Twilight's Rose

Chapter 2: Retrograde

“Most flowers will grow wild, of course,” she said. Her long indigo mane dragged on the floor as she took a step toward the frozen stallions. “But roses are different.”

Luminov and Long Shot shuffled to either side as she approached, but Domino had already backed up against the concrete planter.

She took another step forward, putting her muzzle-to-muzzle with Domino. “A wild rose bush is nothing but a bunch of thorny sticks, with an occasional sickly bloom.”

Domino squeezed as close to the planter as he could get. He heard the sound of pistols being slowly drawn from their cloth holsters. The mare shuffled forward and raised the shears, shifting her weight to her rear hooves as she gripped the razor-sharp gardening tool. “Roses really require cultivation.”

She snipped off a single rose. “If you pour your soul into a rose, it becomes something beautiful. A reflection of yourself.” She dropped the shears and sat down, then carefully bit the thorns off of the rose’s stem, spitting them into the planter. “A lot like friendship, actually.”

Domino licked his lips and formed a word with his lips a few times before he managed to say, “W-who are you?”

The mare spoke without looking away from the flower in her hooves. “I’m Twilight’s Rose.”

She started, her wings fluttering for an instant. She scrunched her muzzle, then squeezed her eyes shut and shook her head. She looked down at the rose in her hooves, then back up to Domino. “I’m sorry.” She tucked the thornless rose behind his ear. “I’m Princess Twilight Sparkle.”

Domino swallowed hard and nodded.

Twilight Sparkle froze, then squinted at the trembling stallion. She poked his face with a hoof, and her eyes grew wide. “Y-you’re real!” She galloped to the other stallions, and squeezed their faces with her hooves, then pulled them all together and hugged them. “Y-you’re not hallucinations!”

Luminov and Long Shot traded glances while the alicorn sobbed and laughed and nuzzled them in turn. Finally, Twilight let go of them all and leaned back, rubbing her muzzle with a hoof. Domino was still frozen, his white muzzle sticking out of the long, silky mane draped over his head.

Twilight leaned back and tugged on her mane, trying to untangle the unicorn. “I’m sorry, you’re caught in my… Wow. When did my mane get so long?”

Domino blinked, and glanced at his crewmates as they slowly holstered their pistols. “Uh, Miss?”

“Technically,” she said as she held up one lavender hoof, “the correct title is ‘Your Highness,’ but really, I’d rather you just call me Twilight.”

“Okay, um, Twilight. Are you… real? Like, I’m not hallucinating or anything?”

Twilight giggled. “Of course I’m real. Just a second ago, I was the one imagining you.”

“But—” Domino gestured to the wings folded at her sides “—you have wings and a horn.”

Luminov cracked his neck. “And Earth pony strength.”

Twilight blinked. “Okay.”

Domino sputtered, “B-but you’re real!”

Twilight tossed the bundle of her mane hair on the ground. “Do you mind if we continue this repetitive conversation on the way to a barber shop? I wasn’t really expecting company, and this mess is pretty embarrassing.” She pointed down a corridor. “There’s one just past the ice cream parlor, and then you can all help me install a little invention of mine that should get us to the next habitable planet in just a few hours.”

Long Shot’s eyebrows climbed up his forehead until they got lost under the brim of his hat. He glanced at Domino, then Luminov. Both of them had similar expressions. Domino mouthed the word, “Hours?”

Twilight cocked her head to the side. “Well?”

Long Shot cleared his throat. “Sure. Lead the way, lady. Princess.” He blinked. “Highness.”

Twilight smiled and started to turn, then looked back to them with one forehoof still in the air and her ears folded back against her neck. “Can… Can you please not disappear when I look away?”

All three stallions nodded.

“Great! Do you guys want ice cream?” She started trotting.

The Ain’t Home’s crew fell in step behind Twilight. They could hear her mumbling to herself as she went. Long Shot whispered, “What the hell is going on?”

Domino whispered back, “We just found a spaceship from your legendary planet, with a legendary immortal goddess on board, who’s invented a faster-than-light drive that’s two orders of magnitude faster than the best we’ve got.”

