Prologue: NUMBER ONE—NUMBER TWO THOUSAND
“Trick Up a Sleeve”
I’m still beating, let me be your heart.
How do you keep yourself from crying? The unimaginable, ice cold, and shadowy pain that rests in your chest while a numb-like feeling sweeps across your belly.
Eyes just stinging because of the pressure that rests behind the aching eyeballs, unbearable to look in the mirror because of how pathetic it looks
It shouldn’t hurt this bad
There’s not a god damn thing you could do about it.
Not a damn thing you can do about it.
The early noon sun beats down on the both of them, but neither of them minded.
Her eyes are like a magnet meeting a piece of metal for the first time, there wasn’t a thing Trickster could do except be attracted for her eyes are like magnets and his eyes like metal.
Her lips parts slightly, as if she was going to say a word but nothing escapes past her lips with the exception of warm air that lands on Trickster’s nose.
Trickster wishes he could speak, but something about this female stuns his lungs.
Preventing him from speaking to the mare, but it seems the mare didn’t want to speak either.
How unfortunate.
A steadily rising heart rate bursts against his chest and he can see the mare’s purple chest rattle in rhythm.
Trickster and the mare stares quietly and dumbly into each other’s eyes.
His internal organs seems frozen—
No. That’s not accurate for how Trickster feels. The ever-so tight knot that was his stomach tightens in probable panic, if there was anything to fear.
The mare stares with such wonder, her violet eyes encasing the passageway to her beautiful and young soul. This mare’s eyes make Trickster feel weird; peculiar but in a good way.
Like staring at art.
Trickster can’t divert his eyes. This mare is too fascinating to just simply be a passerby, not in Trickster’s head.
They stand no closer than three inches, both of them frozen. The world around them: blurry and the only sound was the rhythmic drums that were speeding up.
(His heart flutters, but why?)
The mare’s face, a tinge of pink glows on her face like a radioactive experiment gone wrong. Her eyes finally break from his to scan over his face, Trickster feels needy but dares not to express it.
(Needy, how a strange way to put it.)
It wasn’t sexual tension, it was an ache – if that’s what Trickster feels right now. Not for anything lewd, or anything like that, but he needs her eyes to meet his again.
The ache for her attention, or was it the ache for her eyes to meet his again? The mare’s eyes travel his face, up his forehead to down his neck. Trickster’s eyes never moved.
The ache in his spine was relieved when her eyes met his again, returning only when the mare blinks.
Boom.
Bang.
Boom.
Bang.
BOOM!
BANG!
BOOM!
BANG!
BOOM!
BANG!
BOOM!
BANG!
The constant and nonstop tumble of Trickster’s heart was all too much to handle in one lifetime. His heart beating against his chest, in rhythm with the mare’s heart. It hurts to look away but neither party wanted to look away.
Trickster’s lips moves.
The mare’s lips moves.
No sound comes from either pony, despite how much they move their jaws and lips – nothing comes out of their mouth except the hot air that lands on each other’s nose.
Her breath smells of sweet lemon paste, bread, and dandelion. Her lunch. Trickster didn’t know what his breath smells like, but it should smell like his freshly applied toothpaste.
The mare leans in, but stops.
Trickster leans in, but stops.
Two centimeters from touching.
“Who are you?” The mare’s eyes never left Trickster’s eyes. Her breath never deciding to either be shaky or calm. “I’ve seen you everywhere.”
Trickster’s lips tug into a small smile.
“I’m a phantom menace, mate!” Trickster jokes, the only defense to panicky situations as these. The mare reacts well to the sarcasm, her eyes brightens up in amusement. “I gotta haunt somepony!”
“Oh?” The mare raises an eyebrow. Her voice is smooth against Trickster’s ears, like a nanny reading a bedtime story. “Going to kidnap somepony in a theater and then play the organ for them?”
“I would, if I knew that I’ll get booked by the coppers for her majesty’s pleasure.” Trickster blinks as he chuckles. “That, I’m having hard times playing the piano— I might as well be playing a broken ukulele! It might be easier!”
The mare giggles lightly, her eyes still not diverting from his gaze. The more he spoke, the gentler her breathing became. “You really think that learning stings is easier than the piano?”
“Oh balls to that, you must take me for a jammy bastard!” Trickster had to learn the hard way about the difficulty of playing instruments, they were much-much harder to keep hold of with his proficiency of magic.
“Luck has nothing to do with music, luv, you got to—”
“Right, Right, I have to be patient and learn it – I got that bit from the music books I read,” Trickster still remembers the headaches. “All those flutes I destroyed out of frustration.”
“I wouldn’t let Octavia let you hear that, she’s a real devil if you can’t so much as play a recorder!” The mare responds, her smile grows as the conversation goes on. “I still remember the amount of ibuprofen I had to chug to get the pounding in my head to even loosen up.”
“Right,”
A loud, shrill whistle echoes through the two ponies. Their time coming to a close, Trickster looks to his left to see five blacked out ponies but this didn’t make sense, why would there be blank ponies—
Trickster was dreaming his fairy-tail again.
He turned back to the mare, and he cupped her face. The stallion needed more time, he blew it, his opportunity to know this mare’s name. The mare is black; no horn, no color – no details.
Only her eyes.
“Your name!” Trickster raises her hooves to cup his face. “Quick!”
“It’s…”
Twilight shoots up, the chills creeps across her legs from the hoof-tips to her chest. Twilight’s breaths, quick and shallow. Twilight’s skin, cold and shaky. Twilight’s head, brimming with questions that still lack answers.
He ruined her plan, that stallion did. That blue stallion shook her of her concentration with just his words, his eyes enchanting her heart, the way he scanned Twilight’s face – which required he break their gaze – left Twilight almost begging for his eyes.
Twilight was so close, but her folly – that stallion’s charisma – proved all too much for her to keep focus.
But why does this happen?
Obviously, she fell for this stallion quickly. It didn’t take Twilight a month and a half to recognize her feelings for the mystery stallion. The stallion was on her mind ever since she first dreamt of him, and to make matters worse – she saw him when she was living in Canterlot.
That was a while ago, but why was it just now affecting her? The more she thinks about the stallion, the more her heart races, the more she desperately needed answers; the stallion’s eyes held the truth from her like a carrot on a stick.
Twilight kicks away the crumbled paper, each of them with an urgent letter for Celestia that she’ll burn from existence. Twilight wasn’t due a friendship report for a week, and even if she did miss the deadline – goodness forbid – she has written up some in advance to last her a good… two weeks.
At the most.
Twilight sleeps at her study—she has done so for the last couple of days. She can’t sleep in her bed, the reasons are unknown to her but it feels like a foal being stripped of its stuffed animal. Better words would have been that she misses something, something in her life missing.
Twilight blinks, staring at the brush in her hooves. She looks around her bathroom, not remembering any sort of movement or transition from her desk to her bathroom. Her brain is on auto pilot, so to speak.
Twilight looks into the mirror to find her mane brushed finely, her coat clean and brushed of any knots or grime, the bathroom floor is wet and there’s a soaked towel resting in a straw basin – that sits by the door. Twilight feels numb as the stallion invades her mind again, his voice familiar but never remembering exactly the tone or pitch.
Twilight leaves the bathroom, more tired – yet fully awake. It feels like she could fall asleep at any given point or time.
