The world is ending
“Are we just ants on a log, Rarity, coming from oblivion and going to oblivion?” Twilight mumbled, propping herself up with one hoof. She wobbled, her muzzle almost connecting with the table in an unceremonious thump, but she caught herself at the last second. She blinked at the wood. It had imprints of coffee mugs on it, and it was lucky that it didn’t have an imprint of her face on it. Slowly, Twilight levered herself into a crumpled but technically upright position.
Rarity gave her a concerned glance before cautiously sipping her whipped maple latte. It had whipped cream and syrup spiralled neatly on the top, but its perfect symmetry was ruined with a straw. The only reason Rarity tolerated this was for the sake of dignity. It simply wouldn’t do for a lady like herself to be seen with whipped cream and maple syrup on her nose.
“What,” she replied, pulling a sketchbook out of her saddlebag.
“I said,” started Twilight, but she gave up before completing her thought. Why even bother, when nothing really mattered? Nothing was real. Sleep wasn’t real, though her body seemed to insist the opposite, rather loudly. Twilight ignored its distress call and decided if it didn’t really matter whether she said something or not, she might as well speak to pass the time. “It’s not important, anyways.” She pouted, hoping that Rarity would pursue her train of thought.
Rarity, however, was busy fussing over her latest design sketches. “Well, darling, if you insist,” she lilted, her smile slightly too cheerfully to be genuine. “I simply must get these designs done before tomorrow. You know, I haven’t heard from you in a while, how has everything been?” She looked up from her drawing, unintentionally shading outside the lines.
Twilight stared up at her blearily from her attempt to sink completely into the stool cushion. “Everything. Everything is coming to an end, Rarity. Some of it sooner than later. All that’s left is a waiting game as we consign ourselves to the darkness.” She took a sip from her tea and made a face at it.
“Well, that’s… certainly one way to look at it, darling. Perhaps that’s what this needs! A fresh perspective! Twilight, dearest, I shall tell you my problems, and you’ll tell me what you think of them, and this will all sort itself out! Are you ready?” Rarity giggled into her straw, almost making a bubble and ruining the composition of her latte.
“All that we do is just idling, awaiting our imminent destruction, so why not?” grumbled Twilight, sloshing her tea around in her mug.
Rarity took a deep breath and let it out slowly, savoring the moment before her rant. “So darling, work has been simply dreadful! I haven’t gotten any interesting orders in the past month, and rival companies are starting to appear, and while I’m genuinely happy that ponies like them, I’m afraid they’ll like me less and I won’t be able to do what I love. I’m also worried because my work is starting to bore me because it’s just the same thing over and over and I thought if I really loved it then I wouldn’t be bored but here we are, you know?”
Rarity looked over at Twilight to gauge her reaction. Twilight took a sip of her tea and made another face at it.
“But really, darling, it’s not like I’m not passionate! It’s just so dreadfully dull and my hooves ache at the end of the day and I have so little to show for it other than a heap of clothes that are in style one day and despised the next. I’m starting to forget why I even said I would do this. Not literally, of course, just… why did I think I could make it when I can barely get out of bed in the morning to face another day of doing the same thing?”
Twilight cleared her throat, and Rarity gazed at her expectantly. This was it! This was her fresh, new angle!
“Rarity,” began Twilight, setting her tea down to stare Rarity firmly in the eye. “Have you ever considered the fact that we’re all going to die someday and then ponies will move on and it will be like we never existed in the first place?”
This was, of course, not what Rarity had envisioned as ideal advice. Still, she reasoned, there must be some truth behind it. “Twilight?” she asked, as a thought struck her square between the eyes. “When was the last time you got a good sleep?”
“Sleep is the little death,” said the alicorn as she scowled into her half-empty mug. “I reject it as I await the inevitable destruction of my reality.”
Rarity gave Twilight a good, hard look, and decided she’d need more coffee. She stood up and sauntered over to the counter. The cashier looked utterly bored, but took her order anyway. A few minutes later, she returned, a second whipped maple latte hovering in her magic.
“It really is beautiful,” she commented as she took a delicate, ladylike sip from her drink. Twilight blinked rather stupidly up at her until Rarity nodded towards the window. Twilight looked. There were some dead leaves fluttering lifelessly around the parking lot, chasing a plastic bag with the words ‘Thank You For Choosing Food Mart. Do Not Inhale Plastic Bag.’ in large cheery letters on the front.
There were many words (all meaningless, in the end) that Twilight could use to describe the streetlights shining their spotlights on the merry chase of the plastic bag and the dead leaves, but ‘beautiful’ would not be on the list. “Sure is,” mumbled Twilight hopelessly, and took another ghastly sip of her tea.
“Not the trash, darling. The night! See, above the hazy horizon, there are stars, somewhere. We cannot see them here, of course, because of light pollution, but somewhere, they’re out there, smiling down on us! What do you think of that?” Rarity beamed at Twilight, proud of her uplifting thought.
“Did you know that some of that light traveled for millions of years to get here, only to be stopped on its path by this stupid crust of a planet? Have you ever really realized that those stars could very well be dead right now, and nopony will know until long after we’re gone?” deadpanned the alicorn.
“Twilight, darling, that’s not… what… no. Sweetheart, look! They’re twinkling down for you and me! No matter where we are in life, the stars don’t mind! They’re always here for us!” said the unicorn, clapping her hooves, nearly spilling her second coffee in the process.
“They’re big balls of combusting basic elements. They were there before we were, and they’ll burn on long after we’re dead and decomposed.” Twilight sighed and gulped down the rest of her tea. It was cold, and icky, and everything that Twilight disliked about tea.
Rarity had had enough. “Fine! Be that way! Depress yourself with such hopeless thoughts!” She snorted at the perfectly spiralled whipped cream that had melted into a mess of foam. It didn’t respond, so she slurped it up defiantly with her straw.
Twilight stared into her empty mug. A few of the granules of tea had settled at the bottom. Twilight wondered if, from some microscopic vantage point, they spelled a tragically ironic phrase. “I’m not depressed. The world just stopped believing in me. It’ll all turn to ash someday, and that’s a wonderfully comforting thought, so I’m clinging to that, much like you cling to your sugary caffeinated drinks.”
The unicorn huffed and levitated all three mugs into the air and set them on the counter. The barista whispered something that sounded suspiciously like ‘finally’ before disappearing with them into the kitchen. Rarity set her sketchpad into her bag and held out a hoof to help Twilight off of her seat.
Twilight accepted the hoof, much to Rarity’s relief. They wandered out of the coffee shop together. Twilight made it a point to step on the plastic bag as they walked past.
“You know, darling,” began Rarity. Twilight’s ears flicked up, and she looked at Rarity as hopefully as a hopeless pony resigned to the inevitable destruction of the world could.
“You really should get more sleep,” Rarity finished, licking the last of the whipped cream off of her lips as they melted away into the darkness of the empty parking lot.