Mary says it's okay; she can see the future
The sky was heavy with an unscheduled summer storm.
Maud Pie was hardly paying attention to the weather, though. Part of that had to do with the way she had been brought up, and part of it with her level of engagement in her work. You could never have told by looking, but the intrepid earth pony was feeling almost as electrified as the sky itself.
The tall grasses rushed beneath Maud’s hooves as she scanned for any hitch in the soil. Even the tiniest blip on her magical radar could mean she had struck gold.
Figurative gold, of course.
It had been a long time since Maud had struck gold. Had struck anything, really. Sometimes, when she was out in the field, she felt as if her head had been wrapped up in gauze. A sticky, static-y, fuzzy, close feeling that choked all her senses and dulled the world around her.
Being honest, she could have dealt with being blind, deaf, and mute. It was the way her hooves felt that itched Maud the worst.
Numb.
The sort of numb that comes from being caught out in a blizzard, hooves trudging through the sloppy slush under fluffy flurries. A numb which radiated through her very bones and reached her chest, constricting it, making her wonder if she was losing her touch. After all, with hooves like these she couldn’t pick out those hitches and blips in the soil so well anymore.
She wondered if that’s what getting old was, though the mare was hardly even due for a mid-life crisis, let alone the loss of her faculties. The loss of her senses. That dullness, creeping into her periphery like a smear of petroleum jelly on the lens of her life, wiping away the clarity of the world in more ways than one.
Maud tried not to wonder what life lay beyond her abilities as a field geologist. She tried not to think about what might happen should her special talent fade away. She only pushed forward, searching for her big break. For the proof that she was still sharp.
Even through the psychosomatic cotton in her ears, Maud could hear the roll of thunder boom across the plains. She, at last, looked to the sky.
It was grey. A metamorphic sort of grey, Maud noted-- bands of light and dark that swept across the sky as one, flattening together, pressing down on the earth below. Under immense pressure, or perhaps exerting immense pressure, or perhaps both. Like dominoes collapsing down upon Equestria.
She blinked once, hard and purposeful, to rid her eyes of their bleary blurriness. She had only just spotted the little blue streak before it began to shout at her:
“Hey, you!”
Maud reached up to rub at her eyes with one hoof.
The little blue streak cut across the bands of clouds, unaware of the order she disrupted with her careless flight. “Hey!” she repeated. “Storm’s coming!”
“I know,” Maud muttered.
The streak, of course, didn’t hear her. “Storm’s coming!” she repeated. “Seek shelter!”
Maud let out a weary sigh as the streak’s shape crept into the circle of clarity. She recognized the vest before she was able to make out even one detail of the pony’s face. Not that it really mattered who she was.
Search and rescue.
“I’m not supposed to be here, am I?” Maud guessed sullenly.
The pegasus faltered and dropped to the soil with a clumsy thud.
Maud stepped back warily and watched as the pegasus, athletic as she seemed, struggled to shake off her rocky landing.
"Mn-mn," the pegasus said with a firm shake of her head. “Not during a storm, you’re not.”
“You’re going to take me in,” Maud continued, “aren’t you?”
“That’s my job,” the pegasus said, tapping the winged patch on her chest. “C’mon. There’s an outpost not far from here. I’ve got tea.”
Maud growled softly to herself, but knew better than to argue.
The outpost was guarded by a shockingly blue plastic sheet anchored at each of its four corners. From a distance, it looked quite safe. It was like a great blue forcefield gently holding the squat little building in place.
As the mares approached, though, the wind whipped up. Maud's frock tangled itself threateningly about her rear legs. The tarp began to tremble, and the wretched sound of taut, shuddering plastic tore across the fields, louder than the rain itself.
"Almost there!" the pegasus shouted, though that fact was abundantly clear.
Maud simply kept her head down and followed behind. Her mane grabbed longingly at her cheeks.
The pegasus opened the door to the outpost, and the wind ripped it right out of her grasp. It slapped against the side of the building once, twice, three times before she got hold of it again.
She waved to Maud. "Go on in," she instructed.
Maud hesitated. She peered into the tiny building, wondering just how long she might be forced to squat in it.
Before Maud could decide, though, the siren started.
