Crusader's Crutch

Chapter 2

The prospect of a house, in many ways is a rather intimidating one. You can pull an outlandish variety of both bright and shady characters over your welcome mat and due to the apparent sacrilege that one commits by raising the tiniest bit of animosity, wear a different face for each encounter. Yet the walls, the appliances and even your bed, they’ll know all your faces and they’ll know of all the times that their grand master kept running those expressions by the mirror to test what sticks. So it was that the great river that coursed its way through the old gardens of Canterlot, became to so many ponies a second home; when the sun soared high above the mountain’s peak in the shining noon, as it still did strangely enough in Celestia’s absence, the fathers with their wives and fillies, along with the very special someponies on Hearts and Hooves Day flocked to the river’s candy coloured bridge; laughing and grinning as they crossed. Come the time when the sun retreated into the valleys and you could watch those same ponies quivering to themselves in the river nursing their redundancy or their bleeding heart, as their tears lead to the end of the city by the currents, were they trickled down the waterfall into the darkness below.

Back-Bone passed a few of these faces as he paced toward the Memorial Tree with an anxious anticipation that early Saturday morning. The state of his mind as a result of those emotions would have made a whirlwind go green and the pitch black bags under his eyes that were plastered on his face as luminous sticky notes of his sleeping routine since the meeting was arranged certainly weren’t doing him any favours. That wasn’t even accounting for the fact that the manager on the strips had announced the totally delightful news that Back-Bone would be working the notorious “suicidal Sunday shift” just the day prior, which would take place after he had finished painting Stale Dough’s apartment a single, imperceptible shade of green brighter than the one in Sparkling’s place. Nevertheless, Back-Bone pressed through the fatigue with surprising ease, the frailty in the smile of that mare scratched at his mind on the mere thought of it and with the book held so close in his saddle and the permanence of another pony’s grin within the reach of a snail’s arm, Back-Bone knew he would reignite the flames of passion which he could swear once burned freely through her; else, the rich, full mane of his beloved party pony would fall flat and the nightly cries on both ends would creep along once more.

After a gruelling yet short period of walking, Back-Bone found himself at a bend in the river. An exact description of this corner shall not be given, for trying to describe such a place would be the equivalent of attempting to detail the appearance of a blank wall with a picture of another blank wall slapped on it. There was however, a crooked, lonely tree that hung over and observed the natural and unnatural fluids of the rivers with an obviously rusted plaque dumped by its trunk. Fighting for his brain to acknowledge these details to judge whether or not he’d taken a left turn off the mountain and was now smack dab in the middle of the Everfree getting his loins sized up by a prying Timber Wolf, Back-Bone rubbed the sleep from his eyes and upon their readjustment, took the sight of that chilling, weak smile on a lavender muzzle, floating against the darkness of the night sky as conformation that he had made it.

“I am glad that you have arrived, my friend.” Spoke the mare in the black fedora with a robotic tone of pleasantness.

A chill coursed down Back-Bone’s…well, back bones as her queer speech simultaneously allured and disturbed him into delirium; shotgunning the carriages of his train of thought across the bounds of his skull. The calls of crickets drowned out the long silence in the air, until suddenly the hypothetical carriages of Back-Bone’s mind clicked back into place and resumed their course.

“W-wait…” he stammered meekly in realisation, after his widened eyes had wandered to survey his surroundings further, “isn’t this where…?”

After waiting for Back-Bone’s question to wind up at that abrupt close, the mare responded without a single nuance altered nether vocally nor facially, “This is the very spot in which Princess Twilight Sparkle first learned the legend of the Mare in the Moon. Surely you had not forgotten, my friend?”

It was then Back-Bone’s realisation morphed into horror. Of course that’s where he was. How in Tartarus could he have assumed otherwise? After months and months of reading, he could remember the precise number of rocks that Pinkie used to make “Rocky” during her tragic social isolation and he could refer to all the trivial ponies to have ever crowded around the six by name, yet he had forgotten one, simple moment that marked the beginning of it all. He bit his lip; perhaps he was more suited to the strips than to carry the confetti-filled torch for his pink pony- After all, if that mare with a faded smile recalled something from the text which he couldn’t, then what hopes did he have of flushing ignorance from her? It was on this thought that the cries surged through him once more, howling higher than spring winds:

“Make it Stop! Oh, make it stop!”

“Do not worry, my friend.” Droned the mare in black again, “Your expression speaks your thoughts. You are forgiven.”

The cries stopped. It seemed that blessing came with a second opportunity.

Attempting atone his stature in his own head, Back-Bone stuttered as he spoke, his whole fidgeting to such a degree that it would make those with ADHD seem like turtles, “Uh, no I- well, what I meant was that it was…um…good, of you to pick such a…good place.”

Were it anyone else he was talking to and it would’ve had as much of an effect as a stick to a nuke, but still the usual short silence sliced the conversation.

