“You still with me, Daring?” In Situ asked.
Daring looked up at her young protégé, trying to tell herself that he wasn’t so young anymore. Every time he went out of her sight, she kept thinking of him as the gangly, bouncy colt who kept following her everywhere and pestering her with questions about the best way to clear away dirt without damaging a find, which period each piece belonged to, or how he too could dodge arrows and outrun boulders if only he had the right exercise routine. But then she looked at him and saw a thicker stallion with a choppy beard and plenty of grey hair in his mane.
She’d lost all of her own gray hairs years ago, replaced by white. The ravages of age had been kinder on her than she could expect. She still had her eyes and her mind, after all. But the rest of her had taken the first step to mummification. All of her joints were stiff at best, flaring up at the slightest motion when she hadn’t taken enough medicine. The feathers on her wings looked ratty and frayed, the consequence of less frequent molting periods. Her glory days passed by decades ago, and the archaeological society had decided, after one too many reports of faltering hearing and reflexes, that her days of retrieving priceless relics had ended. Now she was one herself, or so she’d grown accustomed to thinking when she felt like joking.
“Huh?” she asked him. Her hearing had not fared as well as her eyesight.
Situ walked back over and tapped her on the shoulder. “I asked if you were still going to see our present. It’s just up ahead.”
“Really now?” Daring asked, glancing around at the end of the path. “Because I can’t help but notice you’ve led me to the graveyard. I should probably tell you you’re not on my will, at least not if you’re gonna be this obvious about it.”
He jumped back from Daring and tripped over his own hooves, almost planting his rear on the ground. “What? What do you think I’d—”
She let out a creaky laugh and reached out to help him back up. “I’m just kidding, Situ. I know you wouldn’t hurt me like that.”
“I can’t believe you’d joke about something like that,” Situ said as he brushed his legs off.
“Well, you still haven’t told me why I'm here, squirt.” Daring peered at the rows and columns of tombstones, decorated and carved with love and reverence so that no two of them looked alike. “You don’t need to tell me I’m gonna die. Surprised it didn’t happen sooner, honestly.”
A twisted, anxious frown crossed situ’s face, complete with an evasive look in his eyes. “It was the society’s idea. They thought you’d appreciate the expense.”
Daring would have tilted her head if she could trust her neck to remain flexible. “The what? No, don’t tell me. Might as well get it over with. Lead the way, Situ.”
He did just that, weaving through plots and tombstones to the back of the cemetery where the most ostentatious of monuments lay. More than once she passed by a statue of a confident, rearing stallion or mare eager to be remembered forever. But once she reached the corner with the mausoleums, she found herself having to do a double-take. The newest, largest, most impressive one had a compass rose cutie mark above the door. Instead of the fluted columns she’d seen on neighboring mausoleums, she saw the square spiral engravings and other decorations endemic to Neiztec architecture.
“Holy smokes,” she whispered. “Is this… is this mine?”
Situ nodded. “They said they put murals inside, too.”
Looking inside, she saw that he was right. Aside from their relative newness, the embellished depictions of her career’s highlights couldn’t be more authentic to the traditional Neiztec style, with angular faces, no depth or perspective, and stiff, awkward posing. Art from pre-monarchic eras was an acquired taste, and the idea that somepony out there decided to recreate it for her sake made Daring snicker.
There was barely any negative space on the walls, either. The carvers crammed every inch with some sort of detail, with ponies clumped together and ornate borders between scenes. She let her eyes wander and came upon a scene with what looked like two of her galloping away from a terraced pyramid, with Ahuizotl shaking his fist at them. Closer inspection revealed that one of the depicted Darings had no clothes and a different cutie mark.
She blinked a couple of times, remembering Situ’s predecssor in endearing annoyance. “Wonderbolts Hall of Fame wasn’t enough for her, was it?” she asked, turning back to smile at Situ.
He peered at the moment where a fan of Daring’s managed to worm her way into Daring’s life. “Oh! Well, yeah. Anyone who’d help you stop that huge heat wave probably deserves this much. I might not have been born if it weren’t for the two of you.” He sounded relieved and bewildered at the same time, like he’d dodged an arrow the size of Manehattan.
“Yeah, sure,” Daring said with a flat tone and a frown. She couldn’t make up her mind on whether she really needed Dash’s help that day, though Dash’s posse did give her a rare numbers advantage, and they managed to be more cordial when they bumped into each other again. “I’ll give her that.”
Situ sighed and shook his head. “She’s really not that bad. She’s got a great sense of humor and she can be a pretty good listener sometimes.”
“When she’s not too busy with the press, fundraisers, practice, autographs, or promos,” Daring muttered. She’d turned her back to Situ and started moving on with the mural, her lips pursed.
