i know The End

by The Red Parade

One More Try

Rarity didn’t think it was raining.

It may have smelled like rain, it may have sounded like rain, and there may have been puddles on the ground and drops against the window, but Rarity was fairly certain it wasn’t real.

She looked down at the steaming cup in front of her thoughtfully. A cheery tune played over the speakers, lucid and distant and all the more indecipherable. The fog and water drops covered the window, masking the world beyond.

A cool breeze of air cut through the world, making her shiver slightly. She looked up to see the clouds patching up the sky, glowing in a warm orange in the setting evening sun. The buildings of Ponyville stood fragile, like they would have vanished if Rarity looked away.

“Is this what it’s about?” Twilight asked, her warm eyes cutting through the cafe haze. “You’re afraid of loss?”

Rarity sighed, dipping her head low. “As much as I hate to admit it… I think I am, darling.”

The silence was only broken by the creaking of the swingset.

“I don’t think that’s something to be ashamed of,” Sweetie Belle said as she rocked gently, her hind legs dangling over the side.

Rarity pursed her lips, sipping from her now cold drink. “Perhaps not… but I don’t suppose that makes this any easier.”

“And pushing away ponies because you don’t want to lose them is?” countered Twilight. She spread her wings and they seemed to glisten.

“I suppose it isn’t healthy,” Rarity admitted, sighing. “But if it makes the pain hurt less…”

Sweetie laughed. “Rarity, is that really any better? Do you really think it will hurt less down the line, when you’re lying on your deathbed and wishing you passed before; because at least then you would be among the ponies you loved?”

Rarity thought carefully on that. “I… I don’t know.”

Twilight blinked, and for a second the warmth was gone. But it returned quickly, reaching out and seizing Rarity’s heart.

And then Rarity’s world was ablaze. Shades of color burst through the sky, reminding her of a hundred started hobbies that silently passed, and of cancelling plans only to longue about bored, and of regret and love and a million other things.

Dreams like half-finished dresses flew about her about her head, mixed with vivid shades of baby blue and neon red.

Rarity looked down at the menu beneath her hooves. Instead of plastic pictures and fancy dish names, there was a single line:

The end is near.

She blinked, hearing the distant wails of air sirens beneath the pounding storm. And Rarity stood up, the chair scraping against the cafe floor. Twilight watched as she stepped away, following her with those pale warm eyes.

She trotted over, feeling the floor morph into dirt and gravel beneath her hooves.

Sweetie Belle watched her come, swinging back and forth slightly.

Rarity looked back at them both and sighed. “I think I understand.”

“The end is here,” Twilight said.

“The end is here,” Sweetie Belle said.

Rarity turned around and trotted down the streets, accompanied by the setting sun and the screaming sirens.

As she turned and maneuvered down the roads, shadows opening up and fading away, the sun began to glow brighter and brighter, until she was bathed in a wave of ultraviolet.

She smiled gently as she basked in its glow, letting her hooves carry her onwards automatically. She felt her lips crack and fade, and she felt her fur burn slightly as the sun seemed to draw closer.

The world seemed to hold its breath, like a symphony sitting at the ready. Waiting to let loose its first note.

And who better than Rarity to count them in?

She began humming the bars to some dreadful little song she had heard over the radio: a monstrous little mix of words with horrid implications. But it had a catchy intro that she couldn’t deny.

As she continued moving, the world echoed her humming, the streets shimmering and shifting in her wake. Houses became cheery farms and grim slaughterhouses. Open empty fields became shopping malls that went on forever, and throughout it all the low rumble of thunder filled the air.

There was a flash of lightning from above and Rarity laughed, feeling the raindrops hit her skin. They penetrated deep into her body, mixing with her blood and washing into her heart.

As she looked up there was a bright, iridescent rainbow that shattered the sky into a million pieces. It ripped and tore through the air, fracturing it into tiny shards. It reminded her of something from a long time ago, when the skies opened up and she learned her destiny.

