Through Crooked Eyes

by Capulus

Rating: everyone
Tags: Slice of Life, Dark, Romance
Length: 3071

An experiment into writing a story from the perspective of Derpy Hooves. Heavily based on personal headcanon. Read with this in mind.

-This is a story written based on my own personal headcanon. Read with this in mind, please, and as usual, I appreciate any and all criticisms-

Your name is Derpy Hooves. You live in Ponyville, with your daughter, Dinky, who you would do just about anything for. Unfortunately, your lives aren’t the best; You work two jobs, a mover and a mailmare, and due to your disability, it makes things difficult.

All your life you have lived with crooked vision, ‘Derped’ eyes as it has come to be known, since as far as you know, you’re the only one to suffer from it. And, while the ponies you know are nice, and do their best to tolerate you, you can always hear them laughing behind your back, or when they think you aren’t there.

But you do it all for your little Dinky, your daughter.

But what if, one day, something happened, to rid you of this curse? You have a few ideas, and with newfound confidence, you might just follow through on them…

Published 1970-01-01 00:00:00 UTC
Last updated 2013-11-12 15:50:01 UTC

Chapter 1

On a bright, sunny day, without a care in the world, you fly through the skies of Ponyville, smiling and waving at the pegasi as you fly past them, feeling a real thrill as the cool wind ruffles through your feathers.

You land effortlessly outside Sugarcube Corner, your wings folding by your sides. You catch a glimpse of yourself in the clean, glass windows; clean, grey fur, messy, but cute blonde mane, and yellow eyes, totally straight, properly staring back at you and making proper eye contact. As they should be, of course.

Moving on, you shake yourself a little to get rid of the post-flight adrenaline, and happily trot into the colourful bakery, smiling at the ponies around you, who give you genuine smiles back. You trot up to the counter, and order a banana muffin, to sate your growling, hungry belly.

After paying without any awkwardness whatsoever, you trot out of the bakery, narrowly avoiding Mister Cake as he rushes past, on whatever odd business he was usually on. Stepping out into the street, you scratch your ear, hearing a faint voice in the back of your mind. In fact, the more you focus on it, the louder it gets;

A faint voice, saying ‘Mummy!’, as well as a faint beeping, that gets louder and louder until-

You open your eyes, immediately shutting them so as to avoid the bright light in your bedroom blinding you. You feel a pressure on your chest, as well as a small something prodding your cheek. You can hear an alarm beeping at you, as well as a quiet, female voice, repeating the same thing;

“Mummy! Time to wake up!”

You slowly open your eyes, letting them adjust to the lights in your bedroom. You know there’s only one physically there, but you find it far easier just to go with the plurals of the things you see, to simplify it. Since you always see double, since your eyes are so horribly off center.

You look down, and see a small unicorn filly on your chest; Light purple fur, a fluffy yellow mane, she’s the most adorable filly in the world. Then again, you are rather prejudiced; She is your daughter, after all.

You wrap your forehooves around her in a warm hug, whispering good morning to her, and telling her to go and get ready for school. She nods excitedly, and jumps off of you, running into the small bathroom next to the bedroom.

You slowly sit up, rubbing your head, thinking about the dream you had. Then again, there wasn’t any point in thinking about it. Almost every night you have the same dream, you could probably just lay down and picture it in your head, over and over...

Before you can, however, Dinky bolts out of the bathroom, jolting you out of your mild stupor. You look at the filly as she rummages through her small set of drawers, finding a yellow bow to put in her mane, before she runs out of the room, into the kitchen.

You slide off of your bed, doing your best to focus on the two rooms you see. Then again, you don’t really need to; You have the same routine, every morning, so you could do it with your eyes closed. Still, it’s good practice. You walk into the bathroom, and take a look at yourself in the old mirror. Messy, blonde bedmane, grey fur with faint bruises and scars hidden beneath it, from many, many crashes, and, your worst feature; Two yellow eyes, one staring up, the other staring down, permanently messing your vision up.