For a moment, Situ just watched her with a frown on his face. “I seem to recall you blowing off people once or twice for an assignment, too. Or to crack a puzzle and beat a rival to an artifact, or-”
“Fine, fine, she’s got her reasons,” Daring said, stiffly waving her hoof at Situ. “She’s fine in small doses, and if you catch her at the right time. And I guess if you get the chance to know her better and she doesn’t put you on a pedestal.” She snorted and looked at another icon of Dash, with her on Daring’s back as they swung, or perhaps just hung, from a rope on the ceiling. “Sorry. It’s hard to know what to think about that mare. I don’t know how you can get along so well with her.”
Situ glanced up at the ceiling and tapped his hoof. “You know, I’m not quite sure either. Maybe there’s just something about me.”
One particular scene caught Daring’s eye and made her crack up. “Yeah, who could resist talking to a stallion like this?” She slowly stepped aside to give Situ room to look.
He looked over her shoulder and groaned. “Oh no…”
“Oh yes,” Daring said, glancing at an image of a young colt, fresh cutie mark on his flank, stepping into a suppressed stone as a boulder hung in free fall above him and a younger Daring gripped his tail in her mouth. “Now that’s an event to memorialize.”
“I can’t believe… I mean…” Situ put a hoof over his eyes and took a deep breath, then another. “I’m never going to live this down, am I? We were partners for the last few decades, I was pulling more and more weight when you got- when you couldn’t anymore-”
Daring flinched.
“But that’s what people remember about me, almost dying on my first trip with you. I’m almost old enough to be their father and ponies still treat me like a lisping, naive little fool!”
“Well now, that came first, and first impressions matter,” Daring snapped. “And I did specifically tell you not to touch anything. You touched everything! That’s the exact opposite of touching nothing!”
The tomb took on a silence characteristic of its ilk as both ponies took stock of what they just said, and the waters that lay ahead of them. Port looked appealing for both of them at the moment.
“It’s only one or two strangers, really,” Situ said, averting his eyes from her. “Not that bad. I’m blowing things out of proportion again.”
Daring put a hoof on his shoulder. “You learned that from watching me, I’ll bet. But you’ve also learned more important things, like patience and charisma and letting ponies get a word in. You’re not that pain-in-the-neck anklebiter anymore, and anypony who can’t recognize that isn’t worth your recognition. Here, lemme show you.”
A quick scan of the wall revealed another image of Situ on the wall, standing between a jaguar and a lying, unconscious Daring. It was hard to tell whether Situ or the jaguar looked fiercer. “See this? Took me fifteen seconds to find you again.” She pointed at several more images. “Here’s another, and another, and it actually looks like you’re in every other image from now on.”
Situ folded his ears back and slunk over to see for himself. “Yeah, I feel ridiculous now.”
“Your reputation isn’t nearly as awful as you think, Situ. It’s only going to get better in time, now that I can’t overshadow you in the tomb-raiding business. Once I’m gone, you’ll take over the research side of things too and nopony will ever put that incident first in their minds again. You’ll see.”
Situ bit his lip. “I’m not sure that’s a worthwhile tradeoff, honestly.”
He had a point. The transition from Daring wanting the bratty colt to stay home and leave her alone to working well with a smart young stallion, to the extent that the two of them could scarcely be separated, came so gradually she didn’t notice it happening.
She sighed. “Yeah, well, get used to it,” she said. “I don’t want to go any more than you, but them’s the breaks! I’m lucky I got this much time and this… this whole, beautiful damn thing to be remembered by.” She stopped to take a breath and gather herself. There were no tears — she was not the crying type — just a furrowed brow that would add yet another wrinkle to her face.
Situ blinked. “Are you okay? Should we go to dinner now? Talk about something else? I’ve heard the unicorns at the society came up with a new way to date fossils!” He learned a lot at Daring's hooves, but dealing with moods like this wasn't part of his curriculum.
“Just a moment,” Daring said. “I have to check one more image. There’s something I need to make sure they got right.” She steeled herself up, clenched her teeth, and scanned the walls until she found what she sought.
A bearded Caballeron kneeling before Daring in supplication, his face as sorrowful as the art style would allow, as Daring reared back to strike him. Daring standing uncomfortably close behind him as he pointed to a map. Looking shocked at his body in the air, riddled with arrows, then in the next image carrying him away on her back, barely able to stand.
Daring lying in a fetal position, hooves over her face, near a burning pyre, with far more space between them than anything else in the entire mural.
“G-good enough,” she croaked, turning away after too long a stare. “Good enough. We’re done.”
