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One Thousand Years of Solitude
At first, she did nothing but scream.
Curses and spittle-flecked rants of rage, the wails and moans of self-directed grief, the hoarse moans of bitter regret, the pitiful cries for a pointless forgiveness.
It was all the same. The roars of a wounded animal lashing out at the world and its enemies and itself.
But there is nothing much to scream at on the moon and after a time she tired of the empty, unlistening air and became still.
That is when I first spoke to her.
"Is this not what you wanted?"
Then the air was once more filled with screaming, for now little Luna finally had a target.
When the screams died down again I did not at first approach, for I too tired of the empty air. And so we sat a while in the humming silence and felt the turning of the ground beneath our feet, saw the lights of her sister's charge curve around the horizon in patient loops.
After a time she spoke, and the quiet of it seemed to echo through the black skies.
"How long?"
I pondered the heavens, thinking of the many times I had watched them pass, and found her answer. "Near a quarter century now, I should think."
Collapsed in sheer exhaustion as she was she did not sag, for there was nowhere for her body to go; but what little light had remained in her eyes seemed to dim a little. I confess I found it vexing.
"Leave me be, spectre."
Her words were quiet but I found no jest in them, and so left her to her misery.
When once I happened upon the princess again the skies had moved around us a hundredfold times more than when last I had seen her, and I found her much changed.
It appeared that she had not moved overmuch from where I had left her, for her once glossy coat now hung heavy with moondust, silky trails of silver streaming from worn feathertips. She sat on her haunches, hunched forward like an old nag, half planted in the ground like some withered tree after a landslide, now clinging to the dull earth with only the deepest and bitterest of roots.
I waited. She did not move.
Eventually, I asked again:
"Is this not what you wanted?"
I waited. She did not move, but instead made some small noise, like the rustle of her old silken gowns over stone castle floors. I realised after a moment that she was laughing - it seemed the dust had coated even her throat, and so she sat and quietly laughed, the wheezing huff of a mare before the gallows.
I misliked that laugh, and asked her again, forcefully now:
"Is this not what you wanted?"
The laughing stopped. She did not move.
Eventually, I left.
When next I returned to where the princess sat the dust had risen to her chest. Her mane, once the envy and muse of every artist, resembled more the crumbling gravel walls of a long abandoned mine than the skies above us.
I kicked her.
Time and neglect cannot touch an alicorn, and I have no doubt she barely felt the blow, but to be touched by something other than the stillness and slow weight of burial clearly startled her, for she flinched, dust spilling away onto the barren ground and scattering into the air.
"Is this not what you wanted? A world of your own, a place to rule without standing in her shadow?"
She turned her head, slowly, more dust cascading downwards as she tilted wide eyes, focused for the first time in four hundred years, towards me.
It is unnerving to so thoroughly hold the gaze of a goddess, but what need does a shadow have to fear the light that casts it? I met her gaze.
"You told me in the quiet hours of the night of the new world you would build if just given a chance. You have a world, Luna. Now build it."
She stared at me, unmoving. I had passed years in what felt like days as I wondered the mountains and valleys of this empty world, but those next few seconds felt like an eternity. And then in one smooth, deliberate motion, Luna stood up.
The accumulated weight of four centuries of stillness burst into the air, swirling in clouds and plumes of shimmering refracted starlight. Her blue coat gleamed like new, and her mane and tail seemed to reach forever out into the everspinning sea of stars above. A goddess risen anew from the grave.
"Come then, Nightmare," she said, looking out at the untouched horizon. "Let us build."
The city was dead, but it was no less glorious for it. No civilisation had ever walked these halls, but its splendour rivaled the grandest of any bygone kingdom's halcyon days. Grand cathedrals in her name, spiralling towers reaching towards her everdistant home, deep caverns hiding the treasures of this worlds deepest places, murals and statues and glittering jewels. It would be the crown of any empire, the anointed jewel of any people, the envy of all who beheld it.
Only I was here to see it. Only I ever would.
