Search

In a small rural house, a unicorn was becoming restless of her farm life. Her name was Morning  Dew, and she had an orange coat, with a simple yellow mane. She needed more than what her parents had, her being a unicorn, and her parents being earth ponies. She couldn't go on like this.

Dew, being a unicorn from a long line of earth pony farmers, was always weaker than the other  earth pony fillies, and, on top of that, she knew absolutely no magic except for a simple light spell she had managed to figure out on her own because of her parents financial troubles and because of how far away she lived from the nearest city. Dew was absolutely miserable. She hadn't found her cutie mark and was turning nineteen soon! Her parents never showed disappointment or resent—or any negative emotions toward their useless daughter—but it was painfully obvious to Dew that they wanted an earth pony daughter or son, rather than a unicorn like herself. She sometimes wished she was an earth pony, just so she could fit in.

When she went to school, she was teased almost everyday. There was only one other non-earth pony in her class, the other being a pegasus. She found a friend in the pegasus, but she eventually had to move away back to Cloudsdale. That was one of the most devastating things in Dew's life. Just when she had found contentness and true acceptance, it was ripper away from her.

On this day, Dew found herself, as she did many times, silently crying as she starred out the window watching her parents work. She absolutely hated being useless. It was less obvious earlier in her life, as most foals can't honestly do anything to help, but now, she felt like a foal, when she obviously wasn't. Maybe it actually wasn't that obvious, actually. She didn't have a cutie mark and knew no magic. On top of that, her room décor hadn't changed since she was five. This is wrong. Why couldn't have I been normal? Why can't I help them? Why can't I get my cutie mark? This is unfair! she thought angrily to herself.

Still, to call herself useless was an overstatement. She milked the cows and tended to some of the animals. She knew this, but she also knew that she had to leave her parents to do the hard jobs like plowing and harvesting.

When the sun began to set, she saw her parents stopping their work for the day to eat dinner and  wash up before bed.

Dew collected herself. She left her room to greet her parents as they came in. “Hey, mom.”

“Hey, sweetie. Did ya' sleep well?”

“Y-yes.” I hate it. While they are out there, all I can do is sleep! Dew looked down at her hooves.

“Hey, sweetie. Don't be down, now. We all know ya' can't help being who you are. It's okay. Okay? Please, sweetie.”

Mom treats me like a foal still! I can't do anything! I'm useless! Dew walked off to her room.

“Wait, honey,” her father called out to her.

“Please.... I... I just... I can't cook tonight, I'm sorry. I have a lot on my mind, and I need to think...” she said as she walked off to her room. She shut the door, tears growing in the corners of her eyes, ready to leave the nest at any time. She wiped them away before they could fall, and sat on her bed with her face in the pillow, and groaned. “I'm sooo useless! Why can't I just be normal?” she mumbled.

It was almost half an hour after she had heard dinner was done before Dew finally decided to leave her room. She sat down at the dinner table, which was a small, humble, wooden circle. Her mother spoke, “Hey, sweetie, we got dinner.” Dew's mother smiled.

Dew said monotonely, “Thanks....” She sat down at the table and chewed slowly after she clumsily picked up the fork and brought it to her mouth with her hooves. The meal consisted of simple peas and potatoes, something her parents knew she liked. Dew didn't want her parents to do anything for her, yet she had asked them to cook dinner. She was digging a hole around herself every time she left her parents to do the work; Dew knew this very well, but also couldn't get over the aching feeling she felt when she was around her parents. To her, there was a constant tension between them and her, though she could not tell what it was about. Yet, at the same time, she knew her parents loved her. She felt so conflicted—not to mention that her poor decision making skills: they were not helping her at all.

“Honey, I know ya think that y'ur useless but y'ur not,” her father tried reassuring her.

Dew said nothing.

“Sweetie,” her mother said, “Don't feel bad, please?”

Dew still remained silent. She then spoke after a seemingly long pause, not looking up from her food. “Then... what am I good at?”

“Sweetie, we don't know. Ya just got to find that out for y'ur self. I'm sorry.”

“Yeah, honey. Y'u'll know someday, promise.”

“I thought you'd say that,” she paused for a second. “No, I knew you would say that,” Dew said with a sigh.

Dew never looked up from her plate once after the start of the meal. She couldn't bare to see her parents gazes. To her, it looked like the faces they made to a foal, trying to reassure it that thunder was nothing to be scared of. She hated it. She wanted to be done with this way of life, but what could she do? Another miracle was not due anytime soon.

Dew finished her evening meal and went into her very filly-like room, shutting the door behind her. I don't belong here, she thought. I... I need... I don't know... she thought as tears formed in her eyes. I need... she thought to herself again. “I need...” she said out loud, tears streaming down her face. She put her hooves over her eyes and sobbed. She hated this. She hated being sad. She hated being weak, Yet, when she cried over her woes, it made her feel those ways. It was a viscous loop. “What do I need?! What?! Why can't I just be shown?! Why can't someone just show me?! Why do I have to be weak?!”

