Wanted: Minion. Applicants should be strong, loyal, pain tolerant, cold tolerant, unambitious. Must be capable of following simple instructions. Ideal applicant should be of low to average intelligence and mildly deformed, but exceptions will be made for extraordinary candidates, with extraordinariness to be determined by employer. Must be willing to begin work immediately.
Remuneration will be in the form of room, board, and insight into the true nature of the cosmos. Extremely generous bonuses up to and including subcontinents may be awarded if merited and if circumstances permit. Interviews for the position to be conducted at 108 Haybale Lane at 10:00 AM sharp on 4/7. Applicants are expected to be punctual.
—The Dark Lord Sassaflash
It was morning in Ponyville, and the shifting sounds of local life danced from squeak to whistle to clank to clatter in cheerful aimlessness. There was no rhythm to it, no beat, no planned and calculated goal; it was simply the sound of life being lived, drifting along in its artless, happy way and weaving itself into a medley of disharmonious harmonies.
At length, a new noise began to drift in amongst the other sounds. Distant hooves thudded out an awkward beat, faint but very distinct, and the carefree disorder of Ponyville reached out to take in this new rhythm and thread it into the town's music—but then something went wrong. The friendly clink of wind chimes, extending itself in the hopes of settling into a nice 7:2 beat with the newcomer, tripped over a hoofbeat that should have come half a second earlier and blundered headfirst into the yipping of a small dog. The hum of the marketplace faltered. That shouldn't have happened. It was a game trier, though, so it rallied itself and tried again.
A tap came where there should have been a thud.
For some strange reason, the rattle of wooden cart wheels no longer seemed to mesh quite so melodiously with the operatic bellowing of the salespony hawking his latest shipment of futons. The susurration of noise filling the Ponyille—
A hoofbeat planted itself firmly into the sound of the plaza fountain and sent it careening sideways, reeling drunkenly through a whole host of other noises.
—The susurration of sound—of noise—
Another set of taps and clacks, none falling exactly how or when they should. There was a tense, shivering moment as the music of the town clung to itself, and for a moment it seemed it might manage to hold together—but then the great town bell, which hadn't really been paying attention, boomed out the hour. Normally the interruption would have been easily endured, but now? Chaos.
Dogs barked, voices yammered, metal clanked, birds screeched, all clashing together as each struggled to harmonize with the dull, not-quite-rhythmic hoofbeats of the creature who had just plodded into the marketplace. His coat was gray and uneven, his knees knobbly, his snout hairless and pink, and his eyes rheumy. The newcomer trundled to a halt in the midst of the marketplace, one of his long, hairy ears drooping down for no apparent reason, and he executed a sort of shuffling half-turn to peer around at his surroundings. He sighed, shifted his old bones into motion again, and trudged over to two mares gossiping by a turnip stall. They didn’t notice his approach at first and continued chatting, and as he drew near he caught a fragment of their conversation.
“—Well you know, enough is enough. I’m a patient pony, I hope, but he’s just so mule-headed, that one. Why, I…”
The speaker, a well-groomed mare with a curling mane like a candied orange peel, trailed off as she noticed the gangling creature’s approach. Her eyes widened. The newcomer smiled—not with his mouth or with his eyes, but a private, secret little smile tucked deep away in his mind—and thought, No offense.
“No offense,” said Well-Groomed Pony.
“None taken,” said the Mule. He smiled. “Begging your pardon for the interruption, ladies, I’m sure, but do either o’ you'uns know how to get to Haybale Lane? Only I lost my map.”
The directions were a bit vague—Well-Groomed was evidently not very familiar with that part of town—but taken with what he remembered of the map, they were good enough for the old mule’s purposes. With a lop-eared nod of thanks he plodded off, scraggly tail swishing behind him. The two ponies watched him go. When she thought he was out of hearing range, Well-Groomed turned to her friend and continued, “So like I was saying, he’s completely mule-headed, and I’m just not going to put up with…”
No offense, thought the Mule, as he moved out of earshot and the rest of the mare’s diatribe sank into the raucous babble of the market. None taken.