Long Shot glared at him. “So you’re a believer now?”

Domino watched Twilight’s tail swish back and forth as she walked. He turned back to his captain. “I have eyes.” He stepped over the length of hair that flowed like an indigo river behind Twilight. “How about that FTL drive, though?”

Luminov hopped over Twilight’s tail and leaned in close to the other stallions. “She could be genius. She could be crazy. She could be lying.” He nodded toward a hat shop staffed by a very stylish corpse. “She could be murderer.”

“Or,” said Domino as he glanced at the stallions trotting on either side of him, “she could be a pony who needs our help.”

Long Shot rolled his eyes. “We ain’t pirates. Getting her safely back to civilization is a given.” He paused as Twilight laughed at some unspoken joke. “But getting us back safely is important, too. That means not gettin’ taxidermied, and it means gettin’ paid so we can eat. You wanna get paid, don’t ya?”

Nopony bothered to nod.

“Good. Now, the two most valuable things on board this ship are the location of Earth, and that drive she wants to install. Our salvage award is based on the value of the ship and everything aboard. Drive installed: big money. Drive not installed: pile of junk on a workbench.”

“Besides,” said Domino, “if someone with a bigger scow finds this ship after we have to leave it behind, they might have enough dash cable to wrap this whole thing and drag it back. We found it, so there’s no reason to think somepony else couldn’t find it, too. It’s in the middle of nowhere, sure, but it’s big enough that I’m surprised we’re the first to have found it.”

Luminov grunted. “Let us not count eggs before they hatch. This drive she invented may be ruse, or imaginations of a sick mind.”

Domino nodded. “Sooooo… What’s the plan?”

Long Shot took a deep breath, then set his jaw and let the air out through his nose. He whispered as the others leaned in. “Okay, in order of importance. One: Don’t get taxidermied. That implies Two: Find out what happened here, why everypony’s dead. Three: Figure out where Earth is. Four: Get the tech installed so we can get a salvage award and retire on our own private floating islands. How does that sound?”

Luminov raised an eyebrow. “What about the—” he tilted his head to the side, and made a strangling noise with his tongue lolling out of his mouth “—everywhere?”

Long Shot nodded. “That’s part of objective two.” He looked at Domino with a grin and pointed to the flower behind the younger stallion’s ear. “She seems to like you. You ask her.”

“Fine,” Domino hissed as he adjusted the rose and smoothed down his mane. “Should I ask her about Earth, since you’re both obsessed above and beyond even filthy luchre?”

“Don’t push her,” Long Shot replied softly. “Just keep her talking. And try not to upset her.”

Luminov chuckled. “You know. Any more than she is already.”

Domino rolled his eyes, then sped up until he was trotting by Twilight’s side. “So, uh, Twilight.”

“Hmm?” Twilight looked at Domino and gasped, her wingtips fluttering and then settling back to her sides. “Oh, it’s you. Uhhhhh…” She blinked and opened her mouth. “I’m so sorry! I’m a terrible host. I haven’t even gotten your names. It’s just been so long since anypony has visited, I’ve kind of forgotten my manners.”

Domino stopped and did a mock bow with a sweep of his front leg. “Domino, at your service, Your Highness.”

Twilight rolled her eyes with a grin, then gave him a look up and down and bopped him on the nose. “Well, you are almost black-and-white, aren’t you? Do you have white boots under that suit to match your muzzle?”

“Boots!” hollered Luminov and Long Shot in unison before dissolving into a fit of chuckles.

“I’ll take that as a ‘yes,’” Twilight said, turning back to Domino. “Don’t be so grumpy about it, Boots. Nicknames are often a way of bonding with friends.”

“Bonding. Right,” he grumbled. “Anyway, that’s Luminov and Captain Long Shot.”

They both waved. Twilight gave a soft smile. “Nice to meet you all.” She turned to her right and took a step toward one of the shops. “Chocolate or vanilla? Maaaybe strawberry swirl?”

