It was raining.
Or rather, sprinkling.
But why did that matter? Starlight honestly didn’t care for rain, whether it was a sprinkle or a storm. It made the ground soggy, her hooves muddy, and she generally disliked being ever slightly cold and wet, so she was glad to find her destination and eager to dry off under the familiar roof.
The journey was worth it.
Approaching the entrance of the secluded home, she gave a firm knock to be let inside. It had been too long since she last came to visit.
No response greeted her knocks.
So Starlight knocked again.
“Daring?” she called through the door, loud and slightly desperate. “It’s me, Starlight! The students are out for spring break. Is.. now okay to visit?”
Still nothing.
Starlight bit her lip and knocked some more. “Dare? ... Dare, are you in there?”
She waited a few more seconds.
Then she tried the door.
And it flew open with surprising ease.
A.K. Yearling stood and swirled around with a flare of her writing cloak, ready for anything for just a second, and then sighed once she identified her visitor. “Starlight, it’s just you. …You really startled me.” With that, she returned her attention to her typewriter. “Come on in– Shut the door.”
“Nice to see you too,” Starlight chuckled as she shut the door behind her and shook some rain and dirt off her hooves. She locked the door. “By the way, don’t you think you should lock your door more often? Enemies from every corner and all?”
“It’s broken,” Daring replied with far too much ease, much to Starlight’s distress. “Dr. Caballeron’s goons did it a while back. It sucks, but it’s too much of a hassle to fix right now.”
“Isn’t that… kinda dangerous?” Starlight asked, testing the lock. Surely enough, it did not prevent the door from swinging open again at the slightest pull.
“I've got most of the artifacts hidden right now, locked up tight. I've even got some traps set up. Besides,” A slightly malicious smile shined through her voice. “A little danger never hurt any pony.”
“Pfft, speak for yourself,” Starlight rolled her eyes with a smirk before reluctantly giving up on the door and carefully navigating across various books, discarded manuscript pages and nicknacks to get to Daring’s side. “Some of us prefer a little relaxation every now and again you know, Dare. …Especially if we’re supposed to feel comfortable staying the night every once in a while? Wink, wink? Nudge, nudge?”
“Alright, alright, I’ll get around to it eventually. Now get over here. I’ve missed your company.” But as Starlight made her way over as told, Daring abruptly stopped. “Wait-- Hold on. Why is it that you never call me A.K. Yearling when I'm clearly in my A.K. outfit?” She gestured vaguely at herself, seeming to acquire a faint layer of jest when she asked, “You do see these giant glasses I’m wearing, don’t you? Or would you like to borrow them to see my current shut-in aesthetic?”
Starlight laughed pleasantly, taking a seat by her. “Oh come on, you know I know Daring Do a lot better than I know A.K. Yearling– And that they're coincidentally the same pony.” She then wrapped Daring in a comfortable foreleg and gave her a loving squeeze. “Same cocky adventurous spirit unbothered by unlocked doors, same stickler for the correct word choice. Plus, it’s also a lot easier to say.”
Daring rolled eyes, though a faint smirk didn't leave her. “I’ve hardly even been a stickler for word choice yet.”
“No? What about the sprinkling rather than-…” Starlight paused, realizing. “Right. That was... in my head. But my point still stands. You’re so much of a stickler you’re rubbing off on me when you’re not even around.”
“Oh, good," said Daring with the same idle pleasure in her voice as she might have complementing the weather.
With that, she swiftly refocused on her work. She didn’t exactly start typing, but she did seem to go into deep thought.
Starlight leaned her head comfortably against the mare’s side as she mentally worked.
Her cloak was soft and familiar.
The silence was pleasant.
“... Now that I'm thinking about it,” Starlight spoke up after a beat, “Why do you dress as A.K. when you're alone? I thought she just existed to hide your identity. Why keep her around if its just you? ...Or us?” She sat up to think about this, had a thought, and gave her a teasing look. “Is it for me? It is a pretty cute look, I'll admit. Covers up most of your handsome figure though, which is less ideal.”
Daring’s eyes flicked from the page to Starlight a couple times for an absent moment, unable to immediately refocus her attention or process what she was saying. Too preoccupied with whatever she was working on.
Starlight merely waited.
And when she did process them, she went red. “What?! No, it’s not for you!” She gave a frightfully powerful shove, and Starlight allowed it to sway her, laughing. “It’s just that I associate this cloak and this hat with writing. Helps get me in the zone faster. ... And the glasses are for reading.”
