"I am sorry, but there isn't anything I can do," Death explained regretfully.
"But..." The ghostly pony soul looked behind her. "I didn't even get to raise my child..."
Death placed a wispy limb onto her shoulder. "No, but you will be allowed to guide him as he ages and visit him in his dreams, although he might not recognize you."
It was met with a snort as the ghost nodded and slowly faded away to the next life, leaving the concept of mortality alone in the white void. Well, as alone as this instance of its omnipresent perspective had. In reality, it was constantly ferrying the dead of all types and planets along to their respective afterlives.
"Where's this?" a feminine voice asked.
Death turned around, coming face-to-face with a tanish-yellow colored mare sporting a voluminous and curly mane and tail. On her head was a red bandana covering one ear with a blue patch carrying a golden shield roughly sewn into it. The Reaper furrowed its brow at the supposed 'cutie mark' of this individual, noting that it displayed some form of life as well.
"This, is the transitional world for the dead," Death said with as much tact as it had always possessed. "I apologize
for any feelings of fear or regret, but I cann--"
"Oh, that's alright," the mare said with a smile. "I won't be here long. They said so."
Death became perplexed. "Who said what?" The concept noticed that this newcomer was sporting a smile, and the shine in her blue eyes looked like a broken heart. "You are quite peppy for someone in this tenuous position, I must say." Death recomposed itself, realizing what this strange mare meant. "Yes. Whatever your teaching, the probability that you will be awaited on the other side are fully cer--"
"You misunderstand. I'm not staying here. I got plenty more to do," the mare added.
She pulled a ticket out of her mane and showed it to the Reaper who grabbed it and looked at it sceptically. "This says 'One free pie at Blueberry's'." The mare nodded enthusiastically. Death stared at her silently. "Where did you pull this out of? The dead can't carry any possessions except those related to their..." The concept looked down at the ticket again and frowned. "This has nothing to do with the afterlife!"
"No," the mare responded.
Death was getting frustrated. This pony was acting nonchalantly as though she were just passing by casually, and it was really starting to fluster the Reaper's core precepts of existence.
"Listen here, you," It started while waving the ticket at the pony. "You're going to go to the afterlife and you're going to do it without a fuss! I have no qualms with keeping you h--"
Death stopped as the area started to blur and become a contorted, swirling mix of colors. Distorted, otherworldly faces took up the entirety of the void as much as they were shifting into multiples of said faces acting like wallpaper covering the spaces around the pony. They were faces of ponies, of diamond dogs. One had the appearance of some form of naked ape whose lower face was covered in thick, bristly hair that reflected off their gigantic monocles. Dog-headed serpents fell from their head and opened their maws toward the pony, displaying primate teeth that chittered and clapped against each other.
"The fae?" Death commented apathetically. "Today is going to be tiresome, isn't it."
The pony continued smiling while the weird apparitions approached her, their own smiles growing and warping their faces the closer they got to her. Death raised a nonexistent brow when the cutie marks came from the mare: Two halves of a broken heart. They fused together into a golem of brown, fractured stone. Two massive hands with four digits ending in sharp points and large blocks of stone served as its limbs, as all that it was became interconnected by purple flames that bled out from the cracks of its body. From between the central crack emerged a tall flame upon which three white, crescent shapes grew, forming a frowning face. It was quick to rush forward and start stomping the serpents while slapping the face when the tinier ones converged together during the shifting.
Even though it was in pain, the face continued to smile as it got closer to the mare, and her stoic expression started to falter until two large pink swirls appeared above her and looked at the weirdness unfolding. In an instant everything got encased into a jar while two hooves started dribbling said jar into the ground like a basketball, shaking its occupants inside before soaring into the sky and slam-dunking it into a hoop, making the jar disappear.
The Reaper remained silent, letting the brief distraction break the monotony it was used to. Calm, however, did not return.
"Swirly Break?" a voice echoed through the white void.