You sigh heavily, grabbing your brush after a few missed attempts, and run it through your mane, smoothing it out. You do this for several minutes, making sure you’ve gotten every part of it, before you turn, and walk out, into the kitchen, where Dinky was eating jam on toast. With a small smile, you get yourself a muffin, and sit with the filly, eating it in silence. At least you couldn’t mess a muffin up.

Admittedly, even though you like muffins, the only real reason you eat so many is because they aren’t complicated. Just open a box, take one out, and eat it. And at least they could be healthier than cupcakes or doughnuts.

You and your daughter eat in silence for a few minutes, before Dinky finishes her food, and jumps off of her seat. You slip off your chair, and lean down, hugging her tightly.

“Have fun at school, Dinky.” You say, with a small smile. She hugs you back, just as tight.

“I will, mummy!” The filly squeaks, before letting go of you, and running to the door, grabbing her saddlebags and running outside.

You watch her go, staying silent for a few seconds before you stand back up, and grab her plate, taking it to the sink, and washing it. At least you don’t have as many accidents in your home, you know it far too well. Unfortunately, in public, you aren’t so lucky.

Ah, ponies pretend to be kind, and they pretend to tolerate you, simply laughing it off and ‘forgiving’ you. But, unintentionally, you’ve heard the jokes they make, heard them laughing at you when they thought you weren’t around.

But you pretend not to know any of it, simply playing the part of the ditzy mailmare slash furniture mover, since it’s the only part you can realistically play.

With a sigh, you leave Dinky’s plate in the sink, and walk into the bedroom, making your bed, then making Dinky’s bed. The filly sleeps in the same room as you, since a single mother slash mailmare, slash furniture mover doesn’t earn much, and your house is rather small.

You make sure everything is tidy, cleaning up Dinky’s mess by her drawers; The filly never knew how to put her things away after tossing them everywhere, something that she refused to do, no matter how hard you tried.

After tidying up the last of the breakfast mess, you grab your house keys, and don your postmare cap, grabbing your mailbag and dropping the keys into one of it’s many pockets. You leave the house, locking it behind you and taking off, slightly unsteadily, and head to the post office.

You manage to collect your letters with only a few bumps, much to your chagrin. Just once, you’d like to go a day without hitting something, or tripping, or dropping something breakable.

Delivering your letters, you make sure to not make any mistakes, as usual. But, as you flew back home with your empty mailbag, you felt that you’d done something wrong, as usual. It was even more likely today, since you had so many heavy things on your mind.

At about midday, four hours after leaving home, you finally get back, and reach into your bag, to grab your keys. Opening the key-pocket, you reach inside, only to discover, with a loud groan, that they aren’t there. And, to your dismay, in the pocket next to it, you find a letter addressed to Twilight Sparkle. You’re so preoccupied today, you completely failed to notice that you delivered your own housekeys instead of a letter.

You spread your wings, and shoot into the air, doing your best to stay steady as you head for the library, hoping your keys would be there; You always spent a few seconds after delivering a letter to read the address on the next one, to make sure you knew where to go.

You land outside the library with a small ‘whump’, your wings hanging limply by your side. You’d been flying back and forth for so long, you needed a rest, at home. So, you quickly go up to Twilight’s door, about to knock when there is a small flash from the windows. There is a muffled yelp from inside, and the top half of the door flies open. Before you can react a book flies out, hitting you squarely in the eye, sending splinters of pain through your skull.

Yelling in pain, you fall to the ground, a hoof over your eye, under which is a small cut, which was bleeding. That was one heck of a book, you think, through your haze. You dimly hear the door opening, followed by a yelped apology. Without warning, you feel the tingling of unicorn magic surrounding your body, and you’re levitated upwards, then dropped onto a warm, pony’s back. You can’t really say anything, through your pained crying.

After a quick, jolting ride, you vaguely recognise the Ponyville hospital through your one, tear filled eye. While you’re so busy noticing things, you see the pony carrying you, vaguely. It appears to be Twilight Sparkle. She must be the one who carried you here, since you’re currently being carried by her.