“... Ah,” Starlight said simply.
There was some silence.
Soon enough though, the pegasus let out a flattered chuckle that she couldn't quite keep in. A faint blush. "Handsome," she murmured, sounding pleased by the word. "Like you've thought about it before."
Starlight felt unexpectedly flustered by this call out.
She cleared her throat very aggressively and held her closer, resting her head on her again. "Uh, sorry, what was that?"
In a soft voice that sounded like a content smile, "Nothing."
And so, silence returned.
Daring Do presumably went back to writing. Or at least, thinking about writing.
She was almost always writing when she wasn’t out rescuing ancient tressures from malicious types. Starlight didn’t really mind this routine much, though. The only thing that really mattered was that they got to be together for a while.
It was an odd transition, being together for so long and then suddenly being unable to see each other every day. Though luckily, the time apart didn’t appear to change their relationship nor their comfort around each other. It still felt as natural as breathing. Speaking wasn't often necessary.
In particular, Daring’s warmth was all Starlight truly needed for any given moment to be exceptionally pleasant. And that was mostly because Daring was a very welcoming individual to hold in an embrace.
She wouldn't have thought so before given how distant she is upon first impressions, but the truth was that regardless of her adamant desire to work alone most of the time, she had still been in need of some kind of physical affection. These two things were evidently not mutually exclusive, she'd learned. And that meant that poor Daring had been quite touch starved for something like years.
‘Can you blame me?’ She'd said the first time they cuddled up with each other for a night. ‘Not like I could ask Ahuizotl for a hug…’
‘No,’ Starlight had conceded quietly, too exhausted by the circumstances at the time to be anything but judgment free. ‘But you can always ask me.’
These days, Starlight was happy to spoil her and Daring always seemed glad for it.
A comfortable yawn arose from Starlight presently, looking idly about the room.
Her gaze almost involuntarily settled on a rectangular object leaning against the wall, wrapped in thin white bed sheets.
She frowned. It was always there, and it was harmless now, but somehow it still bothered her just a little. The softest ping of guilt still residing somewhere within her, sparking up whenever she saw it. It was a reminder of everything she was. A reminder of the paths she’d lead herself down and the festering feelings that came as a result.
But it didn’t matter. She was out of that thing’s grasp now. They both were.
Redirecting, she shifted her attention to Daring’s progress, which appeared not to be going anywhere fast. Starlight hadn’t heard one clatter of the keyboard for a while now. “Sooo… D’ya get to the Raging River of Death, yet?”
A relaxed chuckle forced its way out of Daring’s throat. “I wish. Unfortunately, I’m still stuck in the second chapter.”
“Really? What’s in the second chapter?”
Daring slumped a bit and said plainly, “You.”
Starlight snorted. “Me? What's so bad about that?”
“It’s your character’s name,” came Daring's simple reply. “I’m having a hard time coming up with one that completely suits you.”
Starlight blinked and looked at the page. “Oh… Really?”
Once the tumble settled, Daring Do barred her teeth at the mare trapped beneath her. “Start talking. Who are you and what have you done with the rest of Equestria? Why are you the only living pony or creature I've seen in four whole days?”
The mare she had in her grip– a unicorn with such a perfectly swirled mane it was almost painful– flailed her hooves in a desperate show of innocence. “
A blank bottom half of the page followed after an open quotation mark, stopping the retelling short.
Starlight remembered it like it was yesterday. She remembered Daring’s messy mane and the exhausted look in her eye, the heat of Somnambula covering the both of them in sweat. She remembered how loud Daring’s voice was, partially because of her volume and partially because it was the only voice in the entire world at the time. And what a relief that had been.
“You think my mane is painfully perfect?” Starlight inquired once she actually noticed. “Is that, like…, in a good way or a bad way?”
Daring, taken off guard, blushed and stammered. “I don’t know, I just thought it was painfully perfect so that’s what I wrote. What do you want from me?”
Starlight laughed and easily dismissed the issue. “Right, sorry. …My name?” She supposed it was her duty to help, given that she'd requested a different name be used in the first place. It was just vaguely comforting somehow. Something about it. Something about that particular story.
“Your name,” Daring replied in a breath, happily returning to the subject. “I was going to go with Starbright– that’s practically a given– but I can’t think of a last name for the life of me. I initially thought of Starbright Shimmer, but it just doesn’t sound right.” She then closed her eyes and proceeded to tap her head a few times. “Starbright… Starbriiiiight….”
