Ponder over the simple answer, Yes or No
Twilight's dream about a library were nothing short of spectacular. The endless rows of information spanning from horizon to horizon, so large, the inside of the library was fit with water features and an open air natural garden. The pillars of books lead higher and higher, and her eyes darted around, taking in the architecture, and design. At the top of the library was a large round dome, an open skylight that let in wind, and sun. Below the ring, ten meters from the top was the cloud section, a Pegasus only section that could only be accessed by winged creatures.
The last detail made Twilight tilt her head, her dream form becoming a little less real.
"Wait a minute...where are the stairs?"
As she looked around, there were a few instances of the shelves being pushed back and arranged like stairs, where every step, you were walking over books that could be pulled out and read, but every time she looked up at the winged creatures only section far above her head, she instantly thought of the name for the library.
The Cloudsdale Library.
In her mind, there could be no other place in the world that would be designed not to have stairs. By her dream logic and reasoning, she was almost 100% positive the place she was standing in was the Cloudsdale Library.
After visiting Cloudsdale only one other time, before she ascended to princess and gained an invaluable pair of wings as part of becoming an alicorn, she only had the time to literally poke her head in and keep moving.
So now the thought stuck with her, did the Cloudsdale Library have stairs? Surely not, logic would dictate that a flying race would be less reliant on stairs when they could fly around. For other reasons, like elderly ponies who were less able, or children who didn't know how to fly yet, then surely there must of been stairs incorporated into the design somewhere.
Before she realized what she had done, she ended her own dream and was laying in the early morning darkness of her bed, pillows, and comforters.
"Darnit." She spoke softly to herself.
Her dream library was such an elegant design, tall windows around the entire egg shaped library, trees growing inside to keep the air vibrant and free of the old dusty book smell.
Now she was awake and the worst type of problem was burning in her mind.
She needed to know the physics of the Cloudsdale Library, and if there were any stairs inside. It wasn't the worst type of problem physically, only, it kept her up mentally.
Twilight's fantasy library was losing detail by the second, and all that remained was the rubiks cube of dimensions that contained the Cloudsdale library, a soft ticking coming from the wall cuckoo clock, and her breath.
In, out, she couldn't match her breath to overcome the absurdity of the question.
Did a winged-race of creatures, who wouldn't need stairs by definition, build stairs in their library?
She tried to come up with reasons as to why there would be stairs- the elderly and the unable- but the overbearing part of her mind, that was louder than the logical part said in a snarky, almost bragging type of voice similar to Rainbow Dash's, 'Nope, there's no way that place has stairs.'
Worse, she knew she could easily ask them in the morning, but the worst thing of all about having this line of thinking, was that it was 3:17 in the morning. She'd have to wait at least another three hours before Rainbow Dash woke up for an early morning workout, or another hour before Fluttershy's chickens started stirring.
Her mind went to Fluttershy second, not because she wasn't more sure that of the two Pegasus, Fluttershy would be the most likely of candidates to have spent more time in the Cloudsdale Library. Twilight didn't put much stock into Rainbow Dash knowing off the top of her head about the library, let alone if she's ever been in there.
She was reluctant to go to Fluttershy about her physics problem for a very simple reason, her friend, liked to play with physics like a cat would with a long piece of yarn.
She didn't dare breathe his name either, not even under her breath, as she figured out that Discord has a very keen sense of self-awareness anytime someone says his name. He said it's like running your tongue over the roof of your mouth, and then a flavor that associates with a part of the world comes to mind. Then he'll pop into that part of the world and have his merry way. Leading Twilight to believe if she says his name, he'll invariably find out that she wants to know about the dimensions of the library, and might, just possibly, rearrange the dimensions to get a reaction out of her.
Either way, Twilight was resistant to the idea of going to Fluttershy because of the possibility that Discord could overhear.
It wasn't that he would do something like change the physics of the Cloudsdale Library, because he completely would and he can.
It's the fact that he could rearrange all the physics of the library to not have stairs, or vice versa, while she checked visually, and then put everything back the way it was without anypony noticing the difference.
She could already hear the conversation play out in her head a week from now. There she was, lying in bed when an absurd physics problem came to her in the middle of the night, that led her to go pop her head into the Cloudsdale Library the next day, when out of the blue, one of her friends disagrees.
"No way, of course the library has stairs."
"I'm telling you, the Cloudsdale Library, designed by Pegasus, for Pegasus, does not have any stairs. Leading up to the building, maybe. On the inside, probably, but from one floor to the next, no way."
