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Wild Horses

By ForgotenNull
Created: 2021-10-27 05:17:24
Updated: 2021-12-18 05:35:48
Expiry: Never
anontwilight sparklegreentexthie

  1. >The first questions were very clinical, as you expected
  2. >"Who are you?"
  3. >"What are you?"
  4. >"Where did you come from?"
  5. >"What do you want?"
  6. >"How did you get here?"
  7. >Deflection only went so far, but with repetition it went far enough to satisfy
  8. >You were Anon, a Human from Earth
  9. >You want the same as anyone else, to live your life and be happy
  10. >They eventually accepted that you're not comfortable with discussing how you got here
  11. >Though the tight lipped expressions and pinned ears spoke a lot to how deep that acceptance ran
  12. >It would be enough, you told yourself
  13. >And for a while, it was
  14. >You were finally there
  15. >The place you were supposed to be
  16. >The place where you were supposed to be happy
  17. >Equestria was beautiful, everything was vivid and full of life
  18. >The sheer amount of vibrancy that seemed to cling to the air itself was intoxicating in it's own right
  19. >Just breathing you could understand how this world was such a world of magic and wonder
  20. >Now you find yourself leaning on the crystalline arch of an open doorway watching the sun set over the rolling hills to the east over the still idyllic town of Ponyville
  21. >The urge to laugh at the sheer absurdity and whimsy of even the landscape itself passed over you, but you kept it suppressed well enough
  22. >The fact that someone like you could ever be in a place like still felt almost wrong on a fundamental level
  23. >You glanced down to your side to see that your hand was clenched in a white knuckled grip again, you made a conscious effort to try to relax and appreciate the artistry playing out across the sky in front of you
  24. >Slowly you slip down into thoughtlessness as you watch the sun creep slowly down towards the broken and mountainous, but still beautiful, horizon
  25. >"Anon?"
  26. >You jump slightly and swear under your breath, not having heard or noticed the mare come up behind you
  27. >You look back and see Princess Twilight Sparkle, a mostly neutral expression on her face that you can still read as a tight frown from her swept back ears
  28. >Ponies were a remarkably expressive bunch, especially when they didn't want to be
  29. >"Sorry, I didn't mean to scare you."
  30. >The words are apologetic and genuine, and she maintains eye contact the whole time
  31. >Despite yourself you find yourself smile back at her gently as a mirthless chuckle croaks out of your throat
  32. "It's not your fault, I'm just not used to the company."
  33. >She smiles back, faintly, there's concern on her expression, but she shakes her head and does her best to banish it
  34. >"Honestly, Anon, with what you've told me about your world I'm still struggling to understand how that could ever be possible. Billions of people all interconnected through technology at all times? How could you ever have time to yourself?"
  35. >She moves forward through the doorway, slipping past you, and looks out towards the sunset for a long moment before turning back to address you again
  36. >You look down at her before tactfully looking towards the sunset again
  37. "Princess, my people took the concept of being alone in a crowded room and turned it into an artform in itself."
  38. >There's a long pause after that
  39. >"I see." she says cautiously.
  40. >"You wouldn't mind the company, would you?"
  41. >You suppress a frown
  42. >The questions were clinical at first
  43. >But they were becoming increasingly less so
  44. >Repetition has it's limits
  45. >You wear the remnants of that smile as best you can
  46. "By all means, Princess", you say with a nod
  47. >She nods back and unlatches the pouch on the small saddlebag she was wearing at her hip, pulling out a familiar glossy rectangle before levitating it over towards you
  48. >"I think I was able to charge the capacitor enough for it to be usable, but I'll be frank when I say that I'm not used to working with capacitors at this scale with that sort of power density, so besides your instructions I'm mostly guessing at how much I can put in without it overloading..."
  49. >You push yourself off the wall and deftly catch the device in your fingers, pressing the right buttons to get to a startup
  50. "If the math we did was right then it should all be fine."
  51. >She says nothing and waits patiently as you watch the screen
  52. >The startup takes a moment before you're onto the home screen
  53. "Twenty six percent battery."
