My Little Xyloto

Down three flights of stairs, through another spotless hallway lined with numbered doors, and into the long road leading to Heaven ran Mylo.  All of Heaven's citizens lived in such apartments; hundreds of the buildings stood in perfect formation more than a mile from the outskirts of the central city.  Like a ring of dirt and ice orbiting a great celestial sphere, the housing for the working class was worth exactly what was paid: nothing.  The ponies were allowed to live there so long as they had a job in Heaven, and there were so many jobs to do.  Mylo absolutely hated his, though he would never admit it.

It was technically possible for him to find a new job.  A number of factories operated within the city, manufacturing batteries or the devices that used them, and the citizens of Heaven were free to apply to whichever factory best suited their circumstances.  At one point Mylo had believed that to be very fair; more recently, he had to fight to keep from rolling his eyes at the giant billboards of posing ponies in white jumpsuits inviting their readers to "change their lives" by applying for a different factory.

And yet, as much as he hated his job and the deceptive billboards looming overhead, they both contributed to the second highest source of his life's scarce joy.  The district in Heaven where Mylo worked was one of the notorious hotspots in which the shaded words appeared every Friday.  He hurried through the wide streets, paved with smooth, white plastic, casting his eyes from one billboard to another, hoping with all his might that the Angels hadn't covered the words yet.

As if on cue, a group of pegasi clothed in tight jumpsuits of the most astonishing white barreled around a skyscraper at the next corner.  Mylo watched them pass high overhead, envying their uniforms which featured a separate extension for their tails.  He could barely imagine the comfort.  Even from so far below them, Mylo watched their heads swivel back and forth, scanning the streets.  He took some hope in knowing they were searching, too.  The shaded words had not yet been found.

A sudden boom from the tower shook the plastic under Mylo's hooves, his baggy jumpsuit rippling in the shockwave.  Throwing his head upward toward the Alicorn, Mylo saw smoke billow from a ruptured section at its center.  Dozens of Angels buzzed around and through the dark column.  The silvery aura surrounding the tower began to dim, and the Sun sank on the horizon.  Panic built in Mylo's throat, but he tried to swallow it down.  This sort of thing happened far too often for his taste, but it did happen, and it would be repaired.

He gasped at a glorious realization: the ponies who made the shaded words only operated at night, under the cover of dark.  Perhaps if the Sun was down for long, they would put more words on the billboards!  Suddenly filled with glee, Mylo tried to hide the spring in his step as he continued on his way to the factory, glancing upward often in hopes of spotting shaded words before the light was gone.

The Sun dropped halfway below the flat horizon before Mylo saw that day's words.  A group of ponies, huddled together against the cold, all fully clothed in their protective jumpsuits, stood below the marked billboard, whispering among themselves in tones of restrained excitement.  Narrowing his eyes in the dimness, Mylo smiled behind his mask as he read the dynamic words screaming down from high above.  They swirled and slashed over the entire face of the billboard, shining with bright shades unnamed by ponykind.  A warmth spread through Mylo's chest and mind as he drank in the beauty of the words, both in their meaning and their appearance:

"I STRUGGLE WITH THE FEELING THAT MY LIFE ISN'T MINE."

Mylo nodded.  "So do I," he breathed to himself, a layer of tears building under his mask.  "Every single day, so do I."

The Angels appeared out of nowhere, swarming the billboard like hornets.  Mylo quickly dropped his gaze and resumed his march to the factory.  The shaded words would soon be gone from the billboard, but not from Mylo's hammering heart.  He took deep breaths, repeating the beautiful line within the sanctity of his skull.  It carried so much meaning, but most of all it assured him that he was not alone.  There were other ponies--brave ponies--who knew it was all wrong, who knew there had to be so much more than Heaven's cyclical path.

If only he could find them.  If only there was some way he could meet with them and learn about the shades.  They must have names, just as white and grey and black had names.  The Angels tried to pretend the other shades didn't have names.  They told ponies that all other shades were unnatural, evil, and dangerous, and that anypony found in possession of such shades was to be considered a threat to Heaven.

But Mylo knew better.  The shades were real... they had to be!  He himself was covered in them, under his jumpsuit.  His coat, his mane, his eyes... all of them were shaded like the words.  For so many years, Mylo had believed there was something wrong with him.  He dared not speak of his own shades to anyone for fear of being considered a threat.  Threats to Heaven, after all, were immediately cast out.