Twilight looked at both sides of the coin, both sides of the argument from her bed, and it was still only 3:21. Her entire body shook like she'd swallowed a whole pot of bad coffee.
Oh heavens no, not right now. Her eyelids were getting wider, and then the objects in the dark room started becoming more clear and her range of depth was getting better.
She softly cried, "NOOOoooooooo!" wanting to do nothing more than go back to bed and leave the mental problem for a few hours...
but after blinking twice, she shook again and sighed.
"I'm awake."
By far, the absolute worst type of problem was the type of problem that came in the middle of the night, and nothing could be done about it right away.
______
Floating outside of her friend's window, looking in to the dark bedroom wasn't on a list of things Twilight did regularly. She was shivering, but she wasn't cold as she felt. She was shivering from the lack of blood flow and her limbs not being fully awake yet.
It's not like she hadn't woken up her friends in the middle of the night over trivial things, and they all were friends long enough to know that all six of them had their own quaint personality that came with being their friends. But this time it was only slightly different, she was hoping that it could be solved over and done, with a quick yes or no question.
Watching Rainbow Dash's prone form, breathing in and out, Twilight suddenly felt self-conscious about being outside her friend's window for such a long period of time, especially in the middle of the night. What would the neighbors think if they saw her.
It's not that she couldn't wait until morning, it's just that there was an earworm digging through her mind and it wouldn't be satisfied until it had its answer.
Jaw stammering, she whispered "Rainbow Dash." to the window, and got no response. Tapping her hoof once against the window did nothing to get the Pegasus to stir didn't do anything either. Through the window, on the bed she saw a small tiny head poke up.
Her mind stalled on what the creature was, thinking it was some sort of tiny spirit until she remembered the mare's pet tortoise, Tank.
Like a puppy that want's to be let back inside the house, Twilight make a few gestures and whimpering noises to the Tortoise, trying to cause enough background noise to get the sleeping Pegasus to wake up.
Breathing in, Twilight's eyes went to her left, the cloud all around her. Swallowing, she pulled a small tuft of cloud over to her hooves and shaped it into a small ball. The condensed cloud was turning more and more grey by the moment, giving off small claps of thunder.
Rainbow Dash stirred, moving her limbs, but still tightly gripped by the throws of sleep.
POP!
The cloud burst outwards in an explosion of air, light, and sound. Twilight yelped and vanished into the either, popping back into reality by Rainbow Dash's front door, her nerves shaking and breath hardly under control.
That's what she gets for trying to fly and spell casting at the same time, her focus was a little to far into Rainbow Dash's room and the cloud got to unstable.
The door swung open and Rainbow Dash charged out, slamming into Twilight and immediately shouting, "Aliens!"
They stumbled backwards, colliding with their limbs tangled around each other at 4:23 in the morning, and fighting the incorporeal form of Twilight in the darkness.
"Rainbow Dash, Rainbow Dash! Rainbow Dash! It's me! Twilight!"
They separated themselves and Rainbow Dash rolled up onto all fours. She rustled her wings out, flaring them and stretching them wide. Yawning into her first word "Why light? Whad'd'ya doing up? It's like...four in the morning. Di'ja hear the thing? Sounded like one of Pinkie's over-inflated balloons going !pop!"
The athelete shuddered, sending warmth and blood all across her limbs, slowly waking up and rubbing the sleep from her eyes.
"Yes. Yes I did. I was flying and casting spells at the early morning and lost focus for a moment when I was passing by."
"Isn't that one of the things Cadance said not to do, fly and spellcast? It's super distracting, you're going to run into a tree or something Twilight. I'm already distracted enough by other Pegasus, wind, air pressure, air hazards, changes in temperature...what were you doing at four in the morning?"
"I was trying to burn time."
Rainbow Dash's hooves went to the defensive position, "Not literally! I was flying around, trying to use up some spare time I had before coming to talk to you."
Rainbow Dash exhaled, "Phew. For a moment there, I thought you were literally trying to burn time...Don't scare me like that. It's wayyyyyy tooo early in the morning for that."
"You're right," Twilight said, nodding, hoping to interject her raison d'etre.
"Is it too early in the morning to ask you a quick question before you go back to sleep?"
Rainbow Dash's head swung from the doorway, back up to her own room where her comfy warm bed was rapidly losing heat. With a drawn in inhale, she said, "Shoot."
"Does the Cloudsdale Library have stairs on the inside?"
Rainbow Dash closed her eyes, falling deep into her memories, pulling up every detail of the Cloudsdale library, and found only a small filing cabinet with some toddler's books and a few basic picture books for how to fly when she was really young and little.
