This is not a story.
“I had a dream last night.”
“Do tell?”
“Yeah. I was standing in an open road, and all the stars had gone away. I was walking down an empty road, by myself. But even if they weren’t there, I heard them singing a song of dead stars. They watched as I took my last breath. And I felt something. Something divine. A call from home.”
“What was it?”
“I don’t know.”
Scootaloo woke up alone. She sat up slowly, feeling out her surroundings, and letting her eyes adjust to the darkness that threatened to consume her.
She was in a hospital. Pristine white sheets hugged her body tightly, smooth as silk, and the faint beeping of a machine softly echoed down the halls, like a mother of war singing a lullaby to a soldier of the moon.
Fireflies danced outside of her window, as if playing some foalish game of truth or dare.
She was alone.
A shiver ran down her spine as she tossed aside the sheets and swung her legs off the bed. As her hooves touched the cold floor she bit back a sigh and trotted over to the window. She pulled open the blinds and stared up at the sky.
The night was always darkest before the hour of twilight, that much she knew. She tried not to think about the morning after, when a new dawn would crawl across the sky. Scootaloo closed her eyes and listened. Though the heartbeat monitor beeped rhythmically, there was no cadence nor melody to it.
“The stars aren’t right,” she said with a frown. And when she blinked, they were gone, leaving a blanket of darkness hanging above the world. If it was meant to comfort her, it instead left her feeling some empty bliss, void of emotion and reminding her of millions of dashed hopes. She tried desperately not to think of how much she had left to burn.
Scootaloo turned to her right and saw a jet black mirror staring back at her. She approached it cautiously and watched as her reflection came into view. She blinked once, then twice, tilting her head and taking in her reflection. “That isn’t me,” she lied. “That isn’t me.”
But it was her, and that was what scared her.
A low growl escaped her. “Say yes. Say yes. Why won’t you say yes?”
Her face was wrinkled and worn, with bags under her eyes and a scar running down her cheek. It didn’t fit her at all, in fact it looked like she was wearing some horrible, disfigured mask.
She felt a sense of dread run through her body like a snake through the grass, bringing with it some vague recollection of a nightmare long gone. The hospital was a dreadful, lonely place, one that made her long to go back to Canterlot, or even Ponyville for that matter.
The entire place made her uncomfortable: her neighbor was practically a dead griffon walking, who cried out at night about something in the shape of hope at his bedside.
Scootaloo rubbed her eyes, trying to shake off her exhaustion. A particularly brutal case of somnambulism had been plaguing her, to the point where she would wake up disoriented and more tired than before.
With a forlorn sigh she turned away from the mirror, and stumbled through the darkness towards the door. Something about the room was throwing up a red flag for her. She had to get out. She pushed open and then
“But I was alone. And I was standing on top of a cliff and thinking that it was a long fall down.”
“You were alone?”
“Yeah. And it was dark, and it was quiet. And then I heard voices, but they were muffled. Like they were underwater or something.”
“Whose voices?”
“My friends.”
and then she opened her eyes, and she was lying in a bed with the sheets pulled up to her chin. “Hey, you’re awake,” whispered a voice, as gentle as the summer wind.
She looked to her right and smiled. Sweetie Belle returned it with a nod.
“You had us mighty worried for a second,” said a second voice, this one the color of autumn. Apple Bloom joined Sweetie’s side and smiled at her.
“Hey guys,” Scootaloo said softly, her voice raspy and scratchy from disuse. “What’re you doing here?”
The two exchanged a glance. “Well, we’re here to see how you’re holding up,” Sweetie said.
Scootaloo frowned, sitting up in the bed. “Not great, if I’m being honest.”
“Sorry to hear that,” Apple Bloom said. “You gonna keep fightin’ it, though. Aren’t you?”
The pegasus hopped to the floor. “I don’t know, AB. I don’t know. Is there a point anymore? I’m so tired, and I’m so weak.”
“Scootaloo, please don’t talk like that,” Sweetie Belle said.
Scootaloo rubbed her eyes and sighed. Sweetie’s voice flowed smoothly and richly, like liquid from a bottle of wine, and it washed over her completely. “Why shouldn’t I?” She stumbled through the room, tripping on her hospital gown and reaching for the door knob. “I could give you five, ten days to change a heart and it wouldn’t work.”
Neither Sweetie nor Apple Bloom tried to stop her.
“Well, why shouldn’t I?”
And then
“That’s when they… well, I don’t remember what they said.”
“What who said?”
“The visitors. My friends.”
“And you don’t remember anything they said?”
“I remember saying that it didn’t matter at the end of time. Actually, I remember one thing.”
“What’s that?”
“All things in time.”
“What do you think that means?”
“I don’t know.”
and then she awoke in a hospital bed.
Snow covered the endless fields around her, stretching as far as her eyes could see. A few snowflakes dipped across the sky, silently wishing for wings so they could leave the ground far behind. It made Scootaloo want to cry, because she knew this place. She knew it all too well.