I walked through the city, down deserted streets of polished marble, under arches adorned with carvings of plants this place would never see grow.
I met her in her tower. The centre of her citadel, taller and more magnificent than anything else she had built, her castle to watch over her kingdom. My princess stood under the pale earthlight and turned to look at me with such serene joy that I could hardly bear to speak.
"It is done."
"It is."
She turned away, and gazed out at all she had wrought. "Do you like it?"
"How," I asked, "could I not?"
She looked to me again, smiling sweetly. "I am glad". She turned her head back to the city, then tilted it slightly upwards, towards her distant home. "How long?"
I did not answer.
She laughed. "Not long then." We looked at the earth then, she and I, in shared stillness and companionship.
"Stay with me?"
"Always."
"Kiss me?"
"...Of course."
Curses and spittle-flecked rants of rage, the wails and moans of self-directed grief, the hoarse moans of bitter regret, the pitiful cries for a pointless forgiveness.
It was all the same. The roars of a wounded animal lashing out at the world and its enemies and itself.
But there is nothing much to scream at on the moon and after a time she tired of the empty, unlistening air and became still.
That is when I first spoke to her.
"Is this not what you wanted?"
Then the air was once more filled with screaming, for now little Luna finally had a target.
When the screams died down again I did not at first approach, for I too tired of the empty air. And so we sat a while in the humming silence and felt the turning of the ground beneath our feet, saw the lights of her sister's charge curve around the horizon in patient loops.
After a time she spoke, and the quiet of it seemed to echo through the black skies.
"How long?"
I pondered the heavens, thinking of the many times I had watched them pass, and found her answer. "Near a quarter century now, I should think."
Collapsed in sheer exhaustion as she was she did not sag, for there was nowhere for her body to go; but what little light had remained in her eyes seemed to dim a little. I confess I found it vexing.
"Leave me be, spectre."
Her words were quiet but I found no jest in them, and so left her to her misery.
When once I happened upon the princess again the skies had moved around us a hundredfold times more than when last I had seen her, and I found her much changed.
It appeared that she had not moved overmuch from where I had left her, for her once glossy coat now hung heavy with moondust, silky trails of silver streaming from worn feathertips. She sat on her haunches, hunched forward like an old nag, half planted in the ground like some withered tree after a landslide, now clinging to the dull earth with only the deepest and bitterest of roots.
I waited. She did not move.
Eventually, I asked again:
"Is this not what you wanted?"
I waited. She did not move, but instead made some small noise, like the rustle of her old silken gowns over stone castle floors. I realised after a moment that she was laughing - it seemed the dust had coated even her throat, and so she sat and quietly laughed, the wheezing huff of a mare before the gallows.
I misliked that laugh, and asked her again, forcefully now:
"Is this not what you wanted?"
The laughing stopped. She did not move.
Eventually, I left.
When next I returned to where the princess sat the dust had risen to her chest. Her mane, once the envy and muse of every artist, resembled more the crumbling gravel walls of a long abandoned mine than the skies above us.
I kicked her.
Time and neglect cannot touch an alicorn, and I have no doubt she barely felt the blow, but to be touched by something other than the stillness and slow weight of burial clearly startled her, for she flinched, dust spilling away onto the barren ground and scattering into the air.
"Is this not what you wanted? A world of your own, a place to rule without standing in her shadow?"
She turned her head, slowly, more dust cascading downwards as she tilted wide eyes, focused for the first time in four hundred years, towards me.
It is unnerving to so thoroughly hold the gaze of a goddess, but what need does a shadow have to fear the light that casts it? I met her gaze.
"You told me in the quiet hours of the night of the new world you would build if just given a chance. You have a world, Luna. Now build it."
She stared at me, unmoving. I had passed years in what felt like days as I wondered the mountains and valleys of this empty world, but those next few seconds felt like an eternity. And then in one smooth, deliberate motion, Luna stood up.