Even so, all through his life Mylo could swear he saw the other shades in the eyes of his fellow ponies.  It was hard to be sure, due to the blurring nature of the holes in their masks, but some of their eyes were almost unmistakably shaded.  Never had he brought it up or asked aloud, refusing to be responsible for the casting out of an innocent pony, but he often wondered if all ponies were not shaded like himself.  If only the radiation from the Alicorn was not so dangerous, or if ponies were allowed to visit each other in the safely distanced apartments.  Alas, the jumpsuits were necessary for survival while in Heaven itself, and entering another pony's room was "conspiratorial" and strictly forbidden.

But the shaded words gave him hope, as well as to hundreds of his coworkers.  They never spoke of it, of course, but he could tell; he could hear it in their voices, and he saw the bounce with which they worked only on Fridays.  The shaded words confirmed his theories, for how could something so beautiful be as unnatural and evil as the Angels professed?

It was very dark now.  As he approached the factory doors, joining a group of nine or ten other workers, he thought back to the first time he saw the shaded words.  He had passed through the park near the cemetery on his way to the factory one morning when he noticed a crowd gathered at the edge of the park's large pond.  The bridge that arched over the water had been marked with stylized words that immediately excited every corner of Mylo's imagination.  He stared with the silent crowd at those words for several minutes--nearly enough to make them late--shocked and fascinated at their unprecedented existence.  He would never forget the phrase they made:

"DO YOU EVER GET THE FEELING THAT YOU'RE MISSING THE MARK?"

For weeks afterward, Mylo had dissected the question as if his life depended on it.  He had, indeed, very often felt a tug in his chest, a lure to brighter pastures, a sourceless reminder that life was more than making magic batteries.  Beyond "missing the mark," however, Mylo felt he had no arrows to shoot in the first place.  They had all been taken by the Angels, by the oppressive nature of Heaven, and even by the Major herself--no, especially by the Major.

More than a year had passed since then.  Nothing had changed; not dynamically, anyway.  But the words kept appearing, and the messages and shades continued to spur Mylo's hope and his enthusiasm.  Perhaps someday the ponies who wrote the shaded words would find him and tell him their secrets.  Perhaps they would reveal to him a world outside of Heaven, someplace where every shade was treated as beautifully as white.

Until then, Mylo thought with a hidden smile, there was always his treasure in the wall.

***

***M***

***X***

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"Keep at it, Lost Boys!  It's not every day we get an opportunity like this.  Tonight the streets are ours!"

A cheer of agreement went up from the gathered ponies as they each added to the mural blossoming along the brick.  "DON'T LET THEM TAKE CONTROL!" it blared, the most direct and spurring of any of their messages.

A terrible screeching noise, followed by the steady clunk of the Alicorn, alerted the group of approaching sunlight even before the alleyway began to brighten.  Many of them froze, eyes wide, scanning the skies for incoming Angels.

The leader of the bunch scoffed.  Bearing a terrific smile, he threw a foreleg around his nearest companion.  "What's wrong?  Feel a little bit nervous?"

The mare nodded.  "Yes, I feel nervous... a-and before you say it, Charlie, I cannot relax."

A bubbling laugh escaped her leader.  "Ha!  I'm sure you've heard that advice enough from me by now."

A smile came to the pony's mouth, but a younger mare behind her stuttered forth, "H-How come they're out to get us?"

"'Cause they don't know the facts," the stallion said with a wink.  "They don't understand the art we are making.  They simply cannot comprehend it, and so they'll always try to find us and to destroy us."  He gave the first mare a comforting squeeze before leaping atop a discarded box in the alley to speak to his entire band.  "They've taken everything we used to use to make things beautiful.  Everything they could think of, they snatched from under our muzzles years ago.  They thought that without a canvas, we could not create."  His smirk became an elated beam and he lifted the cold cylinder in his hoof.  "So on a concrete canvas we'll be making our mark, armed with a spray can soul!  Now no more dilly dally, everypony get home before the Sun betrays us into the hooves of the Angels!  Hahaaaaa!"

The gang reared up on their hind legs and shouted their delight before taking off like a river of righteousness down the alleyway and disappearing into the shadows of a fading night.  Their leader stayed behind, basking in the glory of their newest and finest creation.  His breath came out in thick, warm gusts of lingering steam.  A lopsided smirk curled over his face as he glanced at the Alicorn in the distance.  It had resumed its artificial glow as it kept the Sun in motion.  He took careful note of the way it spiraled together, so much like the horn of a unicorn.  He sighed, gritting his teeth against a painful memory.  The Alicorn looked so familiar, so comforting... and yet it housed the most oppressive, devilish pony Equestria had ever seen.

"You used your heart as a weapon," the blue earth pony said under his breath, boldly shaking his can while staring daggers at the tower, "and it hurts like heaven."

With a snort and whip of his uncovered tail, he, too, vanished into the morning, waiting--always waiting--for the Sun to really rise.