  54. >"Only twenty six percent?"
  55. >You nod
  56. "It's enough to last maybe six or so hours with light use on lower settings."
  57. >You take a moment to flick and swipe through to bring the power drain down lower
  58. >"Six hours!"
  59. >You glance down at her to see her blink up at you owlishly
  60. >"Anon, your technology is amazing! Six hours of use with all the world's knowledge right in the frogs of your hooves."
  61. >Her eyes nearly cross for a second as she blinks at you again, remembering herself
  62. >"I mean, um, tips of your claws?"
  63. "Fingers and fingertips", you say casually waggling one in her direction
  64. >She nods sheepishly, "Fingers and fingertips"
  65. >You nod back, then shake your head
  66. "It would only be everything if I was connected to the net, and I'm not here, so it's only the stuff that I had downloaded before I came here."
  67. >There was another pause where Twilight kept her face very neutral before speaking
  68. >"What did you download before you came here?"
  69. >The phrasing was very deliberate
  70. "Enough" you said cryptically
  71. >She frowned, but did not press the issue, instead turning to look out at the sunset, which was a deep burnt red that smeared across half the sky as the sun dipped past the horizon full now
  72. >It took a few minutes before either of you said anything, you decided to speak up first
  73. "You said that you wanted to see some of the things that I had on here?"
  74. >She blinks before nodding back up at you
  75. >"I wanted to get to know you better, Anon."
  76. >For a moment, you don't say anything.
  77. >"You said that I you had a lot of things that were important to you on there, didn't you?"
  78. >You did not, you said that you had a lot of culturally significant works on there, but never that anything was personally important to you
  79. "Yes" you say neutrally
  80. >She pauses again
  81. >"Ok, well, is there anything you would recommend?"
  82. >"Art, theater, poetry, writing?"
  83. >You say nothing and stare at the waning crepuscular rays and try your best to appear in deep thought
  84. >"Music?"
  85. >You feel your hand cramp up and reflexively unclench
  86. >Another pause
  87. >"What sorts of music do you have, Anon?"
  88. >You sigh quietly and look down at her as she looks up at you with cautious expectation.
  89. "Well, I have the works of quite a few renowned composers throughout history, as well as a pretty broad selection of historical folk music that shows off a lot of the breadth of the human musical scene over time."
  90. >She nods, "Does that include contemporary pieces too."
  91. >You look at her for a moment before failing to maintain eye contact and reflexively looking back to your device, pawing through it idly
  92. "I have some."
  93. >There's another long pause
  94. "Though most of the contemporary stuff is from my own collection."
  95. >Without looking at her you can hear her perk at that as she speaks up again
  96. >"That sounds perfect! Do you have anything that you think I might like? Do you think that I could hear som—"
  97. "No"
  98. >She stumbles and stutters for a moment before cocking her head at you as you glance back at her before looking back to the comfort of the screen
  99. >"I'm sorry, what do you mean?"
  100. >You let out a long, honest, sigh
  101. "I don't think that I would have anything that you would like in my collection."
  102. >There's another pause before she scoffs at that
  103. >"Anon, please, if you think I would judge your tastes then don't worry about it!"
  104. >"I'm always open to new things and experiences if they let me learn more about the things and Ponies around me, and that includes music even though I'm not the biggest music buff out there."
  105. >She blinks
  106. >"That includes the people around me too, which includes you, of course."
  107. >You nod
  108. "Of course."
  109. >You shake your head
  110. "It's not that it's bad music, or that you would judge on that, it's just that I don't think there's anything that you would like."
  111. >"Can I ask why?"
  112. >You look at her
  113. >She looks back up at you
  114. "Most of the songs in my collection are morose, bordering on melancholic
  115. >She tipped her head at you again
  116. >"You didn't have any happy songs?"
  117. "Almost none of them spoke to me."
  118. >"Can I ask why?"
  119. >Over the days the questions had for the most part become more and more personal
  120. >More and more invasive
  121. >Harder to deflect
  122. >Repetition had it's limits
  123. >You looked at her, realizing that you could maybe brush her off for today
  124. >But she'd come back and ask again, another way, tomorrow
  125. >And the next day
  126. >And the day after that
  127. >You sighed again
  128. "Twilight?"