A cast iron gate lined the perimeter, and a few dead trees were sprinkled across the landscape, facing the sky and trying to find a god who would bless their souls. Scootaloo got off the bed and began walking.
It was just like she remembered it: walking down the path on a sunless winter day. A butterfly flew across her field of view, as if the world was made for him.
“Scootaloo, you’re stronger than you know you are.”
She turned to her right to see Apple Bloom next to her, dressed in her sister’s hat and looking like it was another day on the farm for her. “What’s that supposed to mean?” she asked. “What’s so wrong with me not wanting to stay?”
Apple Bloom sighed, adjusting her hat. “Well, I reckon you’re right. I can’t make you stay.”
“But where’s your heart?” chimed in Sweetie Belle from her right. “Where’s that adventurous spirit of yours? Where’s that sense of courage?”
“It’s dead!” she snapped. “And maybe I am too.”
“Scootaloo, it’s not about being strong on the outside. This time, it’s about what lies below,” Apple Bloom said.
She felt something tectonic move beneath her at that and held a hoof to her chest. The storm that seemed to blast through her mind subsided for a second, leaving her feeling a strange sort of emptiness.
Scootaloo glanced behind her and saw that a procession was now following her, a line of ponies dressed in black. She was struck by a sense of nostalgia but also dread, like she was trying to stay afloat in a sea of blood. Not quite sinking but not quite swimming, instead drifting like a piece of meat in a shark-filled ocean.
She stopped abruptly in front of two gravestones protruding from the snow, like gleaming jewels in the desert. It reminded her of fluffy clouds across a lush Manehattan sky. She thought she heard her parents calling out her name.
On the gravestones were etched the words “Si Vis Pacem, Para Oblivionis.”
“I can’t. I can’t. I can’t,” she said as her body began to shake. “I can’t. I can’t. I can’t.”
She heard the crunching of hooves in the snow behind her. The wind blew cold around her, asking her how to name a rainfall, and telling of things that only came once every five hundred years.
“I can’t. I can’t. I can’t.”
And then
“And that’s what they said? That you can’t get enough of it?”
“Yeah, can’t get enough. I guess it was a bit of a joke at first, but I loved it. It… made me who I am. The bold one, the courageous one. Back when we would spend our days searching for buried treasure or something. It made me… me. At least, I think it did. Before childhood’s end, anyways.”
“I see.”
“Do you? Do you really? Because I can’t see it. It’s like… It’s like I’m looking through a kaleidoscope, and I see all of these pictures but they’re all fragmented and different, and I can’t make sense of it all…”
“...”
“... does that make sense?”
And then she
Scootaloo began to cry.
She threw the sheets off of her body and screamed.
Through blurry eyes she saw the form of a pony standing by her bedside, wrapped in a black cloak that covered their body and a hood which obscured their face. A strange smoke whirled around them, and from within she heard a chorus of voices screaming, for want of a better tomorrow.
“What?!” she cried. “Do you want me? Why won’t you just take me? Why won’t you leave me alone! I never should have come here!”
The pony said nothing, but stared at her through a set of empty eyes.
“Take me!” she shouted. “Take me! I can’t! I can’t! I won’t
and then
And is that what you wanted? To be seen? To be known?
“At one point, maybe. But it didn’t matter in the end, did it?”
Why not?
“I just… I didn’t think this would be how it ends. I still feel like I’m in the first half, not the end. I thought I’d meet a worthy end, not die like this.”
You’re going to die like this? According to who, you?
“I… what’s that supposed to mean?”
…
“I just… wait, who are you again?”
And then she opened her eyes and found herself on a couch, in a lush apartment somewhere in Cloudsdale, with familiar pictures on her wall and memories in the air. The sounds of local life echoed from beyond her door, and traces of sunlight snuck in through the curtain.
Sweetie and Apple Bloom sat next to her, watching with careful, patient eyes. “Scootaloo, you know we want you to stay,” Sweetie Belle said softly. “And we want to help you. You know that, right?”
“I know,” Scootaloo said. A strange breeze swept through the room, whispering like a confidant of things from the past.
Their eyes were shining bright in the incandescent lights of the room, glowing with a warmth that Scootaloo hadn’t seen in a long time.
“I’m weak,” Scootaloo said. “I can’t fight it anymore.”
“You can’t, or you don’t want to?” asked Apple Bloom gently. “There’s a difference, you know. It’s not our way to fall.”
The words echoed across the room as if they were something divine, radiating with an odd ring that sounded both distant and close.
“I don’t want to,” Scootaloo finally whispered. “I’m tired.”
“We know.”
“I’m scared.”
“It’s okay.”
“Is it?”
And then
Everything changes.
“I know it does! I know! I know that like I know everypony lives and everypony dies! Why are you telling me this?”
...
“What, you want to write my life story or something? You want to narrate this story, of some death in two acts? Is that what you want?”
...
“I can’t
And then she woke up, not in a bed, but in a patio chair. A table was in front of her, holding a few plates and glasses of lemonade. An ashtray sat by her side, and in it she saw a wasp crawling about the ashes.
