/*The Message*/
/*20130314 FIM:Booster*/
/*20130322*/
Derpy kept her sight as best she could on the road below as she flew out of Ponyville. This want as easy as it sounds when the wind is gusty, you are behind on your deliveries, your mail bag is flapping against you, and your eyes are misaligned. Getting frustrated at the directions she was given, head out of town and you cant miss him, she was just about to turn round and try the next road out, when she spotted a small wooden shack by the side of the road, with a pretty windmill on top, turning steadily. With a "Yay" Derpy plummeted down to land by the side of the shack, but a side gust caught her, sent her spinning, and she slammed into the back half of a pony whose front half was buried in lots of pretty coloured threads in the wall of the shack. The pony in question cried out in suprise, and tried to stop himself falling over, without success, as the threads he was working on got dragged free, hanging in various fuzzy bundles as Derpy and the pony ended up in a tangle on the floor.
"Twitchy Tail, twitchy tail. Ok if you are Pinkie, but not when you aint and dont." The pony sat up with a groan, holding a hoof against his head, then sighed deeply as he saw the hanging bundles. "Well, thats two days that needs redoing, and I hope there isnt a delivery needed tonight." He looked round to try and find out what had hit him, and looked puzzled at Derpy just sitting there, looking at the open panel with a confused look on her face. "Um, Derpy? Are you okay?" Derpy blinked and looked back at the pony with her usual lop sided gaze, then back at the panel. "Oh, sure, thank you, but the picture is ill. Theres a booboo up over there thats hurting it." She waved her left hoof in the general direction of the top left corner. The pony looked at her strangely for a moment, his mouth open, then closed it with a snap. "Wait right there. Thats where I was working two days ago, and I beleive you have found the problem. Now, all I have to do is look closely enough to see it." He stood up on all fours, then lifted a hoof to his head to remove his head gear and goggles. Next, he closed his eyes and removed his spectacles, carefully placing them in a padded pocket. As he opened his eyes again, Derpy tilted her head as they seem to grow larger and larger, to double the size of before, and yet they didnt seem to be focused on her. She waved her forhooves wi;d;y in front of his face, but he seemed to not notice. Carefully turning, he took a step forward, then another, then another, until his nose hit the shack with a wet thud. "Outh". He carefuly slid his right hoof over the open panel, pressing lightly on the fibres there, then shifted sideways to the right, then lifted his left hoof to first the left edge, then top corner, before pressing his nose to his leg and moving forwards until his nose pressed right up against the fibers. After only a few more moments, he exclaimed "YES", lifted his forehooves above his head, and twisted devices on each leg until in stages both hooves were tipped with tools almost too small for Derpy to see. "Place, grip, place, grip, place, cut, move, move, place, smooth, place, place, join, seal, wait, wait, release, release." Within seconds, his singsong actions had carried out a microscopic repair perfectly. Remaining there for a few moments more, he waited, and watched, then moved a tiny distance to the side, repeating his performance, then again, and again. After a dozen actions, he lifted his hooves above his head, and let the tools retract with a series of clicks while keeping his nose pressed close, making sure there were no more mistakes.
After a few moments, the pony carefully took two steps back, fumbled for his pocket, then his spectacles, before placing them on his nose with his eyes closed, opening his eyes, and turning back to Derpy with a smile. "Thank you for that, if you hadnt seen that mistake I made all that time ago, Id have spent days trying to work out what had gone wrong. I dont believe theres another pony that couldve seen that without being told what to look for and with special equipment." Derpy smiled brightly at first at the nice ponies words, but as he continued, her smile faded, then her face fell, until tears started to fall slowly from the tip of her nose, as it was now pointed at the ground. "Everey Poney make, sniff, fun of, sniff, my eyes. I, I wish, I wish you could fix them as easily as you fixed the picture."