Starlight Glimmer squinted at the page and then looked at Daring with a shrug. “Why not just go with something like, uhh… Starbright Clipper?”
“What?” Daring Do gaped at her, beautifully baffled behind those intellectual red glasses of hers. “No– No, I’m not gonna go with something as random and inconsistent as Starbright Clipper! That sounds nothing like you!”
“Starbright Trimmer?” Starlight suggested innocently enough. “It’s a little closer to Glimmer.”
Daring rubbed her forehead. “Okay, look– The phonetic similarities aren’t as important as the essence. I need the essence of Starlight Glimmer.”
“Right. Essence. Okayy, uh…” Starlight’s eyes trailed slowly across the wood and haphazardly placed miniature rugs, slow and thinking. “Starbriiight…. Trotter?”
Daring blinked. Then frowned. “You’re not even taking this seriously, are you?”
“Of course I am!” Starlight replied with only a soft chuckle, an air of innocence persisting. “Trotter has to be closer to my essence, right? I am a pony, and I do occasionally trot about.”
“Seriously?” Daring sighed exasperatedly, though a sad ‘should have known’ kind of laugh trailed out after it. “I can’t believe you came all this way just to mess with me…”
Starlight, sensing a golden opportunity, smirked. “Oh, like the way you messed with me when you told me that a random river we came across in the isolation dimension had the ability to turn us into undead fish skeletons if we so much as came in contact with the water when in reality you didn’t know a single thing about it?”
“That was one time!” Daring flailed a hoof defensively. “And it really was filled with ominous wriggly fish skeletons! You can’t blame the writer in me for trying to come up with an explanation on the spot when you're given such… weird circumstances!” A stubborn huff. “I didn’t even know we were in the isolation dimension yet. I wasn’t exactly messing around, I was just–... Look, I was being creatively cautious.”
“Okay, fine,” Starlight openly laughed a good bit and then dismissed the issue with a wave of her hoof. “I suppose it always could have turned us into undead fish skeletons…”
“Precisely.”
“But yeah, no. I would never toy with you like that.”
Daring paused and raised a brow at her. Her plain skepticism lingered in her gaze until the silence drew long enough that she had to ask out loud, “You’re… not?” A question, though it sounded more like a statement.
“Of course not,” Starlight answered with a genuine ease. “I’m just trying to help you with what, to me, seems like a relatively easy task. Just name me anything, I’m not that special,” She said, gaze flying to the upper corner amusedly at the silly idea.
Daring stared at Starlight then. She looked into her gaze so very intentionally, flicking her vibrant magenta eyes between both of Starlight's in search of something.
Starlight paused and frowned. “What?”
In response, Daring averted eye contact. She murmured reluctantly, “Honestly, it's a mystery how you don’t realize any of the endless list of things that make you so interesting.” She sighed a laugh at the thought. “No wonder you had access through the mirror...”
Starlight blew some air through her lips. “I-I didn’t say that. Everypony is special and all, I just think… uhh…” A moment passed. Nothing really came to her.
“You just think your essence sounds like Starbright Trotter somehow,” Daring concluded for her with a sad chuckle beneath her breath, shaking her head and refocusing on her typewriter. “Well it isn’t. No… No, it has to be something brighter.” Her voice lowered, deep in thought. “Something smart, something bold, and something…. elegant at the same time.” She looked down and began to meditatively tap her chin.
Starlight blinked, processed, and chuckled. “Elegant?”
Daring paused suddenly, blinked, and promptly hid her face in her hooves. “Ugh, I can’t believe I just said that out loud. I always have to say everything out loud, don’t I? What is wrong with me?”
Starlight laughed quite a bit and gave her friend a playful nudge with her free hoof. “Hey, don’t be so embarrassed. I talk to myself all the time.” She glanced absentmindedly toward the object resting along the wall. The one that was securely hidden under sheets and wrapped in chains and locks. “I bet anypony who could’ve been affected by that thing’s curse probably has that habit…” She murmured.
Some quiet returned between them.
A certain memory replayed itself in Starlight’s mind.
‘Hello? Is anypony there?’ A powerful voice, faint through the glass, though her exhaustion and fear grew less hidden over time. ‘Come on out already! I know there…. There has to be someone who can hear me! …Right? …. Anyone? … Sweet Celestia…’
Starlight couldn’t have gone on ignoring it. It was reckless of her to do what she did, but she couldn’t have helped it. After all, nopony else seemed to have access inside. Nopony else could even hear the voice. And she’d been hearing it for so long. It was about time someone did something about it.
