I’m Marc Hoofson, British metal muscian, you may have heard of me. I wouldn’t mind if you didn’t, I’m not incredibly popular at the moment. However, I got a contract and I’m gonna sign it, but I might as well go back a while, back to where this all started.
So, I always make an attempt to be generous, I often gave out guitars after shows. This generosity is what led me to my marefriend. I was giving out a sleek black guitar, when I ran into her.
She had a dirty blonde mane, not unlike mine. She had bangs that kept on dropping into her face, and sadly, her hair was actually shorter than my blonde mess. Her eyes were brown, her coat orange. Not to quote that ridiculous Jet song, as it’s nowhere near metal enough, but the one thing that was going through my mind was, are you gonna be my girl?
I tried to shake it off, after all, how ridiculous was it to develop a crush on a mare I barely knew. However, I shakily said,”Hi, do you want this guitar?”
“Nah,” she replied,”keep it.”
“I tend to give out guitars after shows, in case you didn’t know.”
“Yeah, I know, you’re Marc Hudson, the famously generous metal musician.”
“How the hell have you heard of me?” I asked, as I was incredibly confused on exactly how.
“I listened to those metal records, very catchy.”
So she was old-school, wonderful. I’m not even being sarcastic here, my singing and guitar inspirations come from AC/DC and Sun Row in the first place. As well as StallionForce, though StallionForce isn’t really ‘old school’.
So there I was, sitting like an idiot, crushing on a mare I’d never met before. The mare didn’t want my guitar, meaning I was holding it out there awkwardly, very smooth, Marc, very smooth. Anyways, she said,”Your hair’s not dyed right, it’s naturally that yellow?”
I didn’t know what she was asking, so I nodded.
“Love the grey eyes and the soul patch too, hope you keep that look.”
I wasn’t exactly going to ask her how I could change my eyes, so I just sat there awkwardly.
“Mind telling me your name?” I asked.
“Not at all, I’m Shattered Glass, I’m a glassblower over on Parks. I’d love to keep in touch, you’re my favorite metal artist.
Being the idiot I was, I decided that there’s no way that could go wrong. Have I mentioned I’m an idiot? I have? Good.
I bade her farewell, and decided to keep that guitar. I decided to hold my generosity for a little while longer, and headed home.
A few weeks passed by, and Shattered Glass definitely kept in touch. I received a letter every week, and I always replied. I kept my black guitar, choosing to give out other guitars instead. Such as a deep blue guitar, some trashpony picked it up, at least somepony who looked like a trashpony. I wonder to this day where that guitar went.
Anyways, I ran into Shattered Glass again, I wasn’t giving out a guitar this time. We actually just ran into each other. I saw her walking down the aisle at a store and swerved left to dodge her. I ran into a collection of soup cans, and as fast as I could I telepathically put them back in their places.
“You’re a unicorn, neat,” she said.
“How the hell did you not notice that?” I asked, blushing redder than the tomatos those soups I nearly knocked over were made of.
“I wasn’t looking at your horn parsay,” she said.
I nodded, and bought some soup. I decided to donate to a food drive, it’s not like I needed the soup. Besides, I didn’t want this interaction to be too awkward, though I’d pretty much failed that already.
“I don’t know if I made this clear, but you’re kind of cute,” said Shattered Glass.
“You do too,” I added.
“It was nice running into you, I hope you continue doing whatever you’re doing,” she said while trotting off.
I waved her goodbye, and finished my shopping trip. I decided on heading home, so I sat down and write Shattered Glass a message. In this message, I attempted to show the side of me that’s not really shown in the spotlight.
In response, I received more letters than I’d ever received, silently wondering if Shattered Glass had a life, I replied.
She showed me her unknown side of her, and we got to know each other pretty well. So in response, I went to see her intentionally, over at her glassblower shop on Parks.
I stepped inside and was immediately taken aback by how good she was at glassblowing. I saw her behind her counter, she was working diligently with her hooves, shaping the glass she’d blown. My heart was beating like that one drum solo from In-a-Gadda-da-Vida. I again felt like an idiot for developing such a huge crush.
She stopped working and hopped over the counter, nearly knocking her work aside. She came up to me and hugged me, oddly, I didn’t mind having half the residents of the shop looking at me strangely. I decided to hug her back.
I looked in the glass to examine how great the quality was. It was so great that my reflection was clearly visible. My white coat was shining, and my mane looked messier than ever, forgot to brush it that morning.