The memories floated around her like ghosts, haunting her soul like a haunted house.

At the very edge of Ponyville, there was a giant wooden sign that had been planted on the hill. It normally welcomed visitors to Ponyville, encouraging them to stop and stay for a while.

But now, it held a very different set of words: The End is Near.

“I suppose it is,” Rarity thought. She looked down at her hooves, where the grass stopped and the earth fell away into nothing.

She turned around to gaze at her home again, only to find that there was nothing there.

Rarity was left alone, with ghosts and shadows and that massive wooden sign. With nothing in front and nothing behind her, and time dripping away faster than she could catch it.

“The end is here,” she heard Twilight say.

“The end is here,” she heard Sweetie Belle say.

“The end is here,” Rarity heard herself say.

“The end is

---

“I know the end.”

Rarity looked around, at the other patrons sipping at the coffees and teas, and chattering happily amongst themselves.

“The end is screaming into an endless void, but without a voice to scream with. The end is falling off a cliff and believing that you are falling, though you have no way of possibly knowing.”

She stirred her tea, watching as the liquid swished around in circles with a sad, knowing smile.

“The end is always coming. Perhaps not of the story, but of something smaller. A page, or a chapter. There is no way of knowing, only knowing that it will come.”

The seat across from her was empty, of course. It always was nowadays.

Rarity reached into her bag and set some bits on the table. She stood up and left her tea unfinished, heading out into the pouring rain.

---

“I know the end.”

Rarity shifted back and forth, the swingset creaking as she moved back and forth.

Groups of foals dotted the playground in front of her, chasing each other and laughing under the watchful eyes of their parents.

“The end is walking down the road, ready to face the sun and all of its wrath. It is being alone, because your friends are hiding in basements and shelters, but being excited nonetheless.”

She looked up at the sky as a group of pegasi assembled the upcoming storm. A part of her was happy she had left the house today, even if it was just to sit on the swings.

“The end is setting your heart on fire to the sickening scent of perfume as it fills the air like gas. I know the end.”

Rarity sighed wistfully, not exactly sad but miles from euphoric. She chewed her lip in thought, trying to make shapes out of the clouds.

But she had lost that ability a long time ago.

Rarity looked up at the sky and wondered if it would rain.

Comments

[AFanaticRabbit]

You keep making me feel things. This sent shivers down my spine and really rang true with me in a few places and was just wonderful. Wonderfully vague, too, not that that's a bad thing. Existential crises ahoy!

Figured I should also point out a typo so you can fix it.

Rarity blinekd, recognizing something familiar in those words. “What?”

[The Red Parade]

10655626

blinekd 128 is my favorite band

ty will fix

[Super Trampoline]

That’s cool cover art!

[The Red Parade]

10655752

It is! So happy with what Mushroom came up with and unbelievably impressed that they were able to put this together just from a bunch of my rambling and stock photos of rainy locations. They definitely deserve major credit for it!

[Silent Whisper]

It was gorgeously chilling when I first read it, and it still fills my head with a distant melancholy when I re-read it. Your writing for this fic is ethereal and I know Seer shall love it!

[Jarvy Jared]

This will most likely sound weird, but I do mean it in a genuine and well-intentioned way.

It's hard to like these kinds of stories.

Oh, for sure, I enjoyed reading it, and Red, you have a knack for the short, and for the atmosphere, for sure. But these kinds of stories that teeter wonderfully on the edge of ambiguous direction and moment-setting, they themselves are hard to like. In a way they reflect their own emotions too easily or too strongly - it's hard to say which - and one gets the sense that something vague in its mystery both helps and hurts.

Of course, the "vague" story is going to have this kind of effect regardless of the many efforts of an author, because that genre is ridden with more questions than answers. I liken it to some of the weird stuff that someone like Jorge Luis Borges wrote - good stuff, but damned if I fully understood any of it. Then again, that may be because these kinds of stories do not position themselves as needing a concrete foundation, a plot that is solid, a direction that is straightforward. Much like poetry, they aim at a certain feeling, a certain evocation.