Concluding that this road of discussion would lead inevitably to them crashing into a solid brick wall as a burning wreck and losing one another, Back-Bone frantically directed the mare onto a different subject.

“So…what’s your name?” he posed cautiously.

“There is no name, my friend.” Replied the mare once more, in that same mode of merriment.

“W-what?” stammered a stunned Back-Bone.

The mare repeated what she said as if it was automated.

Back-Bone flinched slightly at this response, in spite of his attempts to supress it. Then, after summoning up his courage he stepped forward and stared into her, where the fedora masked the mare’s glasses, curiously.

“C’mon, you’ve got to have a name.” he murmured assuredly, “I mean…who doesn’t? Like my name, it’s Back-Bone. I told you mine so… I guess that kinda means you have to tell me yours.”

The mare responded, stating, “My cell designation is: “Zero Three”, my friend.”

Back-Bone’s heart began beating at this dripping of information, “Right, but what about your name?”

“There is no name, my friend.” Zero Three regurgitated.

So the thumping in Back-Bone’s chest dropped dead, along with that topic; which was killed by another brick wall of silence.

Having been reminded once more that he had the charisma of a bowl of porridge, Back-Bone’s mouth released a sigh as he heaved the mangled exchange towards the desired point, “So… um, what do you want?”

This prompted another jump from him, due to the immediacy and longevity of Zero Three’s explanation. Given how easy it is known to be for one to adopt the attention span of a toddler when paragraph upon paragraph of exact elucidation is passing their way from a monotone voice, the whole clarification will again be absent. Though it must be said that despite having not be spared from such a fate, Back-Bone possessed some elusive ability to actually listen through the droning intently, as the mare spoke in circles that both clear and perplexing. She said that she was part of what she called “a society of the liberated”, yet she spoke of “unification”. She spoke of “Omni-benevolence”, yet she mentioned a need to “transcend”. The only portion in all her mechanical babbling that was as straight as a pencil was that she and her associates followed “the way of the six” and that they, after great examination of Back-Bone’s public reading habits, had marked him as their own. The beating in the earth pony’s heart was came back from the other side, thumping like a drum at a party being zestfully tapped by the bouncing hooves of his little pink pony. He had come to dish out enlightenment and instead he had uncovered a batch of likeminded ponies who had already tasted it; thus he concluded that if Celestia was there, somewhere in the plains of existence that she was most certainly smiling upon him that day. Still elated from the ecstasy of the revelation, Back-Bone asked the mare in a wide-eyed prayer, “Can I meet these ponies?”

So ends the tale of how Back-Bone had established first contact with the group known as “The Crusaders” and marks the beginning of the one which tells of how they hurled him to his awakening. There is both little and much to be said regarding these “Crusaders”; while the quietest murmur from the mouth of Fluttershy is louder than what they will speak about their origins, one doesn’t have to know the square root of 346 in order to conclude from their sell-out assemblies, photographic memorisation of speeches within the text down to a comma and framed sketches of Applejack nesting on their bedside drawer , that each and every member of The Crusaders may deem ancient Six to be an element with a little importance in their short and petty existences.

That being said, much has been uncovered concerning The Crusaders beyond the single sentence of a file the authorities of Canterlot cared to compile, which read: “Scene kids”, since the passing of these events. The group was rumoured to have popped on the map an astoundingly short period of time following of the release of that perplexing purple book. The outrageous mass of pages deemed a pure pillar of Ponykind spoke of “Crusaders” somewhere in their textual abyss, so it was only natural that the group put two and two together and labelled themselves with such a title. Thus with a name etched in their heads and a doctrine consuming their hearts, the first of The Crusaders strove to complete the legacy of Twilight and her five followers by attempting to spread Harmony and Friendship across the stony streets. They went about doing this by simply telling others to be happy and praying that such things would happen. As for their rather noir-like get ups, each member was required to wear the standard issue, regulated uniform of a black raincoat, fedora and pair of mirrored shades during any and all organised gatherings, for the sake of, as the ruling Middle Mare put it, “ the eradication of all racial, sexual and personal bias that may strangle the salvation of our unity”; although records recently uncovered suggest that the Middle Mare’s specific selection of clothing she chose as the symbol of her group, can perhaps be explained by the mountain of Gumshoe Sue detective novels she used to nurse herself to sleep at night with.