They stepped out and shut the door behind them, closing the murals off from the light of day. When she saw Situ rubbing his leg, she thought she ought to speak up and clear the air. “I kind of wish those were on more of a display. They’re of superb craftsmanship and the whole thing’s beautiful. Just ignore my little breakdowns. That means it moved me.”
Situ nodded. “Remembering can be hard on ponies, I know. All that’s left is to put last words on your coffin.”
“What, you mean like, ‘Please don’t plunder my tomb?’” Daring asked, a smirk returning to her face. “I’d better ward off karma while I can.”
They both shared a laugh at the idea. “Oh, that would be perfect, wouldn’t it?” Situ asked. “I’ll see if I can’t make them fudge the records for you later. It’s the least they can do after they couldn’t get permits to put traps in there.”
Daring laughed again, hard enough to trigger a minor coughing fit. “Yeah, you do that, Situ.” She knew that the last words business was a crap shoot anyway. Ponies rarely got the chance to see death coming with a sound mind, to summarize their lives in a pithy sentence that lived on after them. Sometimes they had to help the truth along, and sometimes they just had to accept them as it came, just one more thing that was what it was.
At least she wouldn’t have to be stoic about it for too much longer.
Original Writeoff Edition
“You still with me, Daring?” In Situ asked.
Daring looked up at her young protégé, trying to tell herself that he wasn’t so young anymore. Every time he went out of her sight, she kept thinking of him as the gangly, bouncy colt who kept following her everywhere and pestering her with questions about the best way to clear away dirt without damaging a find, which period each piece belonged to, or how he too could dodge arrows and outrun boulders if only he had the right routine. But then she looked at him and saw a thicker stallion with a choppy beard and plenty of grey hair in his mane.
She’d lost all of her own gray hairs years ago, replaced by white. The ravages of age had been kinder on her than she could expect. She still had her eyes and her mind, after all. But the rest of her had taken the first step to mummification. All of her joints were stiff at best, flaring up at the slightest motion when she hadn’t taken enough medicine. The feathers on her wings looked ratty and frayed, the consequence of less frequent molting periods. Her glory days passed by decades ago, and the archaeological society had decided, after one too many reports of faltering hearing and reflexes, that her days of retrieving priceless relics had ended. Now she was one herself, or so she’d grown accustomed to thinking when she felt like joking.
“Huh?” she asked him. Her hearing had not fared as well as her eyesight.
Situ walked back over and tapped her on the shoulder. “I asked if you were still going to see our present. It’s just up ahead.”
“Really now?” Daring asked, glancing around at the end of the path. “Because I can’t help but notice you’ve led me to the graveyard. I should probably tell you you’re not on my will, at least not if you’re gonna be this obvious about it.”
He jumped back from Daring and tripped over his own hooves, almost planting his rear on the ground. “What? What do you think I’d—”
She let out a creaky laugh and reached out to help him back up. “I’m just kidding, Situ. I know you wouldn’t hurt me like that.”
“I can’t believe you’d joke about something like that,” Situ said as he brushed his legs off.
“Well, you still haven’t told me why I'm here, squirt.” Daring peered at the rows and columns of tombstones, decorated and carved with love and reverence so that no two of them looked alike. “You don’t need to tell me I’m gonna die. Surprised it didn’t happen sooner, honestly.”
A twisted, anxious frown crossed situ’s face, complete with an evasive look in his eyes. “It was the society’s idea. They thought you’d appreciate the expense.”
Daring would have tilted her head if she could trust her neck to remain flexible. “The what? No, don’t tell me. Might as well get it over with. Lead the way, Situ.”
He did just that, weaving through plots and tombstones to the back of the cemetery where the most ostentatious of monuments lay. More than once she passed by a statue of a confident, rearing stallion or mare eager to be remembered forever. But once she reached the corner with the mausoleums, she found herself having to do a double-take. The newest, largest, most impressive one had a compass rose cutie mark above the door. Instead of the fluted columns she’d seen on neighboring mausoleums, she saw the square spiral engravings and other decorations endemic to Neiztec architecture.
“Holy smokes,” she whispered. “Is this… is this mine?”
Situ nodded. “There are murals inside, too.”
Looking inside, she saw that he was right. Aside from their relative newness, the embellished depictions of her career’s highlights couldn’t be more authentic.
“It’s beautiful,” she said, a stunned smile on her face.
Situ sighed in relief. “They got you pegged, didn’t they?”
“Sure did! I’m just worried that ponies will plunder this place after I’m dead.”
They both shared a laugh at the idea. “That needs to be on your coffin,” Situ said after catching his breath. “Shame those weren’t your official last words, eh Daring?”
She shrugged. “You can just fudge the records for me if it’s so important to you. Or I’ll say it again when it’s time.”
“But that could be a few years, Daring.”
“Yeah,” Daring said. “I can only hope.”