Like the howling of a dog, it started low and slowly rose, building up to an unbearable shriek shortly before it ran out of breath and dropped off.
"Let's go, let's go," the pegasus ordered, more bored than anything. She pedaled her hoof in a desperate circle as Maud wandered into the building.
It was flimsy. Even with her radio-static senses, Maud could feel how weak this little thing was. No foundation, nothing more than particle board and a shatter-proof window, filled with cheap patio furniture and one electric kettle. It was tiny, too-- somehow smaller than it had looked from the outside. Somewhere between a particularly large shed and a rather small Manehattan apartment.
The siren rang out once more. Another distant, haunted howl.
To Maud's right sat a single unicorn mare. She had her forehooves tucked between her rear ones like a nervous foal. Her mane put Maud in mind of a perfect swoop of toothpaste, but it was her eyes that sparkled with a certain minty freshness.
The pegasus gave Maud a small shove all the way into the building and firmly pulled the door shut. It clicked into place, and the pegasus locked it tightly.
There came another rumble of thunder. Then a different sort of rumble and roar: the sound of a sheet of rain smacking down upon the plastic tarp with the power of an entire military drumline. It came down hard and explosive enough that the unicorn winced, pinning her ears down against her head and peering up at the peaked roof, evidently wondering how strong it might be.
"Whew!" The pegasus chuckled to herself as she squeezed past Maud and into the center of the outpost. "Just in time, huh?"
Maud ignored that. "Hello," she said to the unicorn in the chair.
"Hi, there," the unicorn replied, forcing a pleasant smile. "I'm Minuette!"
"Maud."
"You fillies want some tea?" the pegasus offered, hoisting the electric kettle for all to see.
The other two mares looked at her curiously.
"Right. Sorry. I'm Ranger Night Glider," she said, pointing to her chest. "Look, I promise we won't be stuck here too long. I've weathered much worse storms than this in here."
Maud and Minuette didn't say anything. The siren bellowed its lonely warning once more, though it was quickly overtaken by the sounds of the storm itself.
"What?" Night Glider asked. "You wanna shake my hoof or something?"
Minuette cleared her throat. "Well… how do you know?"
Night Glider cocked her head. "How do I know what?"
"That the storm won't be that bad," Minuette said softly. "How can you be sure?"
"O-oh." Night Glider seemed rattled by the question, though she managed to blink it away. "I'm a pegasus. It's in my blood. Or my bones, I guess. Y'know."
Minuette bit the inside of her cheek and cast her eyes down to the warped floor. "Right."
The sound of the rain filled the pregnant silence which came after. Night Glider still held the electric kettle in one hoof, awkwardly suspended above the floor. Nopony could quite look at one another.
"I'm gonna make tea," Night Glider said at last. "Maud, why don't you have a seat?"
Minuette reached out to pat the seat beside her-- a plastic chair that had once been white, but was now splattered with splotches of dusty grey and brown.
Maud nodded politely and settled herself into the chair. It was the sort which threatened to buckle and twist with each small weight shift, made from thin, soft plastic that could hardly be counted upon to support a small bird. A cheap and replaceable thing. Not built to last.
The texture of it made Maud's teeth itch, but she did her best to relax into it.
"I have black and green with lemon," Night Glider said, producing boxes of tea from some previously-unseen cabinet. She paused, rifling a bit more. "And raspberry, I guess. Any preference?"
"Raspberry, please," Minuette requested.
Maud shifted in her chair. "Black."
"'Kay. Sounds good."
Night Glider crouched down once more and continued to rummage through the cabinet in the corner. From the tinkling, ceramic sounds coming from the cupboard, Maud guessed she was searching for mugs.
Minuette gave Maud a small nudge of the shoulder. "What were you doing out there?"
Maud blinked. "Looking for glow-paz samples. I'm doing a study on magical stone deposits in the area."
"Oh?" Minuette perked up a bit. "That wouldn't have anything to do with-- I mean, you don't think it could help with-- well. You know."
"The study has been in progress for a long time," Maud explained. "Long before the, erm… But, yes. Perhaps."
Minuette smiled at that. A relieved smile.
"And you?" Maud asked.