You dimly take in what’s currently happening, as your pain begins to fade. Still a massive throbbing, and burning, but slowly lessening, you overhear a conversation between two familiar voices, as you’re moved to a comfy bed.

“... new spell... velocity... didn’t work... forgot... lock the door...” Comes what you guess must be Twilight’s voice, although as though spoken through a ten foot deep pillow.

“...more careful... serious injury... possibly permanent... diagnose... sedation...” Comes a voice you definitely recognise; Nurse Redheart, the one who patches you up just about every day. You can barely understand what they’re saying, and, as you feel a tiny pinch in your upper foreleg, you start to find it harder to concentrate, until finally everything goes completely black.

Chapter 2

On a bright, sunny day, without a care in the world, you fly through the skies of Ponyville, smiling and waving at the pegasi as you fly past them, feeling a real thrill as the cool wind ruffles through your feathers. Though, something feels... Wrong. You can’t really figure it out, but something is definitely wrong, the more you think about it.

You land effortlessly outside Sugarcube Corner, your wings folding by your sides. You catch a glimpse of yourself in the slightly foggy, glass windows; clean, grey fur, messy, but cute blonde mane, and... You have the vaguest feeling you should be seeing more, but... Your face is blurry. You can’t really see it properly.

Shaking off a growing sense of unease, you take a few breaths to get rid of the post-flight adrenaline, and happily trot into the colourful bakery, smiling at the ponies around you, who give you smiles back. Again, though, something feels... Wrong. Fake, almost.

Trying not to think about it, you trot up to the counter, and order a banana muffin, to sate your growling, hungry belly.

After paying the oddly-distant mare behind the counter, you trot out of the bakery, narrowly avoiding Mister Cake as he rushes past, the stallion looking rather worried. You wonder why for a moment, but decide not to think too much about it. Stepping out into the street, you suddenly feel something hit you in the chest, then begin pressing down, like a sandbag placed on top of you.

You fall to the ground in shock, trying to get whatever pressure it is off you.

Everything starts going dark, as you hear a slightly hysterical, squeaky voice in the back of your mind, slowly getting louder, occasionally punctuated by another, female voice. As the world around you gets darker, the voices get louder, and more clear, and as you finally slip into consciousness, you finally hear the words;

“Mummy! Mummy, wake up! Please!” You hear the voice of Dinky, your daughter, as well as the voice of Nurse Redheart, trying to calm her. The weight on her chest is probably her, and you can feel her weakly hitting your chest, in an attempt to wake you. Well, she succeeded, but you need a moment before you can properly wake up.

The reason for this being, your head feels like it’s been split in two, and on the right side of your face, you feel an odd tightness, as well as on your forehead, and the back of your head, as if something is tightly wrapped around it. You hear a faint beeping, as well as the sounds of faint voices outside wherever you are, and suchlike.

Deciding not to put it off any longer, you open your left eye. You feel slightly shocked; For the first time, you can actually see normally, not double. It throws you off slightly, but it’s definitely refreshing to see properly for the first time.

Looking down, you see Dinky, her head on your chest, as she sobs softly. Weakly, you raise a hoof, and put it on her back, wanting to offer her comfort.

“Hey, Dinky...” You say, quietly. With a small yelp, the filly looks up, and bursts into a fresh batch of tears, hugging you tightly.

“M-mummy! I-I was so scared, m-miss Ch-Cheerilee t-told me y-you were a-at the hospital a-and then I s-saw you l-like this a-and-“ You cut the filly off with a hoof over her mouth, smiling gently.

“Kiddo, it’s alright, I’m fine.” You assure her.

“I just have a headache...” You turn your head slowly, feeling massive pain in your skull as you do.

Nurse Redheart is hovering next to the bed, worry in her eyes. She is probably the only pony aside from Dinky that you see as close, and you know she would never make jokes about you like some other ponies; She is the only one who really understands your disability, and makes you feel like the smart mare you know you are.