“So what’re you going to do?” asked Apple Bloom, poking at her spaghetti.
“I don’t know,” replied Scootaloo.
Sweetie Belle bit her lip, staring into her cold cup of chamomile tea. “Well… we’ll be with you, Scootaloo. Every step of the way.”
“Every step of the way,” Apple Bloom replied with a nod.
Sweetie reached across the table and seized Scootaloo’s hoof in her own. “You’re strong, Scootaloo. You’re going to get through this. I believe in you.”
“I do too,” chimed in Apple Bloom. “And consarn it, I know sometimes you’re too prideful to ask for help, but just know that if you need a hoof or a shoulder, or even an ear to listen, we’re here.”
“Remember, after the flood comes the sun. And after the fall, you land.”
Scootaloo blinked. Then, she slid out of her chair and looked around at the empty fields that stretched into every direction around them. “We’ve been here before.” When she turned around, the table was empty and her friends were gone, vanished without a trace.
So Scootaloo began to walk. She watched as the dust kicked up underneath her hooves, and she pulled at her itchy hospital gown with annoyance. The sun shone overhead, but its rays didn’t warm her. The wind blew gently, but it didn’t move her mane.
It felt relieving, in a way. As if she was at the bottom of an hourglass, and ready to take the first step into unchartered territory. But when she looked up, she saw a way out of the maze she was in.
She stopped and glanced behind her, seeing the cloaked pony watching her curiously.
…
“No,” she said with a happy smile. “No. I’m not scared of you. I’m not afraid anymore.”
…
“I won’t be afraid, I won’t stop fighting. I’m going to keep living.”
In her peripheral vision she watched as Sweetie Belle and Apple Bloom joined her, standing tall at her sides and staring down the cloaked pony.
…
“Nothing you can say will stop me going home.”
…
“I can. I can. I can.”
And then
And then Scootaloo opened her eyes with a smile.
The world opened up around her, shifting and phasing like a glitch in a system. The walls shrank and grew and ducked and dipped, planes moving in between heaven and earth, knowing no limits and knowing no bounds.
She set off at a brisk pace, eager to complete her unfinished business. All around her she saw memories and versions of herself, like reflections in a mirror room. She strolled down her memory lane, taking in the sights and voices as she walked down spiraling stairs and long halls.
Suddenly, she saw a tiny hole open in the fabric of the world, like a tiny cave in a mountain. It reminded her of what the yaks called an onkalo, or a hiding place. Scootaloo passed through it and felt a strange feeling wash over her.
A stained glass window behind her depicting four alicorns. She approached a pedestal in front of her and glanced at the papers atop of it. Scootaloo shifted through the love letters with a fond smile, reading through the lists of facts and feelings.
“I was hoping you’d come,” said a voice behind her.
Scootaloo turned to see Apple Bloom, facing away from her.
“Yeah, you almost missed it,” chimed in Sweetie Belle, who was wearing a snow white dress.
“I wouldn’t have missed this for the world,” answered a third voice. Scootaloo watched as another version of herself trotted in with a smile, dressed in a tailored suit and tie.
In the evening sunlight she looked like some angel or seraph, ready to take on the world. Somewhere beyond them, voices chanted out stories of Sisyphus and Narcissus, and tales of Stygian and all of his lives.
Scootaloo watched herself as she joined her friends as they chattered eagerly, behind rows and rows of pews.
And she watched as the second Scootaloo looked up and past her friends, to stare her in the eye directly and smiled.
She laughed and turned away from the scene, as feelings passed her by like trains in the dark.
And I see you lying next to me.
She remembered early morning flights and perfect Hearth’s Warming Eves, glimmering around about her like sunlight off a river.
With words I thought I’d never speak.
Every room she passed was dark and gloomy, with closed doors and blinds drawn.
Awake and unafraid.
She came to a halt in a familiar corridor to see the cloaked pony standing across from her. There was a shadow beneath them, one of an inky black darker than the void and sending weaker ripples across the ground.
It gazed at her with glowing red eyes brighter than a midnight bloodmoon. But it didn’t scare her. It let out a sigh that sounded like an airlock closing, gazing upon her with a strange sort of curiosity.
Asleep or dead.
On her left, she looked through the window to see a lit hospital room.
Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle were sitting next to the bed, their cheeks puffy and eyes red. They sat there, hugging it out, and stared at the bed, hopeful and confident, yet nervous and desperate all the same.
And in the bed she saw herself, head resting on the pillow and eyes closed, hooves folded across her chest. Asleep or dead?
On her right was a dark room, but somehow, she could see two ponies standing inside, holding hooves and smiling. Her parents had their backs to her, but she knew that they were watching.
Finally, she turned back to the shadowy pony with a confident grin. “I can.”
She chose a door and then
“I am not afraid to keep on living, even if it means I’ll walk this world alone.”
…
“Know that if you stay, I’ll be forgiven. Nothing you can say can stop me going home.”
Dedicated to Wish, Seer, Moonshot, and Zontan. Thank you for everything you’ve done.
