightly.  

"These actual events may be in the past, but they had shown me just what I really am.  That was the one good thing that school did for me.  It showed me that my hopes to be an aspiring and outgoing mare were not truly me, were not right, and above all, it showed me just what going against my predetermined path would earn me! Now, I do as I should; stay out of everypony's way, hide, so they don't have to be in the presence of such a failure, and do not speak unless spoken to." she said angrily, punching the window base and laying her head against it, breathing out hard.  "Why... why must you make me feel like I am wrong? Please... please just drop the act now and leave me, as everyone else has." she begged me, looking up at me, tears streaming down her cheeks, the liquid filling up her lopsided scar before rolling the rest of the way down her cheek.

I didn't respond immediately, and I didn't look away from her, or even move to get out of my seat.  I waited for her erratic breathing to become more regular, and stood up, lightly picking her up, and placing her in my lap, causing her to look up at me, bewildered.

"I'm not going to leave you, Marble.  You know... I feel like I'm dealing with past self.  The version of me who had not yet met the one pony, or, in my case, person... in their life who knows their pain, and who sincerely cares about them.  I'll tell you this, and it is up to you whether or not you choose to believe me.  You are not ugly, or worthless.  Often, when one is surrounded by external hatred, the barrier between keeping what they think of themselves and what others do is dissolved; corroded, to the point where they take anything that others say as fact, without any of their own input."

I paused, and waited until we passed through a tunnel, so that it was easy to see our reflections in the glass.  

"You see these two beings?  They've both been through similar experiences, though nobody shares the exact same ones.  They are also both what you could call 'goth'.  We both have ways of covering ourselves from judgmental eyes, you with your makeup and mane, and me with my jacket, jeans, and hair.  We also have had and still do have our fair share of bad thoughts.  But Marble, do you know what the most profound difference between us is?"

She shook her head, looking up at me with anticipation.

"I have accepted that I have a unique beauty within me." I told her simply, allowing her to contemplate it while staring at her reflection.

And that is exactly how we sat, for maybe ten minutes, neither of us speaking a word. Suddenly, I felt her move in my lap, as she took a deep breath.

"Cole, am I beautiful?"

I didn't even have to think of my response to that.

"Yes, you are a beautiful mare.  Both inside and out.  You've just been blinded to that fact until now.  Don't let this scar carry the meaning that these oppressors gave it.  Give it your own meaning.  To me, it reminds me of what you are: wondrous," I finished, petting her back.

She looked up at me with an expression of sensational surprise, her mouth trembling, and she actually smiled.  This wasn't a bashful or shy forced smile, or one with the sole purpose of allowing her to attempt to fit in with other ponies.  It was true, and, before she could speak, I kissed her on the cheek, and booped her muzzle.  

I noticed her lips begin to tremble, and she brought me into a close embrace, shuddering against me, her tears wetting my jacket considerably, but I didn't care.  I stroked her velvety ears as she wept, making sure she was close to me.

After what seemed like an hour, she removed her face from my shoulder, and sniffled, looking at me with adoration and happy curiosity.

She laid in my lap the entire remainder of the train ride, and we promised to stay in touch, and her family was shocked to see her approach them with an ever expanding and new smile.  Right before she stepped off, she turned back to me, and told me, "As happy as I am, I'm left with wonder; there's so many parts of my life I can now look at differently..."

I turned back and smirked.

"What's so bad about wonder?"