Rainbow Dash rubbed her face, "What?" She responded, not understanding the question.
Twilight shook her head, expecting this. "The Cloudsdale library is more than one floor, right, it's at least three if I remember correctly. Last time I poked my head in was for the-"
"The Young Flier's Competition" They both said, nodding.
"Yeah...I remember that...but..." Scratching her head, Rainbow Dash's maroon eyes went up and then to the North-East, like a compass directing her to the current geophysical location of Cloudsdale.
"Awh...geeeze Twilight, You're asking me this now?" She asked. "Like what do you mean, do they have stairs? Of course they have stairs."
"Yeah, but I was thinking, in a building designed by Pegasus, for Pegasus, it wouldn't make sense if there was a staircase, leading to the higher floors, because the only ponies who could get to it would need to have wings."
"What about the elderly who can't fly and the kiddos? Wouldn't they do something for them?"
"That's what I was thinking! So does the library have stairs or not?"
Rainbow Dash looked up to the skies for a moment, her eyes squinting, trying to force the memory to come up.
"I got nothing."
"Baga! Basura! (Crazy! Trash!)." Twilight said, almost having the self-fulled prophecy come true. "Alright, I'll leave you to get back to sleep, sorry for disturbing you, Rainbow Dash."
"Now hold on, hold on." She exhaled, "What's got you so interested in stairs at the library? I mean, I know you're an egghead, and rightfully so, but...before I go back to bed, just what are you trying to ask of me?"
"Dimensions, Rainbow Dash. Physics. Was the Cloudsdale Library built with stairs in mind, or was it assumed that since everyone could fly, they wouldn't be needed?
Rainbow Dash inhaled and exhaled. "You're resting on the wrong cloud, my friend. Last time I was there, I remember the first floor, because that's where all the kids books were, off in one section. I can't even remember the last time I was in there. I might've gone in once for a book during high school, but I would've been flying around the whole time or asked the librarian to grab it for me, so I...still don't know."
"Thank you, Rainbow Dash." Twilight said, nodding. She made to leave and Rainbow Dash was walking back into her house, calling after her.
"Now hold on, hold on. I'm coming."
"Rainbow, you don't really need to come."
"Said the camel to the water, I'm coming." Rainbow Dash tugged on a brown swede flight jacket and pulled the door close with her tail. "Where to next, Super fly's? You were going there next, right? She should be up by now."
"I don't think so Rainbow Dash, if my thoughts have told me anything about this morning,
it's that I'm just going to have to go there myself." Departing off the cloud, they fell together for a few moments before jutting out their wings and flapping them to stay aloft.
"I had a whole conversation in my mind this morning with all our friends, and none of us could agree or remember if the Cloudsdale Library was designed with stairs on the inside to reach the upper floors."
"Fluttershy would know. I know for a fact Fluttershy would know, she spent a bunch more time in there than I did. I would drag her out of there a few times...and she was always on the first floor because that's where they had all the 'Earth' and 'Ectomology' and sections that were related to the ground! Darnit! She might not know either!" The self-realization came on Rainbow Dash's own volition, the analytical energy coming off of Twilight was being soaked up by Rainbow Dash.
"Entomology." Twilight whispered in the early morning air, not enough fight in her spirit yet to correct her friend. "That's what I was thinking, too. At around three this morning, I was laying there, thinking-would Rainbow Dash know? Maybe. Fluttershy? Probably moreso than you, no offense."
"None, taken. But now that I'm thinking about the library...DARNIT TWILIGHT! You ALWAYS do THIS! WHY AM I thinking about the LIBRARY at O DARK THIRTY IN THE MORNING?! You need to stop doing that! Stop making me think about the library. Why, it wont open for another five hours!" Rainbow Dash shouted down at the passing hillocks and homes beneath them. The windows were dark, and the barest signs of early morning routines for the extremely early risers were beginning.
They were both instinctually following the road leading towards Fluttershy's cabin and with the same dilemma on their minds, it was going to come to a conclusion very quickly.
They spotted the pegasus going into her hen house with a load of hay and a broom, only to pop back out and take a seat on the hay bale with her eyes looking up at the sky, as if waiting for her friends to come down.
"Good morning Twilght, Good morning, Rainbow Dash."
_____
They left almost as quickly as they came, after Twilight explained the concept of stairs being optional in Pegasus architecture, Rainbow Dash suddenly quipped in that the older buildings from pre-unification definitely did not have stairs, while the newer models probably did.