Death turned around to see a strange, everchanging, wispy mass of pinks and blues holding open what It could only determine to be a door leading into a bright light. Dumbfounded, the concept of expiration was unable to process anything happening until Swirl pulled her 'ticket' out of the Reaper's grasp.
"Hey!"
Swirly Break raised herself up on her hind legs, stretched her forelegs, then started ragdolling and clipping through the ground in rapid succession, startling Death until she reached the doorway and casually handed the ticket to the 'doorman', whatever the entity was.
"Hmmm. Yes. You can come through," the entity said.
Death swooped forward, furious. "Hey wait, you can't do that!"
"Yes I can," the entity said.
"Yes it can," Swirly responded.
The Reaper was starting to fume. "She is condemned to the other side!"
"Nuh uh," the colorful entity responded.
Death was left dumbfounded. "What do you mean 'nuh uh'?!"
Swirly was yoinked instantly through the door, and her living cutie mark stuck out its 'tongue' at the Reaper before the door slammed shut and faded away.
The concept of mortality was flabbergasted. Of the uncountable instances of it in the afterlife and in the world of the living, it could not see any instances with these sorts of beings able to come and go as they pleased. What was that other entity, though? It seemed as unfathomably old as Death itself was while also being as young as a newborn.
"No, it's because you blared that noise that got them all mad," a voice spoke up angrily.
"Nonsense, bro. They just couldn't handle my drummin' beats!" another answered with confidence.
Death wasn't certain, but it had the impression that the second voice had a 'beat' of sorts in the back whenever it spoke.
When this instance turned to face the two -an oddity considering the dead only came in singlets- it witnessed a pair of bizarre-looking ponies. One was almost fully white with a clipped tail and a coiffed, black mane. His cutie mark seemed to change to a different classical instrument every time Death looked away, and his black legs resembled musical notes. This Earth Pony seemed to carry himself with an air of pride and gentlestallionship that had seemingly vanished a few centuries prior in pony society.
The unicorn accompanying him was more flashy, however. His mane and tail were wildly unkempt and seemed to undulate in waves, like a beat. His vibrant coat of sky-blue clashed with said mane and tail that would go from yellow to orange to red the higher they rose. Stranger still: He wore a pair of red shutter glasses that completely hid his eyes. How did he bring that object with him into the afterlife?
"How curious," Death said as its presence surrounded the pair. "I have never seen two together." It swirled its nonexistence that all the dead could somehow perceive up and down to get a better 'view' of the pair. "All that pass have been alone, many succumbing to the distress."
"That, sir, is because we have a pass," the gentlestalliony pony stated. He placed a hoof on his chest. "I am String Weaver, sir," he stated with a bow.
He looked to the stallion on the side and immediately lost his composure, covering his ears. "
"And I'm Tune Adjuster!" the unicorn bellowed. The entire surroundings were replaced with an orange and black background and colorful bars going up and down with a beat that seemed to be coming from the stallion himself. "I play the best music in history!"
String Weaver scoffed and rubbed his ears when the background reverted to its white liminality. "Oh please. Your loud, scratchy noises aren't remotely close to being anything like music," he stated while shooing away the unicorn with a hoof. "Leave that denomination to more refined forms of melody that require hard work and mastery of several instruments."
Tune Adjuster laughed. "Oh sure, ya. Your 'plink plonks' and ear-splitting screeches from blowing into a pipe are totally refined." He grunted and rubbed his ears. "That pipe of yours still rings in my ears. Thinkin' I've got tinnitus now 'r somethin'."
The earth pony glowered. "It's called a 'flute', and you know it."
He was met with a silent, open-mouth display of shock. "So that's what it's called," Tune Adjuster feigned in realization. "So we need to melt down those horrific things is what you're saying."
"What?! No!"