“Hey Marc,” Shattered Glass said.
“Hey Shatter,” I replied, choosing to shorten her name as much as possible.
“How’s the touring been treating you?” She asked.
“I haven’t really been on tour...” I replied.
“That’s fine,” she said, releasing her grasp on my neck. This didn’t remedy the entire store looking at us awkwardly.
“I just came to say hi, that being said, hi,” I said.
“I’m so happy to see you!” She said energetically.
Somewhere, somepony in the back whispered,”You think they’re gonna kiss?”
Blushing, I took a couple steps away from Shatter. “I’d like to purchase one of the glass pieces,” I said.
“Shatter hopped behind the counter and asked me with a smile,”Which one?”
I pointed a hoof towards a light orange piece.
“Great choice, the colour is very authentic. Any reason in particular you’re going with the orange one?” She said with a smirk.
I laughed nervously and said,”Nah, no reason.”
She snickered,”Hey, your secret’s safe with me, that’ll be 30 bits.”
I trotted out of the shop, silently cursing the fact that she knew already.
More letters were exchanged between us, we grew closer, I started visiting her shop to talk to her. At this point, my secret was so obvious that everypony knew. So I decided to take some action.
I walked to that shop on Parks, and opened it, Shatter was behind the counter like usual.
“Hey Marc!” She said, so happily,”Anything you want today?”
“Nah, I just want to give you this note,” I telekinetically put the letter on the counter. It was a letter requesting her to meet me at Vaults and Garden for a date. She happily took the note in her hooves and I left, hoping like hell that she would say yes.
A day later, she said yes. We met at Vaults and Garden and took a seat outside. Luckily, the wait was pretty long, so we decided to talk. She was so sincere about being in a relationship, that... never mind, I’ll get to that when I get to that.
“So, you’re from Oxford too? Nice!” She said with a smile.
“Yeah, born and raised here, still trying to get in a band to get off the ground.” I replied.
She leaned into me, but we got called for our table right then. I ordered some spiced chick-pea tagine, and Shatter ordered an Oxford hayburger.
Why’d you choose this place?” She said after the waiter had left,”It’s so green, almost like you looked off a list of famous cafés around here and randomly picked one.”
“First place that came to mind, not the best choice in hindsight.”
I tapped my hoof on the table. “So, in case you haven’t noticed, I have a crush on you.”
“No way?” Shatter said, before laughing.”Of course I did, I don’t mind in the slightest. Hell, I wouldn’t mind being your marefriend.”
Now my heart had evolved from the In-a-Gadda-da-Vida drum solo to the first drum solo from Painkiller, which probably wasn’t healthy.
“Of course, I wouldn’t mind!” I replied.
So in one date, I had gotten a marefriend, this was a sign I was in a bad relationship.
We decided to move in together, and we did everything together! Atleast until she asked me to join the Columbia Records Club... just fooling with you there, the end of the relationship wasn’t that petty. However, it was still pretty bad.
Here comes the part that pains me to talk about. One day, we just started growing apart, my band was touring more, and requests for blown glass hit record highs. So one day, I headed out towards our fridge and on it was a note that said,”We’re done.”
Yes, the relationship was bad in the first place, but I never thought it’d hit this point. All her stuff was gone, left without a trace. She was a pretty mare, but she was also evidently an intruder. That brown-eyed mare had pulled my hearstrings and broke them.
Sorry about the song references, anyways, that night I lied awake, trying to forget her to no avail. The dark setting sun tried to bring my sadness to an end, but wounds this deep don’t heal in one day. I was lying awake for so long that I was experiencing auditory hallucinations, disembodied voices telling me how much better my life could’ve been if I’d found a better mare.
Even those words died in the night, I grew increasingly more sleep-deprived and delusional. I kept telling myself I was going through a horrible time in my life, that no winter lasts forever, that the darkest is always before the dawn. I kept tellling myself, the seasons will pass, and sunlight will shine on my life again.
Those exact words, when I’m sleep-deprived I’m incredibly poetic I suppose.
I was locked inside my own life, I couldn’t get out. I just wanted to forget Shatter, so I broke her sculptures, and tore down any pictures of her I may have had. I was incredibly delusional and felt like I was just about to fall apart. However, I pushed on, despite my crying at night, and me getting little to no sleep, I kept on trotting. The little sleep I got was plauged by horrible dreams of life with Shatter, dreams of life not meant to be. Everytime these dreams happened, I woke with a start and cursed the rising sun.