Fluttershy responded with "I don't know, I spent most of my time on the first floor in the Entomology and Aviary sections. I remember the way they built it was the more important books like the town charter, local laws, and then all the grown-up books were above us. I remember going up to the grown-up section, but I always flew because it was quicker...so I can't remember seeing any stairs."
"That's what I was afraid of." Twilight said, the rays of Celestia's sun were hitting the far off Eastern side of Canterlot, sending the suns rays straight up into the sky. By the time Twilight would have her answer, it would already be sweeping across the landscape and ponies would be busy, going about their day.
So now the question was, was the Cloudsdale Library a pre- or post- unification era building? Did it undergo any renovations?
Her stomach gnawed for attention, having been awake for almost two hours now, and a friend in tow, she was ready for breakfast, but her mind was still stuck in the dark.
"I will have my answer." Twilight vowed. Something about the word renovation struck a chord in her mind, something about how it seemed to twist and skew her results. The scientific mind said that the possiblity existed, that when she got there, there would be stairs, because entire sections of her Unicorn based life was spent going up and down stairs to get places she needed to go.
Flying to Cloudsdale, she felt the tingling in the tips of her hooves just trying to imagine the concept of stairs being obsolete. No more stairs!
No grand staircase in the foyer, either. No dramatic entrance with a long dress sash billowing down the steps behind her. For a moment she emulated the thoughts of Rarity and imagined a ceremony without a dias for stairs leading up to.
The building her mind was making was more absurd than the idea of a library without any stairs.
Flying to Cloudsdale, it was a two hour flight from Ponyville, to north of Bremmerton where the floating city was currently stationed.
By the time Twilight and Rainbow Dash were swooping through the streets, it was seven in the morning, still two hours before the library opened.
In the middle of their need to know, they had no other choice than to wait.
Like a train coming into the station, they were waiting there on the bench outside the doors to the library. They'd peeked in through the windows, and seen only darkness or a wall of books blocking off their view of the rest of the library.
Rainbow Dash immediately said "Just pop in, pop out. No one will ever know you were there."
It was the principal idea of just because she could, doesn't mean she needed to. Twilight could've been lying in her bed, teleported the entire thing into the library, done her research, then gotten out before anyone in the world would have even known.
But instead, she did the sensible thing and waited like a normal pony. With that, the two of them were able to sit there in the morning light as the sun crawled down the peak of the building, down the pillars, and across the windows.
They sat there in silence as the sun washed over them at 7:23 in the morning and down the steps, sending a light mist into the air that brought the entire town to life with a moist breath of air.
Twilight could practically hear the morning gasps of fresh air being drawn in, the signs of a new day beginning. The early morning yawns, and the sight of street lanterns dimming, and meeting a few other library patrons early that morning who also came to the library.
Three Pegasus stopped by for only a moment, taking one look up at the closed double doors and dropping their book off in the return-slot. One of the three Pegasus recognized both Rainbow Dash and Twilight after dropping off their book and said "Good morning!"
They both smiled brightly, warmed by the morning sun and the blood flow that came to them during their flight, and returned the gesture in kind.
The Pegasus left with an even bigger smile on her face, thinking about what type of life her hero's must lead, to be up earlier than she was.
"You thinking about breakfast, like I am?" Rainbow Dash asked.
Twilight nodded. "I know there's a fruit stand over by the docks that does a really good coconut and papaya breakfast soup."
"Nah, I need mas protein. Too sweet. Hot oats, or lentils with sauteed seitan and nutritional yeast. Gilda said that's the closest thing she can get to chicken, mouth feel and taste wise. That or tempeh fried in honey and dunked in apple cider vinegar glaze. Really good. The acid is good for my muscles and keeps me from getting cramps."
Both their wings bristled against their sides, limbs touching one another, but they didn't mind. At 8:45 a pink and purple Pegasus with two feathers tucked into a beaded headband circled around the front and then circled the building a second time, landing in front of the building, next to Twilight and Rainbow Dash.
"Oh my gosh! It's you." She said, looking to Princess Twilight and Rainbow Dash.
"I didn't even recognize either of you the first pass around! I'm the Librarian, Sable Spring. What can I do you for? Are you here for anything in particular?" Sable produced a set of keys and went straight to the front door.
"I normally unlock through the back, but I always need to fly past the front to get there. I figure I can trust you two." She said, turning the tumblers in the lock and nudging the door open with her shoulder. She held it open for Twilight and Rainbow, and they both stood up, cracking their backs and stretching like cats.