The pony gently reached out, and ligtly patted Derpy on the head. "There there, Im sorry I made you cry after you were so nice to come out all this way as well. I wish there was something else I could do to help you cheer up." Derpy sniffed and looked up hopefully, "Muffins are nice. Im always happy with a muffin." The pony blinks, and shook his head slightly. "Im afraid, that today, I dont have any muffins here, but I like them as well, so Ill send a message back with you to Sugarcube Corner for a daily order, that you can pick up whenever you want. I do have some nice chocolate cookies here though." He reached into a saddlepack, and brought out a paper wrapped bundle, which opened to display said cookies. Derpy nodded rapidly, happily took up one of the delicious cookies, and started to nibble on it, before blinking rapidly, then turning round to search frantically through her own mail saddle pack. "I just rememered, you have a letter, and the Spa ponies asked if you could plumb them up tonight before the weekend rush?" She pulled out a letter and handed it to the pony, who blinked, and opened it up. "Thank you, I hope this is the letter. Ah yes. Its from the specialist spa suppliers in Manehatten, theyve got the part in that the Spa Ponies asked for. Because of your help here, it means I can finish the repairs in time to get there and back to keep the appointment for fitting and testing it. And all because you spotted the problem."
Derpy started to sniff again at mention of her sight, then snuffled as the pony hugged her gently. "Dont cry, you dont want the rest of your letters to get wet. Also, I want to tell you a story. So far its a sad story, but maybe one day it will be a happy story, so dont cry. Maybe your smile might be all thats needed, but dont worry if it takes more. Lots of things take effort." Derpy nodded, then sat down to wait for the story, nibbling happily on another proffered cookie.
"Are you sitting comfortably?" Derpy nodded eagerly. "Then, Ill begin," the pony said.
"Once upon a time, in a land far away, there was a happy pony. He loved going to school because the head mistress was very kind, and let him read all the books that the older ponies would read, and argue with them about what was in those books. Every so often, in class, he would ask a question that was wrong, but which would make the teacher think about a problem he was having. That teacher would talk with other teachers, and every so often a new discovery would be announced in the school, and the headmistress would be even happier. One day, a new filly was introduced to the class, standing at the front shyly. When asked her name, she tried to say it, but stuttered so badly that several students laughed, making her cry. The teacher sent them to the headmistress then told the rest of the class her name was Golden Aria. As she sat down, her cutie mark came into view, that of a golden nightingale. The pony was happy, for now he had someone to talk to, someone that would accept his help as he passed spare materials accross for class, and class notes. After a few days, he got used to waving goodbye to her after school, while she headed off further into the building to wait for her aunt. A few days after that, he was late leaving the school after waving to Aira, and was brought to a halt as the most beautiful song drifted through the hallways. From that day on, after school, the pony would find all sorts of excuses and methods to hold back, to listen for the dreaming music that lifted his heart and helped him feel better. In feeling better, he decided to try and help his good freind with her stutter, and so he started to search out various research books and laboratories in the school, sneaking behind guards, passing through locked doors, leaving everything as he had found it. Time went by, and he built his first device, like a large couch, inside a little used storage room. He started to fall asleep in class, his grades falling, but always had a smile and small gift for Aria. Always, always, there was the golden song after school. Time passed, and the end of the school year approached. The headmistress announced a variation this year, in that the theatre group would perform at the end of the last day. The pony heard this, and went to work even faster, making mistakes, almost getting caught. On the very last morning of school, he played Arias favourite board game with her, hugging her as she crushed his attempts, then asked her to wait in the playground while he want for his present to her. Back in the storage room, he picked up the device he had finally got to work, that looked like a saucepan with a hoof sized hole in the middle, added a barely glowing magical power unit, and carefully wrapped brightly coloured silk all over to hide the wires and nails and other sharp bits. Making his way back down to the playground, he didnt see the janitor that caught a glimpse of him, but who didnt see teh exact rom he had come from, so for the moment thought nothing really more of it, it being the last day. On reaching the playground, the pony ran over to Aria, and happily showed her his project, and the list of research papers and books he had used to make it, all dealing with temporary alterations in ponies, such as helping with stuttering. At first she was expectedly reluctant, but after showing how dim the magic was, and the diagrams that had been published, and after numbing his own mouth and recovering by the correct application of the device, she shyly agreed to at least try. The first time it was used, Aria tried to speak, and stuttered, but not as bad as normally. After careful talking, she agreed to try again. The second time it was used, Aria tried asking about what it was doing in more detail, but she still stuttered in places. The pony