All this information that would have been washed up in the oceans of the years, comes courtesy of Back-Bone from when he went under his “Coronation of Initiation” in the old Sparkle’s house the following week. The manor house, now converted into a public hall, showed as much similarity to itself a few centuries ago as a dog does to a worm. The once sparkling floors of fine azure had been canned in favour of some cheap laminated wood that bore a stench of banality and the lavish library on the second floor whose shelves many priceless first editions of Equestria’s most cultured works called home had been at the chink of some tools, erased from existence to make way for a lanky ceiling that loomed over visitors, instilling a sense of futility. Yet this is not what first registered in Back-Bone’s mind as he giddily strode into the hall. What he did see where the smiles, the legion of smiles on all the muzzles in his direction that marked the outline of an allegorical red carpet leading to the stage where he they wished him to sit. Walking further and turning his eyes left and right he saw the sheer variety of these muzzles; smooth and grizzled, masculine and feminine, gaunt and round, combined with the light lavender of Zero Three that Back-Bone saw merged with a crowd for the first time. Yet what really whirled his brain to and fro, in synch with the whirling of his eyes, was the fact that each of grins, from left to right and top to bottom, where not wandering around him mating and breeding with the others of their kind, but where rather held a helpless captive by his very presence. So it was as a result of this, that when a black fedora was crowned upon his head come the ceremony’s closing, that same smile was worn across his face alongside it.

Returning to the moments preceding the crowning however, Back-Bone’s blood rushed like a parasprite, as he sat upon the simple stage, on the chair of hard plastic The Crusaders dubbed a “throne”. Their leader, the Middle Mare, stood aside him with her flaming red snout to the herd. After a forced cough to silence the noise that was already dead as a corpse filled with door nails, the Middle Mare markedly raised her chin and bellowed the stock speech along with the voices of ponies beneath her; who mimicked her chants like a record. This went something along the lines of:

“The earth pony tends the lands that nourish us, yet the expansion of their fields for which they fought with sweat and blood will certainly be confined by jurisdiction; they are bound. The unicorn studies a sea of spells to their most primordial variants in order to awe and protect us, yet they will be inevitably deemed as dogs with tricks that all those like them have mastered; they are bound. The Pegasus can soar to the sky, yet they will eventually strike its ceiling along with the rest; they are bound. It is only through the bestowing of happiness and harmony, as the benevolence of the almighty six bestowed them unto us, sisters and brothers, that we may transcend the bounds of our manifestations and embrace each other as one!”

After the rest of the black fedoras had piped down, the Middle Mare spoke of things that held actual relevancy to the stoutly brown pony struck by their spell, such as “the second family” and “tolerance” in addition to other jumbles of jargon that the ears of every Crusader consumed contently even after their thousandth time of hearing them. The ears of Back-Bone however, only partially swallowed this into his skull, for his eyes widened as they and his ears uncovered a revelation about the Middle Mare beyond her fedora and rain coat of contrasting white. His eyes perceived her blazing, stress wrinkled muzzle of the fiercest red and while one ear drum consumed her words, his other detected a tone of unconscious hoarseness that was beating against it at its very sound. Even the top student of a hypothetical “School of Sceptics” would be stretching to find doubt in the fact that the Middle Mare herself was none other than the librarian of the Canterlot library whom he’d encountered all those months ago. An inaudible chuckle came from Back-Bone’s mouth at this fluke, along with all that it implied and the coronation proceeded.

Hence, after jotting down his name, age, address, bank account password and desired cell to be assigned over the course of five forums without a moment’s hesitation, we come back to Back-Bone’s crown being fitted with a fedora of its very own. With the deed done, the Middle Mare gazed into his dark brown eyes that shone with a rare shine. The distinct sharpness of her voice had startlingly died as she softly announced, “We shall hereby be call you by the designation of: “Six One”. Welcome, my brother.”

With that the Middle Mare stepped back and nodded at towards the members of the crowd and like good ponies their voices flowed from their monotone mouths and filled the hall in the contextually edited chorus of the choirs that, once upon a time, marked crowning of a certain lavender alicorn. No one truly knows what the fabled “Neighagra Falls” detailed in the map page of that strange purple book actually would have looked like, but given the fact that something, let alone harmonious melodies sung with synthetic precision, was being performed for his sake, as well as the sight of the one to whom he wished to deliver joy, Zero Three, singing along with a smirk and of course, the cheers and whistles of his little pink pony consuming his head and heart, it’s relatively safe to say that the appearance of the quantities of water falling from Back-Bone’s glistening eyes was not a million miles off.

Later that night, with that trademark “Crusader smile” worn along his lips, Back-Bone strutted into his apartment, hung up his fresh fedora, raincoat and shades and woke the baby filly in the room downstairs with his mutilation of the song that was sung by Rarity when she became acquainted with Fancy Pants, which he admittedly liked. He bookmarked the next hymn, which he planned to sing the following Sunday night and leapt into bed. Snuggling into his pillow which now bore uncharacteristic comfort, Back-Bone closed his eyes as the frontal lobes of his brain turned over the Middle Mare’s remarks on “happiness” and drew up plans to spread such emotions at the first opportunity. This was cue of a little portion marked “commitments” at the back of his head that whispered a little reminder that Stale Dough had told him to clean her apartment for Sparkling Spectacle’s forthcoming visit. That was all it took for Back-Bone’s smile to hang itself up with his fedora and reveal an expression of reluctant horror to the walls and ceilings of his home.