"I was doing some yoga by the creek," Minuette said, pointing to the back wall of the shack. "Down that way. I try to come out here at least once a week-- it's just so lovely down there. Guess it's something to do with the glow-paz deposit, huh? You think it could make a place feel different like that? Y'know, uh… magically? Vibe-wise?"
Maud merely blinked in response to the torrent of questions. Pinkie Pie wasn't much of a question-asker as she was an outright ranter, and patiently listening through the rant was usually enough.
Just as Maud was opening her mouth to offer a vague non-answer, there was a bright flash, followed by an enormous crack of thunder.
Incredibly close. Close enough to feel.
Night Glider gasped and jerked upwards, smacking her head on the top edge of the cabinet. Its contents rattled as one.
"Ow!" Night Glider shrieked, falling back on her rear with one hoof to her head. "Son of a donkey, that hurt!"
Night Glider's hoof wandered through her mane, and she winced when she encountered the injury. A quick, sharp sound that blended into the rain.
"Do you have a first aid kit?" Maud asked, already popping up out of her chair. "Some aspirin?"
Night Glider grimaced. "Yeah, but-- don't worry, it's no big deal. I'm fine." She felt gingerly along her scalp, hooves burrowing into her windswept mane. "Just a lump."
Maud climbed out of her chair and came to Night Glider's side. "I'm going to check for a concussion."
"You can do that?" Night Glider asked, breathless from the pain.
"Rock. Bones. What's the difference?" Maud said.
"I thought, like… a lot," Minuette said.
Maud sniffed. "Hm. Pinkie Pie must be right. I need to work on my delivery."
Maud reached out and placed a gentle hoof on Night Glider's head. Careful as she was, Night still sucked in a pained breath and muttered a quick "ow-ow-ow-ow!" which Maud expertly ignored.
Just as she'd scanned the soil for irregularities, Maud searched for anything odd beneath the surface. It still felt like digging through olive oil in search of a stray cat's whisker, but she did her best to hide her uncertainty.
She closed her eyes and tried to push in deeper, but found that the harder she worked to catch hold of the feeling, the more it slipped away from her. She made a low sound of concentration, searching, focusing, searching--
"I-it's okay," Night Glider stuttered, pulling Maud's hooves away from her head. "I'll be fine. The storm won't last long-- I'll just check in with the staff doctor once it's safe."
"You don't know how long the storm will last," Maud said simply.
Night Glider blinked. "Of course I do. I told you, I'm a pegasus! It's in my--"
"Bones. I know." Maud stood up. "But pegasus magic has been unpredictable lately. It's not smart to rely on it right now."
A particularly strong gust of wind swept upwards, drawing the rain away from the tarp for a fraction of a second. Everypony held their breath through the silence that screamed in its wake.
Then, as if nothing had happened, the rain crashed back down. Twice as hard as before.
"What's that supposed to mean?" Night Glider spat.
Maud sensed that she had, perhaps, touched a nerve. She decided to keep her mouth shut.
"I think what Maud was trying to say is that--" Minuette's voice caught as the other two mares turned their eyes on her. "Um. Well, there have been a lot of unscheduled storms lately."
"And?" Night prompted.
Minuette looked down at the floor. "Well, I dunno."
"What does that have to do with our magic?" Night pressed. "There's always unscheduled storms from time to time. It's called nature."
"I know…" Minuette muttered. "I just thought-- well, never mind."
"The magic's fine," Night said firmly.
"Okay."
"It's just… organization," she insisted. "Bureaucracy. Not magic."
"Okay. Sorry."
"It's fine, just--" Night sighed. "I'm not gonna buy into this whole conspiracy theory. It's ridiculous, it's-- the magic's fine. There's nothing wrong with the magic."
Maud clenched her teeth, but said nothing.
Another crack of thunder exploded nearby. This time, nopony flinched.
Night set the electric kettle down on the tiny metal table and emptied her water bottle into it. She did so without speaking, though if the tension in her shoulders was any indicator, she wanted nothing more than to keep on talking.
Only she probably had no idea what to say if she had.
The little battery-powered kettle started to rumble, like its own tiny thunderstorm. Night nudged it once or twice and listened to the way it sputtered and popped.
Evidently satisfied, Night Glider turned away and sank down into the chair on the other side of Maud. She sighed along with the sagging plastic. Her wings dropped at her sides.