I eventually just slept through an entire night. However it did nothing to remedy the issue. Shatter was still in my thoughts. I trued to get in contact with her, but she never shared why she left me by the wayside. The pain in my heart grew for no reason.
Desperate, I grew paranoid about what exactly Shatter hated about me, my constant touring, my eyes, my soul patch, my face. I tried to quit my band, but Shatter still didn’t help. I tried to fix my odd grey eyes by buying a pair of sunglasses and perpetually wearing them, no answer. I tried a different shaving pattern, I got piercings, and Shatter still didn’t contact me.
I was lapsing into the no-sleep territory again. I was starting to have hallucinations about her. Hallucinations about Shatter getting incredibly risqué, and honestly, sometimes I even felt weird after that.
I realized I was getting nowhere. So to drown my sorrows, I went to Browns, and saw a certain pony there, presumably getting hammered. He was the garbagepony that took my deep blue guitar a year or so ago. He spoke in a voice well-worn through constant drinking.
“You having problems with a mare?” He asked.
“Yeah, how’d you know?” I asked hesitantly.
“Mate, when someone as young as you comes to a bar, wearing sunglasses, he’s having problems with a mare. I’ve gotten drunk here plenty of times, and it’s always the same.”
“Who are you anyways, and why are you calling me young?”
“Hell, you’re what, 24? I’m 31, and I have the audacity to call someone 7 years younger than me young. As for why you don’t recognize me,” he took off his sunglasses and revealed his eyes, as well as taking his hat off to see he was a unicorn. “I’m Sam Trotman.”
“Bloody hell? The real one?”
“No, one that has the exact same eye colour, hair colour, and guitar as the real one.” He said, putting his deep blue guitar down.
“So you’re the one that got that guitar a year ago.”
“Mate, the very same,” Sam said.
“Great, because I’m here due to Shattered Glass, she owns that glassblower shop on Parks.”
“Yeah, StallionForce was touring,” he said, taking a bit and putting it into the jukebox. He searched for a while, and eventually found Through the Fire and Flames on it. “That Shattered Glass is a very pretty mare, a bit of a gold digger though.” Sam added.
“Great, just what I needed, now I’m here to drown my sorrows. I’m Marc Hoofson by the way.”
“Mate, drowing your sorrows is one thing you shouldn’t do. I can see the appeal, but that gets nowhere.”
I was opening my mouth to say something about Sam being known as a heavy drinker, when he silenced me and replied,”For all intents and purposes, pretend I’m serious.”
I decided to shut up.
“Now, you’re trying to forget Shattered Glass correct?”
I nodded.
“You’ve gotta face your fears mate, not pretend they’ll go away. The quicker you accept the fact she’s gone, the quicker you’ll leave the past behind.”
I nodded, and left. I didn’t acknowledge the bartender giving me a dirty look for stopping by and not buying anything. I went straight to that glassblower shop on Parks, I walked up to the counter and took off my sunglasses. There was Shatter, right behind the counter like always. I trotted towards her, and looked her dead in the eye.
“Ah, Marc, here to complain about my breakup some more.”
“No,” I replied,”I’m here to leave the past behind.”
“How?” Shatter replied.
“By facing you and saying goodbye.” I replied, taking off my sunglasses,”I was advised by a guitarist of StallionForce to face my fears. So I’m feeling better by saying goodbye.”
I turned and trotted out of the shop, leaving the past behind.
Here I am, now, sitting at a table with a contract out in front of me. I tried to appease StallionForce by singing Heartbreak Armageddon in thanks. I also heard they lost ZP, so I was maybe trying to score a spot in StallionForce.
It worked, I have a contract out in front of me, and a quill in my magic grip. On the line, I have signed Marc Hoofson. I will be sending it back.
I wonder if anypony else would get a spot in StallionForce by them needing a new member and some appeases them by performing one of their songs. Maybe somepony would play Through the Fire and Flames, and Bob’s your uncle. I choose not to fester on these things for too long, and start trotting toward the mailbox.
The only thing I could hope to gain from this experience is that I hoped it made a bloody awesome song.
Author's Note
Hold on, two stories before updating one of my chapter stories? Yes, this song was overdue for a story, so I wrote one. I may also add that I suck at writing romance, and drama.
Anyways, I hoped you enjoyed this odd story, which would be an achievement.
Also, DragonForce fans should know exactly who this stallion is...
Original song is found here
Acoustic version is found here