The accumulated weight of four centuries of stillness burst into the air, swirling in clouds and plumes of shimmering refracted starlight. Her blue coat gleamed like new, and her mane and tail seemed to reach forever out into the everspinning sea of stars above. A goddess risen anew from the grave.
"Come then, Nightmare," she said, looking out at the untouched horizon. "Let us build."
The city was dead, but it was no less glorious for it. No civilisation had ever walked these halls, but its splendour rivaled the grandest of any bygone kingdom's halcyon days. Grand cathedrals in her name, spiralling towers reaching towards her everdistant home, deep caverns hiding the treasures of this worlds deepest places, murals and statues and glittering jewels. It would be the crown of any empire, the anointed jewel of any people, the envy of all who beheld it.
Only I was here to see it. Only I ever would.
I walked through the city, down deserted streets of polished marble, under arches adorned with carvings of plants this place would never see grow.
I met her in her tower. The centre of her citadel, taller and more magnificent than anything else she had built, her castle to watch over her kingdom. My princess stood under the pale earthlight and turned to look at me with such serene joy that I could hardly bear to speak.
"It is done."
"It is."
She turned away, and gazed out at all she had wrought. "Do you like it?"
"How," I asked, "could I not?"
She looked to me again, smiling sweetly. "I am glad". She turned her head back to the city, then tilted it slightly upwards, towards her distant home. "How long?"
I did not answer.
She laughed. "Not long then." We looked at the earth then, she and I, in shared stillness and companionship.
"Stay with me?"
"Always."
"Kiss me?"
"...Of course."
Pics
Examining Luna and the Nightmare in exile is not exactly new material, but I found this interesting, nonetheless. I couldn't get a good read on what the Nightmare was after, exactly, but did perceive that it is deeply invested in Luna (its host, in more ways than one?) and it had this sense of unrelenting... hunger? It wants Luna, and while it will give her space it won't ever go away.
I'm less clear on Luna. She's grieving, then she's seizing upon something to do, then... seizing onto the only other entity available? Her shift(s) came across as abrupt, and it's difficult to intuit why she makes these behavioral changes -- not enough space to explore it, in part.
Mixed feelings on this one.
I'm less clear on Luna. She's grieving, then she's seizing upon something to do, then... seizing onto the only other entity available? Her shift(s) came across as abrupt, and it's difficult to intuit why she makes these behavioral changes -- not enough space to explore it, in part.
Mixed feelings on this one.
Genre: Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri
Thoughts: This presents strong imagery while capturing the weight and despair of Luna's long exile on the moon. I also think Luna's decision to create her own monument after coming out of her doldrums is fitting.
However, I'm going to have to tag >>KwirkyJ here because he hits on my biggest quibble: Luna's relatively quick turnaround. Quick from a narrative perspective, of course. I do see how this shows us Luna suffering through a lengthy, idle despair; I particularly like how the dust imagery contributes to this, both in its slow gathering and in its swift dismissal. That's effective! But she just stands up all of a sudden, and boom, it's SimCity-time. I can clearly see the conversation leading up to it, yet it still feels like a sudden shift. Maybe that could be mitigated by planting some earlier seeds about wanting to build? I have to think there could be some space in the midst of repeating "is this not what you wanted" for someone to drop hints about building that empire.
I'll also poke at the kiss at the end. It kind of makes sense, but also kind of comes out of nowhere. I totally get why Luna's embrace of the Nightmare would go in that direction. But for that moment to carry weight, IMO it would need more buildup than what we get right now.
Buuuuuut, see, here's the thing: I'm poking at the things that don't work here because this is firing in most of its cylinders otherwise. It's a story that fundamentally works. It's complete, it has good imagery... it's well done IMO. Yes perhaps it could use a tune-up, but I think it's doing what it came here to do.
Tier: Strong
Thoughts: This presents strong imagery while capturing the weight and despair of Luna's long exile on the moon. I also think Luna's decision to create her own monument after coming out of her doldrums is fitting.