And that was how it trapped her, too.
But she didn’t regret it.
“Star?” Daring noticed her stiffness and turned to her.
Starlight shook herself out of her mind, attempting to refocus on the present. “Sorry. I know it’s harmless under there, it's just…” Her voice fell away in thought. “... kinda distracting.”
“... Yeah,” Daring’s gaze drifted towards it briefly, understanding. “The sheets and stuff are obviously a temporary solution. I’m not sure what to do with it yet. All I know is it's a lot safer harboring that curse in here with me than being on display like it was.” She gave a frustrated sigh, her voice regressing to a thoughtful whisper. “…Normally with something so cursed, I’d at least consider destroying it, but… I don’t know. Could be superstitious of me, but I feel like that’s a bad idea.”
“Right,” Starlight chuckled softly. “Seven whole years of bad luck. I’d rather eat squid.”
“I was thinking about burying it,” Daring said, refocusing on her halfway typed paper. “Somewhere no one can find it. Just don’t know where the safest location would be yet…”
The two mares were quiet for a bit, vaguely reminiscing on the whole fiasco.
Breaking the curse had been a difficult and drawn out task. A terrifying ordeal, really, but they managed it eventually. They had made it out the only way they could have.
Together.
And if Starlight was being honest, she was glad it had happened. Otherwise, she wouldn’t be here now. Now, there was peace. There was warmth. There was comfort. And at least for this moment, she could bask in that.
Starlight closed her eyes, refocusing on the task at hoof. Trying to help come up with a name for herself that fit the previously discussed qualities.
When her brain repeatedly came up empty, she lifted her posture again to say earnestly: “I... don't know, Dare. Maybe you need to give Starbright Trotter some more credit. She could be plenty smart, bold and elegant.”
Daring Do gave a somewhat theatrical sigh, refocusing with ease at the direction. “Not in a ‘fiction’ novel. Or at least, what most ponies still critique as fiction even if they know it’s real…” She murmured something slightly aggressive there that Starlight couldn’t quite make out, then continued normally. “That’s why I need to come up with a name that’ll give the reader just as much initial skepticism, eventual respect, and consequential faith in Starbright as I have in Starlight Glimmer.”
Starlight blinked, processed, and then actually put a hoof to her heart and blushed. “That’s so sweet!”
Daring, only in response to this reaction, started to feel a slight flush of embarrassment and thus tucked her writing hat over her eyes. “Yes, okay, I think you’re a pretty cool pony and I’m glad I know you but can you stop drawing so much attention to it? I’m really not supposed to be this sentimental…”
Starlight chuckled once more, but softer. “Alright… I’ll try.”
Both of them returned to thinking on the subject.
Eventually, Starlight asked, “Well, what do you associate with intelligence, bravery and…elegance? Other than me, of course.”
Daring hummed, her mental gears visibly turning behind her eyes. “Smart and brave… Predators? Lions, hawks, …. No, no, no. Think. It’s missing something…” She thought for a long moment. Then, as if struck by sudden brilliance, she gasped and stood on her hooves. “Aha! Ravens!”
Starlight blinked in surprise, a tentative hoof rising. “Ravens?”
“Starbright Raven! You're a genius, Star!” Daring said, grabbing Starlight by the shoulders and shaking her back and forth before returning with vigor to her typewriter. “No reader of mine will miss out on the elegant beauty and darkly intriguing essence of that name.”
“...Darkly intriguing essence?” Starlight echoed, an involuntary breath of laughter falling out at the end.
Daring looked at Starlight then, her face flushing brightly. She let out some sort of embarrassed sigh, but she didn’t turn away from her. “C’mon,” She managed, a smile of feigned confidence despite the flutter of nerves that Starlight had learned to read behind it. “Would you really expect Daring Do to fall for anything less than dark and intriguing?”
And Starlight laughed once more, some sort of giddy flickering flame seeming to light inside her. She replied, "You know, now that you mention it, no. I guess I wouldn’t.”
There was a brief pause.
And then, for once, they kissed.
And there came a feeling of peace and warmth that seemed, with surprising certainty, it would stay.
Author's Note
Hey, you!
Just wanted to say a very genuine thank you for reading through this! It means more than you could know. Hoping it makes half as much sense as it does in my head, but either way, thanks for giving it a shot!