Domino looked up and grimaced at the shriveled mare standing behind the counter. Her purple and white mane was pinned up in a style that looked like a mound of soft-serve ice cream. A bright blue stallion with a yellow mane was seated at one of the tables, grinning at nothing and staring permanently over the top of his empty glass sundae dish.

“Actually,” Domino said as he turned back to Twilight, “I wanted to ask about… these ponies.”

Twilight cleared her throat. “Oh, that. I’ve been very lonely for a very, very long time. This here is… was Jerry Rig. He was brilliant, and a very close friend. One of the last to go.” She looked up at Domino and let out a shuddering breath. “Do you know what happens to a pony when the oxygen runs out? It’s not painful at all, you know. His last few minutes were euphoric. I couldn’t do anything but watch as I held him in my wings.”

“I’m sorry. I just…”

“We come here for ice cream all the time,” Twilight said as she reached out and caressed the deceased stallion’s chin.

Domino opened his mouth, then closed it.

Twilight looked at Domino, then back down at Jerry Rig. She jerked her hoof back to her chest and shot a glance to the parlor’s counter. Her breaths came faster and faster as she squeezed her eyes shut. “I… I don’t…” Her lower lip began to tremble. “T-there’s no ice cream, is there?”

Domino looked at the floor beheath his hooves. “No. There’s not.”

Twilight sat down hard and wept. Her wails filled the mall, echoing off every surface and returning even more bitter. Domino turned his head to look at his crewmates, then sat down next to Twilight and wrapped a hoof around her shoulders. She buried her face in his neck and let her wings sag to the floor as she shook with each sob.

When she finally pulled away, she wiped her face with her wings and muttered, “I’m sorry, I’m such a wreck.” She dragged a hoof down the front of his chest. “I got your space suit wet.”

“I’m sure I would be a wreck too, after… Um. How long have you been on the ship?”

Twilight sniffled. “I have no idea.”

“Were you born here?”

Twilight snorted. “I built the ship. The whole mission was my idea.”

“And what mission was that?”

Domino thought he heard a whimper from Twilight. She bowed her head in silence for several seconds before she took a deep breath. “To establish an offworld colony in order to mitigate the risk of a potential worldwide catastrophe.”

“Ah. So you built the ship to…”

“To bring ponies on a one-way trip. To take them away from their loved ones. To let them die of old age in a tiny metal box. To doom their children and grandchildren to imprisonment in a coffin of my own design.”

Domino bit his lip. “I mean… You were trying to save them, right? To save ponykind. At sublight velocity, they all knew their descendants would be stuck living on the ship until you arrived at your destination. They had to know that, right? How long was the trip supposed to last?”

Twilight leaned into his shoulder and muttered, “About four hundred years.”

“Our history,” said Domino as he rubbed Twilight’s shoulder, “goes back nine hundred years. The records get fuzzy before that, but we’d already colonized a dozen planets with faster-than-light ships before then.”

“The life support system started degrading about sixty years after we set out,” Twilight said quietly. “The rate of decay was very slow. I kept it a secret until the first generation had passed away. No need to burden them all with the kind of guilt th-that… Well, we tried to find a solution. Fixes, modifications to the life support system. I looked for more out-of-the-box options. Suspended animation spells, ice preservation, teleportation. But there was less and less oxygen production, and more and more ponies were dying. By the time I’d figured out how to make a faster-than-light drive that could get us to our destination, I was the only pony left.”

Domino felt Twilight shudder. He looked up at his crewmates. Both were staring at the floor between their hooves. Silence lapped at their ears like ripples on an overgrown pond. Domino took a deep breath. “And you’ve been alone here ever since? That makes you - and the ship - well over a thousand years old.”

Twilight pushed herself off of Domino’s shoulder and sat up straighter, her eyes still downcast.

Domino stood up and reached a hoof out to Twilight. “So, is it true that you’re immortal?”

Twilight took his hoof and stood up, then glanced at the barber shop just a few steps away. She looked back to Domino with a smile, the fur under her eyes still wet with tears. She sniffled and chuckled at the same time. “Technically, one can never know that unless and until one dies. Because you might always die tomorrow.”