Death started to grow increasingly angry. "Am I invisible to you mortals?!" Who did these creatures think they were? First, there was that odd mare with powers the Reaper had never seen before warping this space due to the fae folk, and then this pair that are completely ignoring it. Death's anger paused itself for a moment as it analyzed the situation. "Are you two going to tell me you aren't dead?"
String Weaver looked at Death with wide eyes. "Oh. No. We are. We're not so dim that we wouldn't recognize our own deaths."
Tune Adjuster continued to bob his head up and down to an invisible beat. "We just don't care! It's happened before." He flinched and grabbed his shutter glasses. "Ow. Need new glasses. This one just poked me in the eye."
When the unicorn removed his glasses and String Weaver checked his eye, Death furrowed its nonexistent brows. The stallion's eyes looked like the rising bars that the background had turned into earlier when he made his grandiose introduction.
"What is going on with your bodies, mortals?" Death asked.
The earth pony patted Tune Adjuster on his shoulder after checking his eye. "My brother and I both are and aren't mortal."
The concept of mortality was taken aback. "This is not a possible feat. You either are or are not, and all eventually come to crave my embrace whether they want to or not."
Tune Adjuster grunted as he checked his vision with his glasses then removed them entirely. "Ain't how that works, pal. We're the best with music." He leaned forward, his teeth bright and clean. "It has our souls!" With every word he spoke, the bars in his eyes shifted up and down in rapid succession.
He was met with incredulity by their 'host'. "Regardless, you must now join up with your ancestors and loved ones in the afterlife," Death explained softly.
String Weaver bowed his head slightly. "You needn't worry about such things. We are gifted with the ability to visit them at the dates we have chosen, to limit ourselves, of course. We shan't tarry for much longer."
Tune Adjuster stared at his brother bursting into laughter. "And what is so funny?"
"You're talkin' like some refined git from the upper classes," the unicorn spoke while chuckling.
The earth pony was mortified. "I'll have you know that I was part of the upper echelon of high society when--"
"Yeah yeah. You say that all the time," the unicorn stated dismissively. He looked at Death. "Can you believe this guy?"
Once more, Death was mortified. "You can see me? Perceive my essence?"
"Yes?" String Weaver said in confusion. "Why wouldn't we be able to?" Two cages dropped in from above, encapsulating the two in musical notes and symbols before they began spinning faster and faster. "And it looks like we'll be leaving. A bientôt, cher Mort. Ne vous épuisez pas trop au travaille. Tout le monde a besoin de vacances."
"Stop speaking your made-up languages," Tune Adjuster mused. He smiled when his brother turned a deeper shade of red than earlier. "Oh, and you'll have fun after us. He's Psycho," he whispered to Death.
"How dare you! That's Prench, you uncultured peasant! The Prance from our world was one of the most ref--"
The stallion's gripes turned to silence when the cages spun out of existence, leaving Death with more questions than answers. It wasn't as rare as some thought, to defy the fate of their deaths. There were all manner of methods, from simple potions of rare ingredients extending their lives to magic anchoring their souls into the land of the living, although Death found that the latter eventually regretted their decisions, not that It cared. They wanted that, so they had to live with it, and some do-gooder or a random natural event had a tendency to destroy whatever they were using to stay anchored.
These three that just passed? Even gods didn't act this way with their dead, nor did those above even they. It was...curious, to say the least.
The Reaper froze in place, when it ended up face-to-face with another pony, but this one was...staring, and its appearance confused it. Its pupils were pink spirals that took up most of the eye in a background of dark pink where the sclera was meant to be. Its fur was a random mish-mash of bright pink and sky blue patterns that was complimented by the earth pony's mane and tail that shared the colors. There were straight, well-kempt strands, curly ones; and sharp, split hairs, all being the same color of his coat with dashes of green. Sitting on the pony's head was a tophat that was clipped diagonally from the center side to the center of the flat top.
"Die of trauma?" Death asked.