However, I'm going to have to tag >>KwirkyJ here because he hits on my biggest quibble: Luna's relatively quick turnaround. Quick from a narrative perspective, of course. I do see how this shows us Luna suffering through a lengthy, idle despair; I particularly like how the dust imagery contributes to this, both in its slow gathering and in its swift dismissal. That's effective! But she just stands up all of a sudden, and boom, it's SimCity-time. I can clearly see the conversation leading up to it, yet it still feels like a sudden shift. Maybe that could be mitigated by planting some earlier seeds about wanting to build? I have to think there could be some space in the midst of repeating "is this not what you wanted" for someone to drop hints about building that empire.
I'll also poke at the kiss at the end. It kind of makes sense, but also kind of comes out of nowhere. I totally get why Luna's embrace of the Nightmare would go in that direction. But for that moment to carry weight, IMO it would need more buildup than what we get right now.
Buuuuuut, see, here's the thing: I'm poking at the things that don't work here because this is firing in most of its cylinders otherwise. It's a story that fundamentally works. It's complete, it has good imagery... it's well done IMO. Yes perhaps it could use a tune-up, but I think it's doing what it came here to do.
Tier: Strong
Very brave choice to add the kiss! It's right on the edge of acceptability, but in my opinion you made it work. The lack of romance lends it an air of desperation, or maybe resignation. At any rate, it was a gamble that paid off.
Thank you for sharing!
Thank you for sharing!
Oh wow, I wasn't expecting to place with this piece. It's a bit of an oddball - I essentially wrote a story about the Nightmare being a creeper and Luna deciding to play Minecraft while heavily channeling my 15 year old self's love of the Gabriel Garcia Marquez novel One Hundred Years of Solitude. I'm amazed I made it work at all, and I'm glad you all liked it - thank you!
>>Light_Striker
I don't know about you, but I would buy that game in a heartbeat. Space Horse Princess builds fortress on the moon? Hell yes.
>>KwirkyJ
Perhaps my greatest weakness in this fandom is that I am morbidly fascinated by the two OG Alicorns and their stories. I do write about other things sometimes, but it's these two that I keep coming back to. Ah, well - there are worse vices to have.
You got a pretty solid read on the Nightmare actually! The key conceit I was working with is that the Nightmare is ultimately a part of Luna. Something conjured from the depths of her psyche and dark magic, and as such is deeply and inextricably drawn to her. It's obsession made natural, like an electron drawn towards a positive ion, striving to complete the whole it was once part of.
Totally fair. I was trying to explore the grief and isolation that Luna would have gone through - after four hundred years alone, I think most people would turn to the only company they had left. I think the pacing particularly fell apart in the second half, after Luna gets up, but it's a bit iffy throughout.
Thanks for reading, and for the feedback! It's always appreciated.
>>CoffeeMinion
Heh, I suppose that could be the genre! I was thinking more Mooncraft as Light_Striker alluded to. Building for the sake of building, of leaving a monument, not so much making a civilisation.
Anyway: wow. That's a lot of feedback, and a lot of it very flattering. Thank you!
Yup. Totally understandable. I'm actually reasonably happy with how it came out given the whole 'short shorts' thing, but if/when I rework this it will definitely have a bit of fleshing out just to give the isolation time to breathe a little.
This is very good advice, that I will most likely be taking! Although there is, in story, a massive gap between Luna standing up and the constructed city it is pretty abrupt narratively, and there could definitely be more to hint towards this being the outcome of the story.
That's very fair. It was a bit of a spur of the moment decision to add that, and I went back and forth on keeping it or not, but I just felt it worked for where I'd taken the characters (or at least where I'd envisioned them to be). There's definitely more I'd want to add if I expand this. I'd make the Nightmare's obsession with its creator (and subsequent disillusionment when she spends four hundred years sitting in one place) clearer, and there was originally going to be a scene of Luna mourning her weird lonely little world back on Earth too.