“How, uh, cheery.” Domino trotted into the barber shop with Twilight. “So you’re either a scientist or a logician.”

Twilight settled onto a dusty stainless stool beneath the bright lights still shining from the ceiling. “I’ve worn a lot of hats over the years. But I’ve always had a knack for science.” She watched Domino use his elbow to polish the mirror on the wall across from her. When he stepped away from the mirror, she scowled at herself. “Wow. I’m surprised you didn’t run off screaming when you saw me.”

“It’s not so bad,” he said as he ran a suited hoof through her lengthy tresses. “Isn’t there a fairy tale about a princess with very long hair, marooned in a high tower?”

“Don’t you get any ideas, mister,” Twilight said with a pretend frown. She crossed her forelegs over her chest and stuck her chin in the air. “I don’t need to be rescued by any wannabe prince.”

“But you do need to be rescued by a barber.” He looked up and down the countertop until he found an intact jar still full of bright blue liquid. With a nod, he lifted the ground glass stopper and pulled out a pair of scissors and a comb with his magic, shaking them dry as he turned back to Twilight. “Unfortunately, I’m not a barber. And I have no idea what I’m doing.”

“Don’t worry,” Twilight said as she sat up straighter. “I have a lot of experience telling barbers exactly what to do.” She glanced up at Domino with her eyebrows raised. “I was a very particular filly.”

Luminov leaned over to Long Shot as they watched from just outside the barber shop. “Can you believe is real alicorn?”

Long Shot shook his head. “My first thought was ‘changeling,’ but they can’t imitate that level of strength. She’s part Earth pony, for sure.”

“Look at him. Thought of changeling never crossed his mind. You think he ever has met changeling?”

Long Shot snorted. “Not that he knew of, I’m sure. Maybe he’s heard stories.”

“Like the one about salvage crew who throws mare out airlock of her own ship?”

Long Shot grunted. “Kid don’t need to hear about that. You and I know she was a changeling.”

“Is no knowing. No proof.”

“Okay.” Long Shot turned to face Luminov and tugged on his cap, pulling it down tightly over his eyebrows. “Let’s assume she was a flesh-and-blood pony. She was still a pirate.”

“We do not know that, either. But I do know that when we kill her and take her things,” Luminov said as he turned back toward the barber shop and sat down, “that makes us pirates.”

“You know full well that’s not what happened. What, you meet a goddess and suddenly grow a conscience?”

Luminov kept staring straight ahead, watching Domino pull up combfuls of Twilight’s mane and snip them to length. His ears drooped for an instant before he spoke. “Do you think we will have to…”

Long Shot sighed. “I dunno. I hope not. I like her. You know, when she’s not being creepy. Or flipping between disturbingly cheerful and disturbingly sad like a light switch. If I was stuck on this ship all alone for a thousand years, I’d be nuttier’n squirrel turds. Preserving the bodies of my friends is probably the least weird thing I’d be guilty of.” He watched Twilight throw back her head and laugh, then playfully poke Domino on the nose.

Luminov grunted. “I would be throwing myself at first mare to show up, too. Kid does not know enough to be scared enough.”

“See, now I can’t tell whether you’re being paranoid or just jealous.” He chuckled as he watched Luminov roll his eyes. “Let him enjoy the attention. She ain’t the only lonely pony who’s been in space for too long.”

Domino called out, “All finished!” He spun the chair around to face the mirror. “See! I’ve cut off zero ears today. A new record!”

Long Shot and Luminov golf-clapped from the shop’s entrance.

Twilight looked at her reflection and toyed with her bangs. “I look like me again.” She took a deep breath and let it out with a hum. “Thank you.”

“Well, I hope it helps you feel like you again.”

“I hate to interrupt before we get to the highlights and perms,” Long Shot said, “but we do have some rather important questions.”

Twilight hopped off the stool and joined the stallions in the corridor. “And I’ll be happy to answer any and all questions.” She clasped her hooves in front of her chest and tilted her head with a smile. “But first, since there’s actually ponies here to help me, I have a plan to get the ship running again. I mean, sure, I had to invent a faster-than-light drive, but, heh-heh-hey, you do what you gotta do, right?”