  129. >"Yes?"
  130. "What kind of person wants to leave their own world?"
  131. >She takes a moment to consider
  132. >"I don't know," she says tentatively
  133. >"I'm not sure if I understand the question."
  134. >You shake your head and look up at the increasingly deep night sky in an effort to not show her your face
  135. "Someone who wasn't happy, and would rather be anywhere else than where they were..."
  136. >There's another pause
  137. >Another repetition
  138. >"Was that you, Anon?"
  139. >You say nothing
  140. >Your hands unclench reflexively
  141. >"Anon, can I ask a question?"
  142. >You say nothing
  143. >"How did you get here?"
  144. >A breeze blew across the balcony, sending a chill between the two that stood there that cut into the space between them
  145. "I think I'm going to go to bed now."
  146. >"O-ok..."
  147. >You look back down at the tablet
  148. "It's still at at around 20%, you should be able to put twice the power you put into it before so long as you meter it like we discussed to get it up to around 70% or so, then I could feel a little better about using it."
  149. >You shake your head
  150. "For now I'd rather not, so you can hold onto it until then
  151. >You hold out the device in her direction and feel the electric tingle prick at your fingertips as her magic latches onto the device and pulls it away
  152. >Without another word you walk back through the doorway and into the dimly refracted light of the castle
  153.  
  154. >You sit down on the balcony
  155. >Anon clearly isn't feeling well, and it's getting harder and harder to deny the fact that he probably never did
  156. >You want to help him, but you're really not sure how
  157. >Not without him opening up and telling you exactly what's wrong
  158. >You sigh and look down at the device
  159. >Still, progress is progress
  160. >You remember how surprised he was to find that he had it with him
  161. >Like he shouldn't have
  162. >When you asked he just said that he had always been told that "You couldn't take it with you."
  163. >He didn't say anything after that
  164. >You also remember how distraught he was when he tried to turn it on the first time after pulling it out only to find out that it had no energy left to do so
  165. >At least now it worked
  166. >You spent a moment staring at the surface as it softly glowed in the nighttime gloom, painting a strange and alien contrast against the soft light of your own aura
  167. >You wonder for a moment if maybe you could use the device the same way Anon could
  168. >You think about how he worked with it and pulled your aura around the device so that it was only holding onto the edges and back surface
  169. >The face was light up with an unfamiliar picture with several symbols and an unfamiliar script painting a few lines across in a few places
  170. >At random you decide to "tap" at a rounded isosceles triangle tipped on it's side near the center of the surface with your aura, in a gesture like you had seen him do
  171. >Suddenly the soft strumming of a guitar starts up
  172. >You nearly leap and drop the device in surprise
  173. >Luckily you don't
  174. >After a few seconds, you hear what sounds like a stallion singing in a mournsome cadence
  175.  
  176. Childhood living is easy to do
  177. The things you wanted I bought them for you
  178. Graceless lady you know who I am
  179. You know I cant let you slide through my hands
  180.  
  181. Wild horses couldn't drag me away
  182. Wild, wild horses, couldn't drag me away
  183.  
  184. I watched you suffer a dull aching pain
  185. Now you decided to show me the same
  186. No sweeping exits or offstage lines
  187. Could make me feel bitter or treat you unkind
  188.  
  189. Wild horses couldn't drag me away
  190. Wild, wild horses, couldn't drag me away
  191.  
  192. I know I dreamed you a sin and a lie
  193. I have my freedom but I don't have much time
  194. Faith has been broken, tears must be cried
  195. Lets do some living after we die
  196.  
  197. Wild horses couldn't drag me away
  198. Wild, wild horses, well ride them some day
  199.  
  200. Wild horses couldn't drag me away
  201. Wild, wild horses, well ride them some day
  202.  
  203. ~ Fin
  204.  
  205. Hope someone enjoyed my random spaz writing at midnight
  206. Song source https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UFLJFl7ws_0

Wild Horses

by ForgotenNull