>>thebandbrony
THIS IS EXACTLY IT! Oh man, thank you for saying this, I wasn't sure if I'd played this right. Luna and the Nightmare's relationship isn't supposed to be romantic at all - it is, as you said, desperation (on both their parts), resignation (on Luna's) and a little bit of obsession (on the Nightmare's, although I don't think I really conveyed it in this version). Thanks for reading, glad you liked it!
>>Light_Striker
I don't know about you, but I would buy that game in a heartbeat. Space Horse Princess builds fortress on the moon? Hell yes.
>>KwirkyJ
Perhaps my greatest weakness in this fandom is that I am morbidly fascinated by the two OG Alicorns and their stories. I do write about other things sometimes, but it's these two that I keep coming back to. Ah, well - there are worse vices to have.
I couldn't get a good read on what the Nightmare was after, exactly, but did perceive that it is deeply invested in Luna (its host, in more ways than one?) and it had this sense of unrelenting... hunger? It wants Luna, and while it will give her space it won't ever go away.
You got a pretty solid read on the Nightmare actually! The key conceit I was working with is that the Nightmare is ultimately a part of Luna. Something conjured from the depths of her psyche and dark magic, and as such is deeply and inextricably drawn to her. It's obsession made natural, like an electron drawn towards a positive ion, striving to complete the whole it was once part of.
I'm less clear on Luna. She's grieving, then she's seizing upon something to do, then... seizing onto the only other entity available? Her shift(s) came across as abrupt, and it's difficult to intuit why she makes these behavioral changes -- not enough space to explore it, in part.
Mixed feelings on this one.
Totally fair. I was trying to explore the grief and isolation that Luna would have gone through - after four hundred years alone, I think most people would turn to the only company they had left. I think the pacing particularly fell apart in the second half, after Luna gets up, but it's a bit iffy throughout.
Thanks for reading, and for the feedback! It's always appreciated.
>>CoffeeMinion
Heh, I suppose that could be the genre! I was thinking more Mooncraft as Light_Striker alluded to. Building for the sake of building, of leaving a monument, not so much making a civilisation.
Anyway: wow. That's a lot of feedback, and a lot of it very flattering. Thank you!
my biggest quibble: Luna's relatively quick turnaround.
Yup. Totally understandable. I'm actually reasonably happy with how it came out given the whole 'short shorts' thing, but if/when I rework this it will definitely have a bit of fleshing out just to give the isolation time to breathe a little.
But she just stands up all of a sudden, and boom, it's SimCity-time. I can clearly see the conversation leading up to it, yet it still feels like a sudden shift. Maybe that could be mitigated by planting some earlier seeds about wanting to build? I have to think there could be some space in the midst of repeating "is this not what you wanted" for someone to drop hints about building that empire.
This is very good advice, that I will most likely be taking! Although there is, in story, a massive gap between Luna standing up and the constructed city it is pretty abrupt narratively, and there could definitely be more to hint towards this being the outcome of the story.
I'll also poke at the kiss at the end. It kind of makes sense, but also kind of comes out of nowhere. I totally get why Luna's embrace of the Nightmare would go in that direction. But for that moment to carry weight, IMO it would need more buildup than what we get right now.
That's very fair. It was a bit of a spur of the moment decision to add that, and I went back and forth on keeping it or not, but I just felt it worked for where I'd taken the characters (or at least where I'd envisioned them to be). There's definitely more I'd want to add if I expand this. I'd make the Nightmare's obsession with its creator (and subsequent disillusionment when she spends four hundred years sitting in one place) clearer, and there was originally going to be a scene of Luna mourning her weird lonely little world back on Earth too.
>>thebandbrony
THIS IS EXACTLY IT! Oh man, thank you for saying this, I wasn't sure if I'd played this right. Luna and the Nightmare's relationship isn't supposed to be romantic at all - it is, as you said, desperation (on both their parts), resignation (on Luna's) and a little bit of obsession (on the Nightmare's, although I don't think I really conveyed it in this version). Thanks for reading, glad you liked it!
YES MAN, I get hype when artists take risks, and the kiss was a risk that totally made the story. I really hope this one makes its way over to fimfiction. More people need to check this out.