Domino helf up a hoof. “You already mentioned that, actually, and I’m dying to find out how it works.”

“Right,” said Twilight, “so you’ll help me install the drive?”

Long Shot cleared his throat. “Maritime Law requires that I inform you that we are salvors, and any assistance we grant you in repairing or towing your ship will result in a merit salvage award commensurate to the effort and risk undertaken by the salvors, and to the value of the salvaged property.”

Twilight wrinkled her forehead for a moment. “Well, I don’t have any money. Not that would be worth anything to you, anyways. But you’re welcome to keep the ship once my mission is complete.”

Long Shot blinked and glanced at Luminov, then turned to Twilight and pursed his lips before asking, “Why would you give us everything?”

“I… I never really owned the ship. I was steward of it. It was these ponies and their families who owned it. The plan was to dismantle it and use it for materials at our destination.” She spent a few seconds looking down the empty stretches of the mall, still bright and empty, as if waiting for ponies to shop and play and laugh. “They don’t need it any more.”

“I do not mean to be rude,” said Luminov gently, “but if everypony is dead, then why do you bother to complete the mission? We already have colonized all habitable planets in this part of galaxy.”

“It’s my mission.” She clenched her jaw and stood taller, lifting her chin into the air. “I must complete my mission. These ponies died for the mission. Without a crew to track our location and decelerate the ship, I overshot our original destination long, long ago, but I owe it to these ponies to lay them to rest on a pony planet, even if they weren’t the ones to colonize it.”

“We appreciate your generosity,” Domino said, “but what is it that you want?”

“I want to complete my mission. These ponies deserve peace. The kind of peace that I can’t give them here.”

Domino shook his head, the silky rose petals tickling the fur on his ear. “No, I mean, what do you, personally, want.”

Twilight blinked. She tilted her head down and held a hoof to her chest. “Oh, um. I… I want to make friends, and see them happy. A real friend, someone to talk to” —she glanced back to the ice cream parlor, where Jerry Rig’s toothy smile continued to shine— “and have ice cream with. I want to make somepony truly happy. Not just smile-and-nod and pretend to not be creeped out by a thousand year old psycho on a graveyard spaceship. Really, truly happy.”

She turned and began shuffling down the corridor, away from the rose bush where they had met.

Luminov trotted after her. “Which begs question: What is nature of happiness?”

“Oh, so you’re a philosopher?” Twilight tilted her head and smiled at him.

“He thinks he is,” said Long Shot as he followed behind.

Luminov shrugged. “I have much down time. I read many books.”

“Oh, really?” Twilight tucked a lock of her mane behind one ear. “I happen to have a lot of books, myself.”

“Hey,” Domino said as he trotted up on Twilight’s other side, “I read a lot of books, too.”

“Hush, boy,” Luminov said with a wink. “Grownups talking now.”

Twilight giggled. “Happiness is the only thing ponies pursue for its own sake. Riches, love, power… Those are all things that ponies try to achieve because they think it will make them happy. But happiness is elusive, because if it’s your goal, you won’t find it. Some philosophers have said that happiness can only be earned through struggle and pain, because it’s through that pain we truly see what in life has great worth. This is, theoretically, the basis of culture.”

Luminov nodded, his bushy orange eyebrows bunched together. “And what is it, in your opinion, that is of great worth in life?”

“Friendship,” Twilight said in a voice that was audible only in the silence of the empty space filling the mall.

The four ponies trod softly, their ears and eyes cast downward.

Twilight cleared her throat. “Since you asked the question, I’m sure you have a philosophy of your own to share. I’d like to hear it please, Luminov.”

Luminov gave her a fragile smile and took a breath. “One theory contends that ponies live life in conflict between desire to live, and awareness of inevitability of death. This conflict, called mortal terror, is managed by embracing cultural values that provide life with meaning. Values like friendship, as you say.”

“Wow.” Twilight smirked. “Did you just pull that out of the chapter summary?”

“Mostly. I have spent many nights looking at stars and thinking about my own mortality. But what about you? If your death is not inevitable, do you live in conflict?”