"It isn't a conspiracy theory," Maud said simply.
Night groaned softly. "For the love of-- I won't even dignify that with a response."
"You just did," Maud pointed out, devoid of tone or emotion.
Night glanced over at her, peering out from under her own hoof. "Anypony ever tell you you're kinda weird?"
Maud shrugged. "Not in so many words."
That actually made Night Glider snort in something akin to laughter. "Right."
"I think you're cool," Minuette said.
"Thank you."
"You're a scientist, right?" Minuette asked. "I mean-- you said you were doing a study. That means you're a scientist… doesn’t it?"
"I'm a research assistant at the Equestrian Geological Institute," Maud said flatly. "So… Yes. I'm a scientist."
"So what do you think?" Minuette asked softly. "About the magic?"
Maud looked over at Night Glider, wondering if the non-believer might try to cut her off. Night only gently waved her hoof, motioning for Maud to continue. She rolled her eyes, as well, feigning disinterest in a way that was almost convincing.
"I have been experiencing a weakening of my own magic in the last fourteen months," Maud said. She reported it with the sort of non-emotional firmness she had been trained to. "Which matches the timeline of the unscheduled weather, as well as the scattered reports of migraines and cluster headaches from unicorns."
"Hey, yeah." Night Glider sat up straighter. "You're a unicorn. You know better than anypony about magic."
Minuette chuckled awkwardly. "Well… I suppose that's true."
"So you know this is all cow manure, right?" Night said.
Minuette went stony-faced in an instant.
Night Glider stood her ground. Her jaw set. Her back straight.
Maud cleared her throat. "You did falter."
Night glared at Maud. "What? When? What are you talking about?"
"When you landed. Today," Maud said. "You faltered."
Night scoffed. "That's because of the pressure systems," she said with a wave of her hoof. "Y'know, all the turbulent weather and stuff. It screws with the air currents."
"And the turbulent weather is due to--"
"There isn't a problem with the magic!" Night insisted, pounding her hoof on the arm of her chair.
It was like thunder. An explosion.
She let out a tense breath and grabbed at her mane. "There can't be a problem with the magic," she said. "There can't be, because I've seen life without magic, and-- and magic can't just go away! It can't!"
Night Glider stopped herself there, choked by the tightness in throat and chest. She ran her hooves through her mane, one after the other, trying to pat down the stray hairs rising in the humidity.
"Hey," Minuette said gently.
Night didn't react, just clutched even more tightly to her mane.
"Hey," Minuette said again. She reached out, right across Maud's chest, and placed a comforting hoof on Night Glider's shoulder.
Night tensed at the touch.
"I know it's scary," Minuette said. "But… It's okay. It'll be okay."
"But how do you know?" Night asked, her voice strained.
Minuette chuckled. "Well, I… I try not to advertise it, but…" She trailed off, smiled to herself, and shook her head. "I'm a watchmaker. But I can also see the future."
Maud furrowed her brows and looked down at Minuette.
"I know it sounds stupid. It's not all that glamorous," she said. "I can see, like… the shape of time. The direction, I guess. It's not an exact science."
Night Glider fluffed up her wings.
Maud looked down at her hooves.
"And I can see… bad things coming," Minuette admitted. "I think it has to do with the magic, but I could be wrong. It feels like the magic, though. Like this… the undercurrent of everything. A way of life, y'know? Something… something big."
She ran her hooves along the peeling edge of the white lawn chair, watching the way it fluttered at her touch.
"Is that seriously supposed to make me feel better?" Night Glider spat. "Because it--"
"The point is," Minuette interrupted, "after the bad stuff, it's all going to turn around."
She looked up at the other two mares in the shack. Her eyes were wide and shimmering. Her mouth twitched up at one end, the tiniest of smiles for the tiniest of hopes.
"What do you mean?" Maud asked.
Minuette looked up at the roof of the outpost.
Maud and Night followed suit.
"Well, the storm is going to end," Minuette said simply. "And it'll be a beautiful sunny day. There wasn't anything we could do to stop the storm from coming, but…"
She trailed off.
The storm thundered on, wind whipping and lightning flashing.
"We can wait it out," Night Glider finished.
"Everything turns around," Minuette agreed. "Eventually."