"I think you were a Gryphon in your past life, Rainbow Dash." Twilight commented to Rainbow, she had both hooves stretched out in front of her, with her rear end up and tail drooped over. She was caught mid-yawn and turned one eye towards Twilight.
"What makes you say that?"
"You looked like a cute little kitty cat, just now."
"Peeshaw, Twilight, get your fill and then let's go. I've got a whole lot of nothing that needs taking care of back home." She said, yawning again.
"Is there anything I can help you with?" Sable asked again.
Twilight shook her head, "Sorry, we're here on a...a whim, and I wanted to see the architecture of the library on the inside. I was curious. Was the Cloudsdale Library designed with stairs in mind?"
"Come see for yourself. The original library, way long time ago, before I was working here, there were no stairs. This was...back in the 800s? For the longest time ever, there weren't any stairs leading from floor to floor, because we didn't need them.
After the big hurricane of 1395, nearly wiped out the eastern seaboard but was averted last minute by Thunderhead and Captain Flies Long Way of the Wonderbolts, the library was redesigned and given stairs from the first and second levels because there were more books available.
It wasn't until recently, and I'm talking two years ago, that they put in cloud elevators for the non-winged and unable."
Twilight and Rainbow both shared a look with each other. Their eyes combing the walls of the library and taking in the design of the place. There was a foyer with a staircase leading up to the second floor, but all along the walls were cubbies and nookes for books to be shelved in, or private little alcoves Pegasis could roost in while reading a good book.
On the second level were four round disks covered in a blanket of cloud cover with a omni-directional pad leading in up-down-left-right directions.
"These would be used to crawl up the wall, and then whichever direction you want to go, you press left or right, and it will cling to the wall. No more stairs. It's honestly a good deal for how much flying we need to do otherwise. It helps with putting away books in the high up sections."
"Were the high up sections considered a 'Winged-Creatures Only' section?"
Sable's smile partially faltered, "Ehhhh, it was more like we didn't have any one but Pegasus and Gryphon come through here, so it was more of a design fluke than a demand for ponies wanting to get up and down. Like I learned, the giant Monolith bats of Pheru don't live in little caves, so the demand for stairs didn't exist until a Ground type came along and said something."
"Interesting." Twilight said, looking around at the layout of the library.
Much to Rainbow Dash's memory, things were still relatively the same. The first floor contained plenty of books all relating to the earth and ground. The second floor was all about weather, water production, where to find water for clouds, how to get water from the ground up to the skies. The third and fourth floors were about fire and wind, respectively. The fire floor all about cook books, romance, and how-to books along with motivational readings. The floor above that was associated with wind, and many of the old scholars from Cloudsdale's past would spend much time on this ring of the library learning about the healing benefits from alchemical solutions made from plants, crystals and gemstone properties, and home remedy solutions for healing the body- including an extensive selection on broken bones in the wing and scapula joints, otherwise known as the problem areas for Pegasus when they crash.
The fifth floor above that was about communication with other tribes and languages gathered from the world below during the floating city's travels.
The sixth floor had the most windows on it, but from the outside, because the construction didn't warrant any need for support, insulation or wiring between floors, or a central staircase to base supports off of, the sixth floor was only forty five feet from the ground.
At the top of the library, the seventh floor, was Twilight's dome light, the open skylight that was frosted over with clouds that hadn't yet been warmed up by the sun.
The amazing detail about the magic and clouds used for the tiniest detail, was that the hole in the top of this building would stay contained, no air going in or out, even though everypony could look straight up and see the clear blue sky. It wouldn't be until noontime, when the sun was shining directly down on the library that the dome light would open and allow fresh air into the building. Sunlight would come pouring down, illuminating all the floors to the ground level.
Feeling a tingling in all four of her hooves, Twilight inhaled and exhaled, having taken her fill of the library.
"You ready to go? It's almost 9:30, and I'M STARVING. Gilda kept telling me about this one phrase where she was so hungry, she could eat a house. Wood and all. I'm seriously tempted to start nibbling on the flower pots they have hanging up outside if we don't get some food soon."
"Yes, Rainbow Dash. We're done here. Let's go get breakfast." She said with a smile.
Author's Note
Wasn't sure where the slice of life came from, but I ran with it.
Unlike Twilight, I wasn't driven to wake up at 3:00 in the morning. I actually got some sleep.
No, I woke up at 2:00! Then at 4:00! And then 6:00! By then it was late enough in the morning to finally get a start on my day! How's that for a sentence full of contradictions?!