Considering the strange appearance of the ponies prior, the Reaper watched the pony closely, staring at It somehow, and waited. It wasn't sure how long the moment lasted, but it was getting extremely unnerved.
"Well?! Aren't you going to say something?!" Muffled chuckling reached Death and it looked around, frustrated. "Who is that? Who's there?!" A pony identical to the immobile one stepped out from behind what could only be described as a 'wall' in the white void. "Wh-but-There's no walls here."
"Sure there are," the stallion responded with a gigantic, toothy smile. He started pointing everywhere as he moved toward his clone. "There's one there, and there, and there, and even-oof!" The pony pushed off the invisible 'wall' and rubbed his muzzle, his smile still grandiose and unbothered. "I forgot this one." He hopped over to his clone, alternating between bouncing on his left legs and then his right. "Pretty neat, huh?" He grabbed his clone and stuffed it onto his hat. "I made it just for you!" The stallion pulled on a cord dangling from above and a party whistle blew as three bits of confetti floated lazily onto the ground.
"What is this? How are you--"
Death was unable to finish its thoughts when the confetti exploded into hundreds of thousands of bits of color, flooding the area in color and glitter. The colorful stallion laughed heartily at the results.
"I have no form in this space!" the Reaper complained. "How did you even cover me?"
"Like this!" the stallion declared as they covered the concept of mortality under a white sheet.
As Death removed it from its nonexistent form, it found it was now in a bed that followed its concept of nonexistent permanence, going beyond even its understanding of the layers beyond reality. The colorful stallion's mane was combed back, he was wearing nice tweed pants and coat and was blowing bubbles via fake corn pipe. In his right hoof sat a book with no title and the image of a shoe on it.
"Wh-How are you doing this?!"
The world around started to warp and shift as Death became angry. Much like those that would defy it by attempting to extend their lives unnaturally, Death was able to display what mortals would consider 'anger'. While there wasn't a perceivable form of this 'emotion', the embodiment of mortality was nevertheless ready to wring the nonexistent neck of this stallion.
"Why son," the stallion spoke with a gruff voice. "I thought you wanted me to read you a bedtime story."
Before Death could grab him, the stallion turned into soapy liquid and splashed on the floor, leaving his corn pipe to pull out a little bike and start peddling away in the air, leaving bubbles in its wake. The Reaper watched, dumbfounded, at the scene, then heard someone calling out to it. Looking around, it noticed a strange scintillation of colors on the surface of one of the larger bubbles and was startled when it saw the stallion waving to it on the surface of the soap.
A rope was cast out of the surface, slowly followed by the pony climbing it backward and landing on his feet once free. "Ha ha ha! My prank that got me here backfired, but I got to get you good!" he laughed heartily.
"So that's what the brothers were referring to," Death thought to itself. It looked toward Psycho bouncing in place with his enormous smile. "You...are abnormal." It paused a moment. "Wait...I think I remember you..."
The stallion sat on his haunches, crossed his forelegs then looked away. "Nuh uh."
"Wh-Yes, I recognize you!"
"Nuh uh."
"What do you mean 'nuh uh'?! Are you but an infant?!"
"No you."
Death would have ripped out its hair if it had any. "I can't take this anymore. I can't make you move on somehow, I can't send you elsewhere...When is that thing coming to take you away?!"
The stallion paused. "You mean leave?"
"Yes!" Death erupted. It was on the verge of tears. "Leave! In my trillions of years of existence, I have never had so misfortunate an encounter with any such individual before!"
Death watched as the colorful pony laughed heartily. "Oh, I could have left at any time. I just stayed here for fun!" he mused.
"He was right," the Reaper realized aloud. "You really are psycho."
"That's my name!" the earth pony cheered as he threw his forelegs into the air then reattached them once they came down.
Psycho started laughing mischievously as he twirled the edges of a fake mustache and walked behind a 'wall' again, vanishing, leaving Death to the silence it was so accustomed to.
"...I need a vacation."