The three ponies stared up at the roof of the outpost together.
"How long is it gonna go on, though?" Night asked.
"The storm?" Minuette asked.
"I dunno." Night scratched at her temple. "Any of it."
"I wish I knew," Minuette said. "Could be tomorrow. Could be a year. Could be generations. But it'll turn around. It always does."
"Huh," Night said.
There came another gust of wind, curling up and under the tarp like fingers and trying to carry it off. The ponies braced themselves for the worst, but everything held firm. It felt miraculous. It felt meaningful.
Even so, the storm kept on. Battering the sides of that tiny safe haven with torrential rains and powerful winds. Rattling the pane of the window. Biting into the walls and tugging at that plastic sheet, that magical force field that kept them sheltered.
The world was loud.
The world was dangerous.
But everything turns around.
The kettle rumbled like thunder, and soon began to whistle.
When the storm ended--and it did end, though not quite as soon as the trio had hoped--there came a great silence. Without rain on the tarp and constant thunder and wind, the mares found that they had, in fact, been shouting at one another without intending to.
And now the world was quiet.
The memory of sound still rang in their ears, but they found that they could, at last, speak softly.
"Why are you looking for glow-paz, Maud?" Minuette asked. "Sorry, I just never asked. I'm curious."
"Don't be," Maid said.
She stood, stretched, and felt her joints pop back into place after far too long in that little plastic chair. Night Glider followed suit, though she seemed preoccupied by the frizz in her mane.
"It's funny," Maud said, though her tone did not suggest humor in the least. "We're looking for glow-paz because we want to understand the shape of magic."
Night Glider paused in the missing of her mane. "The undercurrent."
Maud nodded.
"Y'know, that's what I say when ponies ask me about working in search and rescue," Night Glider said, plucking empty mugs off the floor. "That it's all about nature. What's… I dunno, beyond us, I guess. Beyond our power and our foresight."
"Why are you in search and rescue, Night?" Minuette asked.
Night shrugged. "I've got good night vision," she said. "I dunno. It's not a skill skill. It's not my eyes or anything. I'm just good with, like, landscapes and stuff. I get how they form and grow and things like that. Makes it easy to patrol."
"That sounds like much more of a skill than just having good eyes," Minuette said.
Night Glider scoffed. "Meh. I guess. Comes naturally to me."
"So does my talent," Minuette said. "And I'm sure Maud's, too. Right?"
Maud shrugged. "More or less."
"It doesn't make them any less special."
"Can you seriously see the future?" Night Glider asked. "Like… like you just… how does it work, again?"
Minuette laughed. "It's not visions. I just…" She thought a moment, then sighed. "Well, it's like you said. I understand how time forms and grows and changes."
"So…" Night Glider smirked. "I'm guessing you can't see what the doctor's gonna say about this lump, huh?"
Minuette snickered. "Sorry."
"Figured I had to ask," Night Glider commented lightly. "C'mon, girls. Let's head out."
Night Glider squeezed around the other two mares and pushed on the door, which came away from the frame with some difficulty. Night Glider threw her shoulder into the door once, and it managed to cut a wedge in the mud gathering at the threshold.
"Yikes," Night muttered. "Okay, uh… watch your step. It's mucky out here."
Maud stepped forward, Minuette just behind her, and surveyed the landscape.
It was, indeed, mucky. But that was probably the most generous possible description of the field which sprawled out before them. It was demolished-- rain so hard and constant that it had flooded the whole place. The ground so waterlogged that the grass seemed to poke out from a marsh.
And then, of course, because the meadow was up on a hill, the water had cut a great tract down the side of it. Its own makeshift creek, leading down to the river where Minuette had been peacefully doing yoga only hours previous.
"Whoa," Minuette breathed.
Night Glider nodded. "It's a mess, alright. But it always bounces back. That's what wetlands do."
As the mares surveyed the area, wandering slowly through the mud and the puddles, the sun peeked out from behind the clouds. It beat down on the meadow with a power that forced Maud to shield her eyes against it.
Which was when she saw it.
A glimmer. In the water. In the makeshift creek, forged from necessity, dividing the landscape--
"Is that--?"
"Glow-paz," Maud said softly.
Revealed at last.
Sparkling in the sunny creek after the rain.