This was it.
This was the moment she had been dreading all day. The hardest decision of her life now sat before her. Left, or right? Which one was the correct choice? The mint-green unicorn continued to stare at her newfound nemeses.
The calm breeze that wafted lazily through Ponyville always had a relaxing effect on her. It was something nostalgic and familiar. With it came fond memories of when she was just a little filly.
The breezes of Ponyville were unique. Depending on the direction of the wind it was possible to tell who was doing what by the scent the wind carried. A sweet citrus flavor was common during applebuck season, while the wonderful fragrance of flowers were a helpful indication of what the flower sisters were growing. Sweet smells often drifted from Sugarcube corner, usually tempting her to buy a snack she hadn’t even known she was in the mood for. Lyra’s favorite scent, however, was the chocolatey aroma from her best friend’s chocolate shop. Lyra always had a bit of a sweet tooth, but when Bon Bon opened up her own chocolate shop a few years back, Lyra had found herself needing a bit more exercise than she used to. Being the shop’s unofficial taste tester combined with Bon Bon’s habit of giving her free ‘samples’ any time she came in certainly had no bearing on that shop being her favorite place to hang out.
But when a pony eats as many sweet snacks as Lyra, they need to eat more than a few extra healthy items to balance their diet. It was this very notion that lead the unicorn to her current conundrum. She stared, silently, at the pair of fruits as they sat on the table in front of her. She knew they were mocking her, she had an ear for these sorts of things.
Sadly, today, the breeze was not helping. Lyra had lost track of how long she had been contemplating which fruit to eat. It wasn’t an easy decision. The one on the left was slightly larger and, by extension, more filling. But did she really need the extra calories of the larger fruit?
To her right, sat the smaller fruit. Smaller fruit were often more flavorful, at least she was convinced of this fact. Less area for the flavor to be diluted across, meant more potent flavor in each bite. Such was her logic anyway.
Denizens of the town strolled by without a care, and patrons of the cafe she was currently seated at payed her no mind as they came and went. The lunch rush was over, but Lyra had nowhere better to be. Most of her friends were busy this day, so she was left to contemplate her inner desires without the benefit of their input. Why did choosing a fruit have to be so hard?
“Lyra, what are you doing?”
The voice snapped her out of the contemplative trance she had fallen into. A quick turn of her head revealed a very familiar plum-colored pony. Lyra swiftly smiled at the sight of her friend Cheerilee. Her horn lit with a golden glow as she summoned a familiar looking lyre from her saddlebags.
Cheerilee instinctively closed her eyes at the sight of the instrument. A smile was already growing on her face. She knew well what was coming, and it was one of her most favorite things about the mint-colored unicorn. A melodious chord sung out across the cafe.
To the average listener, the notes were little more than a brief taste of the beautifully addictive music Lyra had become known for. But to those with a keen ear, or perhaps a strong magical sense, those notes carried a unique, magical tone that could cause a peaceful resonation between their heart and mind. The notes were more than just music, they were magic. But those harmonious notes carried more than just magic to those who could hear the truth; they carried words.
As the chord echoed in her mind, the unicorn’s words rang clearly in her ears. This was Lyra’s ‘voice’. “Oh, hi there, Cheerilee!” the magical voice replied. The gleeful tone of the voice never failed to brighten the teacher’s day. A new chord rang out. “I’m just trying to figure out which fruit to eat.”
Cheerilee’s eyes opened to find a pair of fruits sitting on Lyra’s table. Her expression immediately fell to one of incredulity. “Lyra, they’re the same kind of fruit.”
“Yes, but how do I figure out which one I should eat eat first?” the unicorn replied using a quick chord followed by a pouting of her lips.
Cheerilee was a teacher, thus, she was quite experienced with responding to unusual questions. This particular question, however, had her utterly confounded. Lyra was known for her eccentricities, but this... this was strange, even for her. Cheerilee stood in her awkwardly nonplussed state for far longer than she would have liked. She suddenly realized that her jaw was slightly slack. She closed it as quickly as she could manage.
A strum of the lyre brought forth the silent unicorn’s voice. “See! It’s a really hard decision.” The mint-colored unicorn turned back to the offending fruits to resume her contemplative stare.
“Lyra, you’re making this far more difficult than it has to be.” Cheerilee calmly walked over next to the table. Lyra seemed to ignore her comment.
The plum earth pony lowered her gaze towards the table. She moved around to look at the fruits from various angles in the vain hope that there was some distinguishing feature between the two. After several minutes of inspection, she finally discovered the truth. There were no special markings, no unusual shape, no odd colorations, no anything. The truth was that the only noticeable difference between the fruits was that one was slightly bigger.
Cheerilee sighed heavily.
She should have known Lyra would get caught up on some pointless detail when nopony was around to keep her on track. She always did have a habit of slipping into her own little world when she was by herself. Thankfully, it was a simple enough task to bring her out of it. Cheerilee now knew what she had to do. It was up to her to resolve the situation. With all of her teaching experience behind her, logic could ultimately prevail and release her friend from her contemplative curse!
“Lyra, just close your eyes and point at the table. Then just eat the fruit closest to where you pointed.”
The teacher watched as realization dawned on the unicorn’s face. It was an expression she was quite familiar with, and she always took pride in knowing that it meant another problem had been solved.
Fully content with her solution, Cheerilee bid her friend goodbye and trotted off with a smile knowing there was one less problem in the world. Even Lyra’s active imagination couldn’t mess up such a simple binary decision making method.
A brown earth pony trotted happily down the street. It could quite easily be said that he was having a good day. Mostly. He did get ambushed earlier... though looking back on it, it was less an ambush and more that the poor thing wasn’t looking where she was going. In fact, the more he thought about it, the more he realized that something doesn’t really qualify as an ambush if it happens regularly.
Still, crashing pegasi aside, it was a good day. He did get a confectionary apology after all. Okay, that was admittedly part of the same daily crashing ritual. Hmm, was it really a ritual or a just a regular occurrence? Where was the line to be drawn when something like that happens every day?
Oh well, there was plenty of time to define potentially arbitrary happenstance later. There was always plenty of time to go around, after all. The change in mental focus brought on a new chipper mood for the stallion. He merrily hummed a tune occasionally injected with bits of incoherent lyrics. His musical reverie was cut short by a familiar song.
“Hey, Doctor! Still working on that timey-wimey song?”
The stallion recognized the musical voice right away. Only one pony he knew could speak so well through music. He turned happily toward the source of the sound. What he found was a rather unusual sight. There, seated at a cafe table, was his good friend Lyra Heartstrings.
That in itself wasn’t odd, however. She frequented that particular cafe rather often. No, the strange part was that she was, for some currently unknown reason, attempting to stuff two rather large bananas into her mouth. The Doctor found himself quite perplexed. He wasn’t quite sure if what he was witnessing was Lyra simply being strange, or if she was trying hint at something.
“Miss Heartstrings, what are you doing?” A strum of her lyre carried her message clear as day.
“I’m double timing!”
Now he was certain that she was hinting at something.
Author's Notes
Shameless plug to my inspiration for writing a silent Lyra.
http://www.fimfiction.net/story/17027/Finding-Your-Voice
While this fic did inspire me, my work is not directly related to Kobalstromo's.
