Holding Our Heads Up High
Rain-BOOMS!
Rain-BOOMS!
Rain-BOOMS!
The shouts of the crowd echoed down the narrow hallway to the dressing room; chipped, painted brickwork, damp with humidity and sweat. Seven girls finding their way along the corridor, each briefly illuminated by dim light from the swinging, low-hanging bare bulbs.
"That was a great show," panted Rainbow Dash, theatrically blowing her hair from her face as she set her guitar down in its stand.
"Indeed," giggled Rarity, pushing her way into the cramped little room, raising her voice over the din of the crowd and the thudding bass of the DJ.
"What should we do for the encore?" said Fluttershy, as she span her tambourine on her finger.
"Huh?" asked Sunset, wedging herself into a corner.
"The ENCORE", yelled Fluttershy, before giggling and covering her mouth in mock embarrassment.
"Ain't you s'posed to be the quiet one?", laughed Applejack, gently nudging her friend in the ribs. "Ah guess a crowd of folks chantin' yer name can kinda get you fired up, huh?"
"Yes," said Rarity, loudly, "and the crowd chanting our names is really quite splendid!"
"Hey! You didn't answer Fluttershy's question," said Pinkie, slumped upside down on the tatty dressing room couch.
"Technically, there doesn't have to be an encore," said Twilight, adjusting her glasses. "I mean, alright, maybe it's expected, especially after a great show -"
"And this was a great show!", laughed Rainbow, before noting Twilight's raised eyebrow and quieting herself back down. "Well, it was," she said, with a shrug.
"...Maybe it's expected," continued Twilight, "especially when the band leave their instruments up on stage..."
"My guitar stays with me," snapped Rainbow, and Applejack looked over with a smile to see if she was hugging it.
"...but there's always that element of doubt, isn't there? A kind of suspense," said Twilight.
"Yeah," agreed Sunset, deep in thought. "Like, the audience kind of knows we'll come back out, but there's always that tiny chance that we won't. That that really was the end. That we aren't going to send them home with a big hit, or with what they paid to come out and see... that the house lights will go up, and the roadies will come out and start taking the stage down, and the fans just have to go home. It's that chance that makes it exciting... and that's what makes it better when we come back out."
"I think a show can't be super fun without an encore," said Pinkie.
"A great encore," said Fluttershy.
"Well... I've been thinking about that too," said Twilight.
"Of course you have," said Sunset, grinning and rolling her eyes.
"Whenever you play," continued Twilight, "you all - we all - get filled with Equestrian magic. We don't know why, and we never got to work out what it means, or why it chose us. And if we pony up when we play music, or when we do something amazing together... well, it stands to reason that the magic is within us somehow, and we have the power to let it out, by sharing it with our friends, and with each other, and so I guess it could be from sharing it with the crowd too, right? Like... it's as if the magic needs someone to see it. Like a reflection."
"Ah don't follow," said Applejack, taking off her hat and scratching her head. "What's any of that gotta do with us playin' more songs?"
"It's just a theory," said Twilight, wiping her glasses on her vest. "It... well, it led me to some questions."
"It's almost December," said Pinkie, twirling a drumstick around her fingers as she lounged on the sofa. "We could go back out and play a bunch of Christmas songs!"
"Ugh," snorted Rarity, shooting Pinkie the look she always shot Pinkie when she said something ridiculous. "Can you imagine, playing a set like we just played, and then going out and saying goodbye with our Christmas songs? I mean... they're not bad songs or anything," she hastily added while looking at Rainbow and Fluttershy, "...but it seems a little, um, inappropriate, as an ending."
Sunset looked up at Twilight, her eyes wide. "I get it," she said, in a shocked half-whisper. "Oh, Twilight... I hope not, but... I'm sorry."
"I know," said Twilight, equally quietly, looking at the ground. "I mean, if I hadn't said anything... but now you know too. And that means it's already too late, doesn't it? I'm right, aren't I?"
"Maybe not!" said Sunset, but her voice lacked conviction.
"Would y'all mind tellin' the rest of us what you're talkin' about? You ain't makin' any sense," said Applejack, still confused.
"Well, have you noticed the crowd aren't making any noise any more?", said Sunset, not looking her friends in the eye.
"Maybe they all went home," whispered Fluttershy.
"Maybe they did," said Sunset.
"Whoa whoa whoa," Rainbow said, frantically, waving her arms. "No. No way. You can't be saying..."
"It's the end," said Sunset, simply, and Twilight nodded.
"No," said Rainbow Dash.
"Where's Rarity, Rainbow?", asked Sunset, and Rainbow realised she hadn't even noticed she was gone.
"No. We were too good not to at least get up there and play one last song! You know what they say, right? Better to burn out than fade away? C'mon, who's with me?"
"Or how's about we do neither, if'n we're gonna be given the choice?", murmured Applejack.
"I don't think we get to make that decision," said Sunset, and Applejack gave a good-natured shrug.
"Endings are hard," said Pinkie, leaning back in her chair. "I guess it would have been nice for us to say goodbye. All these people came out to see us, and now we don't get to say goodbye."
"I had so many different theories," said Twilight, wistfully, picking up a plectrum from the floor as another light went out. "I even wondered, for the longest time, if this world was just here as a... a by-product of yours. A magical mistake, conjured into being by a thaumaturgical leak. Which would mean... well, it would mean that none of us was real, Sunset. Besides you, and the other Twilight, we'd all be just... artifacts. Copies."
Twilight turned the plectrum over as she spoke, idly playing with it the palm of her hand.
"Not exactly figments of your imagination," she said, "but not exactly real, either. We'd be like less-developed versions of you and your friends back in Equestria. And maybe somehow the magic would preserve our memories and our personalities, or maybe we'd only be remembered because of you, Sunset. You'd be the one reason for us to exist... until you realised that, and then I guess that'd be how you solved the problem of what to do with a duplicate world when everything else back in Equestria was changing forever. You could go back to your own world... the real world."
"Twilight..."
Sunset pulled Twilight close to her, standing under the last remaining bulb, the two girls lit by this one final spotlight, surrounded by silent darkness.
"And whenever the leak got, uh... fixed, well..."
Twilight looked up at Sunset.
"Then that would be the end," she said, firmly.
"What would happen to me, in that case?"
Sunset held up the plectrum, just looking at it for a moment, tilting it from side to side, watching as the dimming light from the solitary remaining bulb flashed across the symbol printed on the plastic. A symbol she hadn't seen in a long time.
Her cutie mark.
"I'm gonna tell you how it's gonna be," she smiled, and closed her eyes.
Author's Note
...Yeah.
Bobby Fuller's version is the best one, but I thought the Stones were more appropriate. Always finish on a song, eh?