You smile weakly at her, only able to hold it for a few seconds before you fall back, panting softly.

“Redheart, my head really hurts... What happened?” You ask. You only vaguely remember getting hit in the head, and Twilight, and a book.

As if on cue, you hear Twilight’s voice, from near the foot of the bed. You jump in surprise, not having seen her, too busy focusing on your daughter and your friend.

“That was my fault, Derpy... I’m so sorry, I didn’t take proper precautions, and now... I... I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to hurt you.” She says, her voice quiet. You knew Twilight. While she doesn’t mock or laugh at you, you know that she doesn’t think much of you. Whenever you go to her library, she always assumed it was to deliver a letter or something, and, on the rare occasions you are actually looking for a book, she seems genuinely surprised.

But that isn’t important. You focus your one eye on her, blinking slowly.

“Hurt? It’s just a headache, I’ll be fine...” You say, although you have the weirdest feeling, on the right side of your head. Like, you could feel bandages, and the texture, and all that, but around your eye, it felt oddly... Numb.

You hear a small sigh from Redheart, and she glances at Twilight.

“Can you take Dinky out? She might not want to hear this.” The mare says, calmly. You look at Redheart, then at Twilight, wondering what’s going on, as Twilight’s horn glows, and she picks Dinky up with a spell, trying to calm the frustrated filly, as your daughter tries to get back to you.

“It’s alright, Dinky, you can come back in a minute.” You say, with a reassuring smile. The filly looks at you worriedly, but lets Twilight take her out of the room. As the doors close, you sit up, wincing at the pain in your head that seems to accompany every movement.

“Alright, Redheart... What’s wrong, what happened?” You ask, as calmly as you can manage. The light pink nurse bites her lip, hesitating, before explaining what happened.

She tells you that Twilight had been experimenting with a new spell, that could make getting around far easier, if she got the right spell power, and concentrated properly. She was trying on a rather heavy book as you arrived, and, due to Twilight’s negligence, she sent the book flying through the door, where it hit your eye. Twilight rushed you to hospital, but there was nothing that could be done except sedate you; Your right eye is all but destroyed, unusable. She says that you should wear an eyepatch over it, until it properly heals, so that there is no, or at least reduced chance of infection. you make a half hearted joke about being a pirate as the shock of this really sets in. You can’t use your eye... So... Does this mean you never have to worry about your double vision again? You can begin to actually be normal?

The more you think of it, the bigger the smile on your face gets, until Redheart trails off, and looks at you questioningly. You turn your head to her, ignoring the pain, which is beginning to fade at last.

“Redheart... This is a good thing.” You say.

“I can finally be... Normal. I can finally see things normally!” You say, excitedly.

“I can finally be me!” You cry, shaking with excitement. Redheart realises what you’re saying, and smiles, leaning forward, and putting a hoof on your shoulder.

“Derpy... You’re right. I mean... It’s not good that you were hurt, I hate to see that happen to a friend.  But... You’re right. It just means we won’t see each other as often, since I won’t always be putting bandages and bandaids on you.” She says, playfully.

With a small giggle, you shake your head slowly.

“Redheart, we can still be friends. In fact, I think I want to have you over for dinner to celebrate! You’re my friend after all, and now that I can finally be myself, and do things for myself, I think it’s time I learned to cook!”

You smile, sitting completely upright, letting out a small yelp, then sitting back, clutching your head in pain.

“Argh, as soon as this settles down...” You mumble.

Redheart chuckles, and gently hugs you, before tucking you in.

“Rest up some more, I’ll tell Dinky that you fell asleep while we were talking.” She says. You nod slowly.

“Alright, I need some rest anyway... I feel so tiiiiiiiiiyyyayeyreed...” You say, a yawn interrupting your sentence halfway through. You smile, and close your eye, knowing things are finally going to start looking up. Not up and down at once, for the first time.