“Double wow.” Twilight hung her head and took a deep breath. Her wings shifted and settled tighter against her sides. “That’s quite a question.”

“It is,” Luminov said. “If you permit me observation… You do live in conflict.”

Twilight nodded, squeezing her eyes shut and biting her lip as she marched forward. When she opened her eyes, they were brimming with tears that didn’t fall. “Some days, I’m convinced that I’ve already died, that I’m just haunting this place. That thought terrifies me more than anything else. So, yes, I fear death. I’ll do just about anything to get my mind off that notion. Maybe you’ve already noticed that.”

“Yes, uh, is making sense now. Is interesting to note that both our theories account for friendship as path to happiness.”

Twilight shuddered and lifted her eyes just long enough to make eye contact with Luminov before she shuffled to a stop in front of a pretzel stall. “Not all theories will end up at that same conclusion, though.”

Domino sat on the floor next to Twilight. “You have another theory?”

Her eyes darted to the ceiling as she tilted her head with half a smile. “Not so much a theory as… I read a book a long time ago. The author lived just about a hundred years before I was born, on an orange farm on the river, not too far north of Ponyville where my castle was. I forget the name of the story, but his pen name was Two Marks.”

Luminov gasped, his eyes lighting up as a smile spread across his broad face. “Samuel Clementine! I knew he was real!”

Long Shot cleared his throat and stepped around Luminov. “There have been some rather, uh, contentious debates regarding the authenticity of Two Marks as a pre-colonization author. Some of his books survived, but most folks thought they’d been written by Lost-Earth hoaxers. I guess that’s settled, now.”

“I am sorry,” Luminov said, taking a deep breath and smoothing down his mane before he turned back to Twilight. “Is very exciting. You were saying about one of his stories?”

A fleeting grin crossed Twilight’s face. “Don’t apologize. It’s nice to make somepony smile.” She sighed. “Anyway. I don’t remember the story really well, but, basically, this mare meets some kind of supernatural being who can grant wishes. At some point, she wishes for a friend of hers to be happy.

“The creature grants her wish, and the friend suddenly believes herself to be queen of the world. Even though she’s living in squalor and nearly starving, she thinks that she’s in the lap of luxury, enjoying lavish feasts. The mare asks the creature why her friend is now crazy, and the creature responds that the only way to be truly happy is to be insane. I think that was just a minor point in the story, but it’s always stuck with me.”

Luminov cocked his head. “I do not think I have read that one. Do you believe is true?”

Twilight chuckled. “Well, I’m not exactly a model of mental health at the moment, but I’m not particularly happy, either. Although, that proves nothing because it’s a converse error.” She looked up at the stallions and shrugged. “I’m not sure. I was happy once, you know. I had some wonderful friends. Sometimes I wonder if I was crazy then. Imagined them all. Or if I’m crazy now. It feels like another life. That those memories were from another Twilight. A previous incarnation or… Or whatever.”

Her head sank lower and lower until her horn finally touched the floor. She swallowed and took a deep breath, then sat up and cleared her throat. “So, do I need to sign a contract or something for you guys?”

Long Shot shook his head. “No maam. I wasn’t asking for an agreement, just notifying you that when we reach a planet, a merit salvage award will be determined by a court. Since you have no money, the ship would be auctioned off to pay the award. Unless, of course, both parties agree on compensation.”

Twilight nodded. “Either way, though, these ponies will be laid to rest on a colonized planet, right?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

Twilight smiled with wide eyes and clasped her hooves in front of her chest. “Then consider me informed! Execute plan seven.”

Long Shot squinted, his eyebrows bunching up in the middle of his forehead. “What’s plan sev—”

“Hush!” Luminov held up a hoof. His ears pricked as he held perfectly still, his eyes tracing the shops and stalls lining the corridor.

A metallic clatter rang out from the back room of the pretzel shop and echoed up and down the hall, coming back in waves. All three stallions reached for their pistols as the air filled with a deep groan that resonated in their ears. As they spun in circles, the sound of hoofsteps came from all directions.