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Organised by
RogerDodger
Word limit
400–750
Musing on Fate's Design
Muse dipped her brush of Destiny into the swirling colors of her palette of Dreams. The stark contrast of shades swam together under her gentle urging, only to separate again as soon as she lifted her hand. Frustrated, she tried again with the same result. A standard pony framework placed before her seemed to share her frustration, but nevertheless, stood ready to accept her Design.
Career aspirations loomed over her daunting task, and she couldn’t afford the stigma of failure right at the start. After millennia studying and practicing her craft, her first real assignment following graduation from the Universal Academy of Arts and Natural Sciences came at odds with centuries of carefully laid expectations for her given role. Golden thread, strung across the shoulders of the model, held a dangling tag which clearly outlined each point of Fate’s Design. It was required that she adhere to the instructions in formulating the Destiny of the soon-to-be-born-pony, no matter how poorly they seemed to fit her mood.
Gender: Male
Race: Pegasus
Coloring: Dark Blue Coat/Gray Accents
Cutie Mark: Lightning Bolt
Personality: Loyal/Fearless/Competitive
Muse brushed her pool of indigo Dreams along a strand of black Desires, trying to achieve the proper mixture for her Design. Again, the color rose from the palette in an assortment of bright shades, and again, she hesitated in letting that color reach her canvas. A power beyond that of typical Destiny seemed to want to override her directive. Conflicted, she laid her brush and palette aside and began to ponder on her situation.
As she sat in quiet contemplation, the voice of Fate echoed in her thoughts. Three simple rules had been drilled into her head from the moment she had been chosen for the job. First: Don’t ever stray from the proven Design. Second: Maintain uniqueness by trusting in Fate to guide your hand. Finally, and most important of all: Creativity has its limits. Don’t test them. None of her training, none of those rules, gave her any options. She had no choice in the matter.
Reaching out, she placed her hand against the framework’s flank. The cool touch of blank hide felt like a cloud just before a late Spring shower. She ran her hand across the wing, a slightly upgraded model from what came standard according to Fate, and soaked in a raw power waiting to burst forth. She stared up into the model’s empty gaze and discovered a fiery furnace of devotion and pride streaming down from some unknown reserve. Nothing about her task felt right; nothing about this pony fell within the guidelines that Fate had dictated. She resolved that she was missing a piece of the puzzle, something personal.
Having exhausted her standard training, Muse felt she had no other choice. She poured over her palette of Dreams, opening her mind’s eye to pierce the veil, searching out the young mare set to bear this particular foal. Her search didn’t take long. For all her years of practice and preparation, nothing could have prepared her for the response. The soon-to-be-mother’s wave of Hopes and Desires washed over her. Immediately, she felt the urge to comply with the plea from deep within her heart for one, specific thing: a daughter.
Muse’s hand flew to her brush. Color poured off the palette. Damn the rules of yielding to the basic scope of Fate’s Design; dreams of a young mother and the call of a higher destiny guided her strokes. Still, she stuck to the task of filling the framework with personality and purpose, of creating the perfect Design from the template provided, and so, she tempered her creation by combining what she could of both Fate and Desire.
Once she was finished, Muse stepped back to inspect her work. The completed Design stood out in a spectacular display of color and creativity. A cyan coat flew in the face of Fate’s Design for a mare. The rainbow mane and tail carried the entire spectrum of Hopes and Dreams that her palette laid out. Sleek, yet powerful wings gave the pony an understated masculine strength while preserving the presence of feminine grace. Even the embedded Cutie Mark with the perfect cloud and tri-colored lightning bolt that held her Design's completed Destiny glowed with the light of an answered prayer.
Muse leaned forward and offered up a name to her creation, “You are my first, Rainbow Dash, and you are totally awesome! Stay true to your heart, and I know you'll make your mother proud!”
Career aspirations loomed over her daunting task, and she couldn’t afford the stigma of failure right at the start. After millennia studying and practicing her craft, her first real assignment following graduation from the Universal Academy of Arts and Natural Sciences came at odds with centuries of carefully laid expectations for her given role. Golden thread, strung across the shoulders of the model, held a dangling tag which clearly outlined each point of Fate’s Design. It was required that she adhere to the instructions in formulating the Destiny of the soon-to-be-born-pony, no matter how poorly they seemed to fit her mood.
Gender: Male
Race: Pegasus
Coloring: Dark Blue Coat/Gray Accents
Cutie Mark: Lightning Bolt
Personality: Loyal/Fearless/Competitive
Muse brushed her pool of indigo Dreams along a strand of black Desires, trying to achieve the proper mixture for her Design. Again, the color rose from the palette in an assortment of bright shades, and again, she hesitated in letting that color reach her canvas. A power beyond that of typical Destiny seemed to want to override her directive. Conflicted, she laid her brush and palette aside and began to ponder on her situation.
As she sat in quiet contemplation, the voice of Fate echoed in her thoughts. Three simple rules had been drilled into her head from the moment she had been chosen for the job. First: Don’t ever stray from the proven Design. Second: Maintain uniqueness by trusting in Fate to guide your hand. Finally, and most important of all: Creativity has its limits. Don’t test them. None of her training, none of those rules, gave her any options. She had no choice in the matter.
Reaching out, she placed her hand against the framework’s flank. The cool touch of blank hide felt like a cloud just before a late Spring shower. She ran her hand across the wing, a slightly upgraded model from what came standard according to Fate, and soaked in a raw power waiting to burst forth. She stared up into the model’s empty gaze and discovered a fiery furnace of devotion and pride streaming down from some unknown reserve. Nothing about her task felt right; nothing about this pony fell within the guidelines that Fate had dictated. She resolved that she was missing a piece of the puzzle, something personal.
Having exhausted her standard training, Muse felt she had no other choice. She poured over her palette of Dreams, opening her mind’s eye to pierce the veil, searching out the young mare set to bear this particular foal. Her search didn’t take long. For all her years of practice and preparation, nothing could have prepared her for the response. The soon-to-be-mother’s wave of Hopes and Desires washed over her. Immediately, she felt the urge to comply with the plea from deep within her heart for one, specific thing: a daughter.
Muse’s hand flew to her brush. Color poured off the palette. Damn the rules of yielding to the basic scope of Fate’s Design; dreams of a young mother and the call of a higher destiny guided her strokes. Still, she stuck to the task of filling the framework with personality and purpose, of creating the perfect Design from the template provided, and so, she tempered her creation by combining what she could of both Fate and Desire.
Once she was finished, Muse stepped back to inspect her work. The completed Design stood out in a spectacular display of color and creativity. A cyan coat flew in the face of Fate’s Design for a mare. The rainbow mane and tail carried the entire spectrum of Hopes and Dreams that her palette laid out. Sleek, yet powerful wings gave the pony an understated masculine strength while preserving the presence of feminine grace. Even the embedded Cutie Mark with the perfect cloud and tri-colored lightning bolt that held her Design's completed Destiny glowed with the light of an answered prayer.
Muse leaned forward and offered up a name to her creation, “You are my first, Rainbow Dash, and you are totally awesome! Stay true to your heart, and I know you'll make your mother proud!”