After yet another self loathing session, she laid in her frilly bed, staring out across her room at her desk. On it laid a few scraps of paper. “I need...” she mumbled again. “I need... to... to...” She never finished her sentence. She didn't want to think about what she needed anymore. It hurt. It hurt because she didn't know the answer. It hurt because she might be afraid of the answer. It hurt because of what her parents thought. She felt the insatiable yearning to know, to understand, to be. It was the same feeling that she felt time and time again. She didn't understand what she needed or wanted. It was like solving a maze blindfolded.

She cried herself to sleep that night, just as she did many other nights.

When she woke up in the morning, the fur on her face felt crusty from the dried tears. The sun was just on the horizon, making the spotty clouds a luscious shade of orange. She knew her parents were either getting up or had just gotten up, so she opened up the door to the hallway outside her room. The hallway had portraits of various family members, dating back thirteen generations. In one of the portraits, one could find that one of Dew's ancestors on her father's side was a unicorn. Still, she was not related to this pony by blood, and it had no correlation with her birth. She was just... an accident.

She walked past her parents bedroom, and heard that they were just getting ready for the day. You would think that I would get up earlier with all the naps I have, she thought, annoyed at noone in particular. She made her way to the dim kitchen and began to boil some coffee on the wood oven for her parents. She didn't drink coffee herself.

She went over to the baking supplies cabinet and pulled out some pancake mix she had prepared some time ago. She eyeballed some milk and poured it with the mix into a small ceramic bowl. Dew then started another burner, and placed a pan on it with her mouth. She poured the mixed mix into the pan along with some lard and listened to it sizzle. When the top was bubbling, she flipped the pancake. When the other side was done, she put the pancake on a plate by the stove. She did this five more times, making sure that the pancakes were perfect. It's not like she had anything else to do.

Her parents waited at the table, expectantly. She sat down at the table with them, and ate. Her father got three cakes, while her mother received two, and her just one. Her parents made small talk about what needed to be done around the farm that day, to which Dew nodded.

She finished breakfast, and went outside to feed the chickens. It was a simple task, and Dew soon found herself in her room again, on her back, starring at the ceiling.

She needed a way out of this. But how? What could she really do? How could she escape? I could leave. She actually smiled at the idea in laughter. Then she thought about it more, realizing that, it had potential. What started as a simple joke idea soon found it's way into being a goal, then a plan.

Of course, this was not the first time Dew had thought about leaving. She would think about it, every once and a while, never putting much thought into it.

She had to answer some questions, after all. Where would she go? What would she do? How would she make money?

But now, she started to work out possible answers for these questions. She knew where she would go. That, in Dew's mind, was the most important question. The others, as she saw it, would answer themselves when she go to her destination.

She knew where she would go: Fillydelphia.

She needed to tell her parents, though. If she didn't, they would worry, and she did not want that.

When dinner time came around, she prepared another simple meal, one of carrots and lettuce. It was plain, but they all ate it nonetheless.

Dew eventually found the courage to bring up her ambitions. “Hey...”

“Yeah, sweetie?” her mother replied.

“I... I... I want to leave.”

Both her parents were silent. They didn't know what to say. They obviously knew that their daughter wasn't content. They saw it, and it pained them. But how were they just supposed to let their defenseless daughter go out in the world on her own. There was one thing that Dew was right about, at least: her parents still looked at her as a filly. To them, she was just a foal, without a cutie mark. They knew, in a way, it was their fault. Dew had nothing to learn magic from, making her just like a weak earth pony.

And now, Dew wanted to leave. How could they let their little filly wonder around like that?

“Honey, I... don't know about that...”

“Yeah, sweetie, I don't think you should.”

Dew replied, struck down, left without will to push the matter, at least at the moment, “O-Okay...”

Nopony spoke after Dew's revelation, leaving the dinner in an tense and awkward silence. Finally, Dew was done. She went back to her room to sulk in her defeat.

Shutting the door behind her, she leaned against it. Tear droplets formed in the corner of her eyes. It was too much. Why couldn't her parents just let her go? Why couldn't she leave?

She had an epiphany.

Nothing is keeping me here! “I... I'm just going to go! I need to leave!” I need to get out of here, I need to find my place in the world! So what if it's scary?! I'm no better staying here! It's pointless. I'll tell my parents tomorrow! No! I can't tell them! I'll leave, before they wake up. I'll do it. I need to get out of here! I don't want to die a little scared filly who doesn't know anything, much less her own special talent!

Dew did just as she said: she left in the morning, long before the sun came up, as to beat her parents. She took with her a small travel bag containing two cans of green beans her mother had canned, and a small canister of water.

She had no doubts in her mind. She wanted this. She wanted to know who she was and what she was meant to be. She wanted to find the universe's reason for giving a unicorn to two earth ponies. There was meaning in the chaos, and she was going to find it. She had to find it, for her parent's sake.

That morning, Dew left, into the rising sun. She would walk for eternity if it meant being free of this life—this wasteful, sad life. She had to.

Her goal was Fillydelphia. It was almost two days travel, and that was if she ran—which she wasn't very good at doing.

But she would make it.

She had to.

For her parents.

For herself.