looked at Aria, and Aria looked back, they both looked at the empty magic power unit, then smiled shyly at each other. One last time, the pony placed the device against Arias head, and pressed the button. Nothing happened. The pony sadly took the device back, and removed the magic unit, placing both in his saddlebag. Aria hugged him tight, saying how sorry she was that it hadnt worked. They both stood still for a long moment as they both realised, then started dancing and jumping round hooves in hooves, Aria speaking slowly at first, then faster and faster as her confidence grew, talking at last about her hopes, her freinds, family, school, class. All that afternoon, and well into the evening, Aria chatted, giggled, laughed, and sang classrom childrens songs with the pony until she saw the long line of expensive carriages arriving for the theatre. Even then, heading back into the school, she continued chatting exitedly with him as they made their way round the back of the stage, where the pony picked up a brand new fully charged magic power unit from one of the spare lights in store. Another couple of enjoyable hours went by as the various students threw themselves into the show, is several cases quite literally with acrobatics. Aria suddenly gasped, then looked embarrased, excusing herself as she had seen her aunt, and had to go freshen up before meeting with her at the end of show soire, a rich ponies get together. The pony nodded, and juggled his newly charged up device around as it was feeling somwhat warmer pressing up up against him, then wandered off to the function rooms round the side of the hall to see if there was any food worth eating. Carefully, he edged his way round busy waiters and serving ponies, trying to stay round the edges, until he bumped into the pony handling the sound and music equipment, who was getting very worried about the microphone at the headmistresses table not working. Sneaking from table to table behind all the well dressed nobility, the pony quickly made his way to the headmistresses table, waiting until she stepped around the far side before slipping underneath the table. As the headmistress reached the front of the table, and turned to the collected nobility, the pony reached up, eased the microphone under the table, and worked rapidly on it until it finally lit up and he was able to slide it back into place. The headmistress began speaking, her voice ringing out clearly around the hall, welcoming everypony to the theatre, hoping they were finding the buffet satisfactory, and to take note of the very special offering saved until last. A wonderful, amazing, beautiful new voice, welcome Golden Aria. The resulting panicked gulp echoed through the respectfully quiet crowd. The subsequent extensive public inquiry, and judges summery came to a consensus of what seemed to happen in the next very few seconds. As the headmistress whirled round at the sound from immediately behind her, her wine glass moved round as well, held by her magic. Golden Aria opened her mouth to sing, but all that came forth was a weak croak, then silence. The pony in question scrambled out from under the table, and dropped to his knees with lowered head in front of the headmistress. This action placed the ponies face in collision with the rapidly moving wineglass, with such force that the wineglass was utterly destroyed. The impact caused shards of glass and drops of red liquid to fly towards the crowd, making the headmistress to automatically spread her wings wide to protect them, taking the results herself. As the pony fell to the ground from the impact, a bright light was seen to form beneath him. This light appears to have been the result of a failing fully charged magic power crystal combined with the device it was installed within being damaged, completely discharging almost instantly. The headmistress prevented further damage to the crowd by firstly already having her wings fully extended, sheilding them from the blinding flash, but also by automatically casting a powerful shield spell around the pony in question. This shield spell confined the effects of the unknown overloaded device. As the only pony left capable of defending herself, the headmistress is exonerated of all charges in this unique and baffling accident. Court calls, Not Guilty on all charges.
Derpy sat quietly, listening as only she could, as the sun settled to the far horizon through the long and convoluted tale. "What happened to Aria and the pony?" the pony paused, and looked sadly at Derpy. "The story doesnt say, Aria was left in silence as she watched her freind who had made her that way collapse in an accident that then blinded her for a while. The pony in the story was taken to the hospital, but after that nothing more is known. Maybe his mother collected him quietly and never let him return out of embarrasment." The pony glanced over to the sun on the horizon, and sighed. "Im very sorry for keeping you Derpy, I just wanted to given you another point of view, and instead Im getting you in trouble. I hope the ponies on the rest of your round forgive you. Oh, and Derpy? Can you please drop by the Spa, and tell Aloe and Lotus that I wont be able to make it for when I said I would, but Ill still have the work done for morning. Ill pay for you to have a slot in my place instead." He carefully moved round, stretching legs one after the other as Derpy collected her saddlebags, took off, hovered for a few moments with a question, then headed towards the setting sun.
The pony waved sadly as Derpy flew off to complete her deliveries, then sat quietly, watching while the sun sank fully below the horizon until not even the twilight gleaming was left, Derpys last question seared on his memories like words of molten lead.
"Did she ever forgive you?"
