Vinyl nodded her head to the music only she could hear. She wove through the thick crowds of Manehatten, narrowly fitting between a large mare and a skinny stallion as she just beat the light. Her anxious steps carried her forward, head bobbing. With every beat of the music vibrating through her headphones, it felt like the ponies around her were pressing closer to her.
She took another confident step, her eyes wandering behind her concealing glasses. They couldn't hear her music, and that was fine. She saw a little filly with clear glasses and braces on. She was sucking on some kind of big lollipop, a big smile on her face.
Vinyl left her behind. The music continued, reaching a gentle portion of the music as a flock of birds flew past overhead. Some kind of gulls? She didn't know birds that well, but they flew in a v formation, wings flapping to the beat of the music they couldn't hear, but she could. She nodded her head with each pulse, each beat. It was a good day.
There it was. A tall building made of stone and glass. It had windows going across in small portals until the last floor, the top being wholly glass that she could see from the bottom flow. Two beats past before Vinyl stepped up into the building, every hoof flashing with colors; colors only she imagined flaring with the music that beat between her ears.
A large male pony nodded to her, allowing her past. He said something, but it was lost to the music. Vinyl didn't care much. He was a bouncer, but she didn't need to sweat that. She strode past him without a word. She belonged. The secretary at the front desk smiled and said something else. Vinyl nodded towards her in sync with the thumping music.
The elevator doors closed, sealing off the view of the gaudy pictures that had hung all around the lobby. Vinyl pressed the penthouse button and the elevator began to move. She could feel the elevator thumping with the music, moving with it. She smiled, her hoof tapping along with the music.
The elevator stopped just as the music paused and some mare came in with a dopey smile. She began talking to Vinyl, perhaps excitedly. Vinyl didn't hear her. She just bobbed her head patiently, and the elevator began to move. The mare looked like she might have just gotten off work and hadn't bothered to change. She was dressed like an officeworker. She had that little pudge that reinforced the idea. She kept talking. She didn't notice, or care, that she wasn't being listened to.
The elevator came to a smooth halt at the penthouse. The mare said something and waved as she trotted of. Vinyl moved with the pace of her music, her entire body in tune with the music that formed a protective cocoon around her. She wasn't alone, not there. She could feel the true faithful, moving in tune to the songs in their hearts. She could also feel the deep thumping that came from the music that was playing outside of her. She couldn't hear that very well, but she could feel it.
She could feel when it beat in time with her own music. She could feel when it didn't. Her heart jumped unevenly, trying to match the two in a dizzying sensation. Vinyl only smiled more, making her way through the dark but strobing dance hall towards where the DJ, a slender stallion, was applying his skill to the two discs before him.
A mare tapped Vinyl on the shoulder as her head slammed in time to the external music, sweat flying free in wide streaks from her dreads with each movement. She made an upward motion before pumping her hoof.
Vinyl nodded to the motion and returned it before moving past, their communication done. She ascended the short stairs leading to the DJ's station. She could hear the outside music fading away. She knew they were introducing her. She could hear the roar, the cheer. The ponies were eager for her, hungry for her, starving for her music.
She was their chef, and she was ready to cook for them. Her smile brightening to its widest, she shared a hoofbump with the DJ she was replacing, passing him by. With her music being the only music, she could feel her senses coming into focus. Her music would be their music.
With a wave of a hoof and a sparkle of a horn, she hooked her headphones into the equipment and twirled two records, one on either hoof. She shouted at the crowd. They shouted back. She slammed down the vinyl discs that formed her stagename. Some stallion was screaming at her, only to be tackled by what appeared to be a friend, the two lost to the crowd.
Vinyl began to pull at the record on her left, making it play forward, then back. She reached with her magic, moving the one on the right. With a flick, she got a background beat going. The music began to play and she was as lost as any of the other ponies there. It was time for music. It was time for noise. The primal beat had them, thumping and controlling them, demanding that nothing else take precedence before it. She was its master. She was its slave.
The music stilled a moment. The crowd stilled. The expectation was electric, running through the stifling room. The shared breath of countless ponies made it stuffy, crowded, and cramped. Vinyl would have had it no other way. She pulled sharply, dropping the beat with a rapid step that brought about a cheer. She unleashed the animal, the beast, to roar and scream across the room.
No other noise mattered. Vinyl threw her head back, sending sweat flying just as she had seen with the mare earlier. It was a sensation she knew so well. She screamed, but the words meant little. They knew what she meant, and she knew them. She knew the music.
Time was a construct made by slow-moving ponies to organize their listless lives. She saw a rowdy pony, a goth-punk mare, get roughly ejected. She saw a stallion slump over at the bar, drinking too much. It was another day of dancing; of music. Vinyl saw many things, but she didn't see the tap coming.
She jumped and turned to the right. A mare with slicked hair was smiling at her. She said something. Vinyl didn't hear the words, but she knew what it meant. Her turn was over. She was done. Vinyl slowed the music to a stop. She reclaimed her discs and slipped them away. The music would be tended by another.
Vinyl stepped down from the stage, breathing heavily but regularly. She could still feel her music flowing through her. She felt a soft tapping. Was it the mare? No, a stallion, one she knew. That one owned the place. He reached for her headphones. She ducked back. She was not ready to leave the music.
The stallion looked annoyed, his moustached snout wrinkling a moment before he pulled out a pen and wrote something down before shoving the paper at Vinyl. She took it, nodded, to the beat of her music, and moved past him.
Perhaps she had won the contest.
She barely cared.
Author's Note
How'd I do? Feelings, descriptions, emotions, music, less pesky words. Really, lemme know.