So, yes, I enjoyed this story, but I found it hard to like, but maybe that's how I'm supposed to feel anyway.

[Silent Whisper]

10655769
A counter- not-quite argument to your not-quite-critique: atmospheric writing isn't about the traditional narrative, and I'd argue that it's supposed to provoke thought more than just tell a story. It leaves you with more than a plotline, it's supposed to be read and re-read with the reader getting different things out of it each time... and that's not for everyone. I know that I'm not always in the mood for something with deeper meaning I have to sit down and muddle through in my head, and that's perfectly okay. I don't know if it's truly hard to like, since that implies it's something one doesn't like at all, but perhaps it can be hard to enjoy in the sense that it isn't everyone's cup of tea when they're trying to unwind.

I don't know. "Your writing is hard to like" would probably hit me kind of hard if I read that as a comment, and I think it's more nuanced than that. Red's writing style is fantastic no matter what sort of story he's telling, but sometimes a reader wants questions answered instead of having to wonder about it. That doesn't mean the writer shouldn't have written it, it just means it might not have been the sort of story the reader needed in the moment.

[Jarvy Jared]

10655781
I appreciate your point! I also enjoy a lot of Red's stuff, but I guess what I mean is that I'm often ambivalent about whether or not I "liked" a story in the traditional sense.

I can enjoy the writing for what it is and what it accomplishes, but as to whether or not the story is something that I liked, well, the distinction starts to emulate itself, and I can't quite find an answer for either side. Hence, "I enjoyed this story, even if I'm not sure how I felt about it, if I liked it or if I liked it." In that confusing sort of way that language and stories tend towards, I mean.

[The Red Parade]

10655854

10655781

Well honestly I'd say you're both right. This is the type of story that's inherently meant to be confusing and not exactly clear, as it first and foremost is a gift for someone who enjoys that kind of writing style. Obviously that makes it hard to parse out for people who may want to go deeper beyond the prose or who want some more concrete answers, which this story doesn't really provide.

So I think it's more than fair to say you didn't like the story or if you're unsure how to feel about it.

[Seer]

I have more thoughts about this story that I can, or maybe even should, try to organise into a cogent comment.
What I can say, beyond a shadow of a doubt, is that this is a marvellous and haunting piece that ranks among the best pieces of writing you've ever done, which really is saying a lot.
It's so elegant, it's so yearning. It's heart wrenching and affected me a lot more than most stories usually do.
I am very, very thankful to you all the prereaders and editors for this stunning piece of work, and very much too to mushroom for their amazing coverart which I can't stop staring at. You're all wonderful people and this story means more to me than I can really put into words.
Just know I really, genuinely love it. I love everything about it.
Thank you so much

[The Red Parade]

10655983

Glad you enjoyed it! Your writing is a super big inspiration!

Stay awesome :)

[SigmasonicX]

Covid story? Covid story.

Or at least that's how I interpreted it. There have been depression fics that I've read on FimFiction before that are sort of like this, but the entire thing about Rarity starting projects then leaving them abandoned, plus the rain outside, gives a real Covid feeling.

This was a very well done dream/imagination story, and you did a wonderful job writing evocative imagery. The bit about the rain mixing with Rarity's blood and going into her heart especially stands out.

[themoontonite]

im thinking about the songs that are referenced and ... honestly? i couldnt think of a single piece of writing that would do them more justice than this . its terrifying and beautiful and singularly human in a way thats haunting. i felt genuinely arrested, held in place by your writing until the story had concluded and even some time after that. the way you wrote these scenes, these confusing slurries thatre just as much daydreams as they are nightmares, is beyond compare. wonderful work as always

[Ice Star]

But she had lost that ability a long time ago.

Ouch ouch ouch what the fuck. This was the line that got me.

Take your green thumb already. Fucking hell.