-----
Two wrong turns and three shortcuts later, the winding, narrow backstreet that was Haybale Lane found itself graced by the appearance of the Mule. Nopony seemed to be about; this place, shaded a deep blue-grey by the clustered buildings leaning overhead and paved with worn, moss-lined cobbles, was clearly not one of Ponyville’s most hot and happening neighborhoods. As the ungainly gray creature made his way down the lane, peering up at the lines of laundry stretched across the jagged crack of blue sky overhead, he found himself feeling a strange sense of patriotic pride as a Ponyville resident. Not many towns of fifty years, he felt, could boast a neighborhood that looked like its last timber had been set in place five hundred years earlier. Fillydelphia couldn’t manage that, he reckoned. Nor New Trottingham. He wondered whether it had been done on purpose, or had just kind of happened.
The shabby creature rolled to a stop and squinted at a mossy wooden plaque to his left. 114? That wasn’t right. With a mild chuckle at his own absentmindedness, he twisted himself around and ambled back the way he had come, paying closer attention to the houses’ numbers this time. 112, 110…Ah, there it was. 108 Haybale Lane.
The old timberframe building before him was more than a little the worse for wear. Strange and unwholesome plants clustered in little pots on the cramped stoop, iron bars had been set in the window frames, and an unseasonal whorl of foul-smelling smoke wafted its way out of a crooked chimney in to the sky above. Red ochre had been rubbed into crude glyphs etched on the timber beams, and a faint, rhythmic thudding sound, like a dragon’s heartbeat, filtered up from somewhere beneath the house.
“Hmpf,” said the Mule, with all the solemnity of a white-maned judge pronouncing a carefully considered verdict.
He lowered himself to his haunches beside the door. It was fifteen or twenty minutes yet ‘til the bell rang ten, and for all he knew this “Sassaflash” character was particular about timing. Best not to go a-knocking just yet.
So he sat and waited, and waited and sat, and Haybale Lane stood silent around him.
It was, the Mule decided at length, a sad sort of silence. There was no mystery to it, or tension, or anything else to make it noteworthy; it was just forgotten, left unseen because everypony had decided that there was nothing worth seeing there. In some far-distant day, he supposed, ponies would abandon this town, and the Wild would take it back and wash away all the meaning that they had so painstakingly given to every cottage and byway—but when it came to this place, it would halt, baffled. There would be nothing for it to do here. This little back way was already meaningless.
Which was sad. Oughtn’t to be so. He wished that somepony would walk out of one of the brooding houses or come trotting down the street, to remind this place that it existed.
By and by, somepony did. The Mule, who had gotten a bit bored, had established to his satisfaction that there were seven dresses and fifteen socks hung up to dry on the clotheslines overhead and was just about to start counting ties and saddlebags when he heard the sound of approaching hooves, clicking against the cobbles of the alley. Peering down the length of the shadowed backstreet, he saw an off-white unicorn filly come in to view, her head down and her curling mane hanging over her eyes. As she trotted she muttered, and every so often she’d pause to give some inoffensive pebble in her path a vindictive kick. It was only when she’d drawn quite near and had veered away from the center of the lane towards No. 108 that, glancing up at the house, she had noticed him at all, sitting there quietly to the side of the stoop. With a surprised squeal, the little unicorn skittered to a halt.
Inclining his head amiably, the Mule said, “Howdy-do, miss. Sorry to startle you. I’m here for to answer an advertisement done by a pony living here.”
“Oh,” said the filly, eyeing him doubtfully. Then something seemed to occur to her, and she squeaked “Oh! Is that today? Ponyfeathers!”
Without saying another word, she scampered past him up the stairs to the stoop, lowered her head, and scraped out a hurried pattern on the door with her horn. There was a faint click and the door gave slightly, upon which the little unicorn cracked it open, slipped inside, and slammed it shut again. The Mule gazed after her for a bit, shrugged, and returned his attention to the Counting of the Laundry.
Four ties, it turned out, had been hung out to dry, but sadly the exact number of saddlebags was destined to remain a mystery. A moment after the Mule had decided that the fifth saddlebag (of an unknown total) was actually some kind of hat, his tally was interrupted by the distant ringing of the town bell, tolling out the turn of the hour. With a grunt and a creak the bony creature hauled himself to his hooves. One, Two, Three, Four, tolled the bell. He twitched his drooping left ear back upright—Five, Six—and arranged himself before the herb-cluttered front door, looking as employable as he could manage.
Seven, Eight, Nine, Ten.
Right on cue, the lock clicked, the heavy wooden door creaked inwards, and a pegasus mare poked her head out of the gap, her thin, teal face wrinkled into a peeved expression. She peered up and down the street, eyes narrowed, and then demanded, “Where are the others?”
The Mule’s eyebrows rose. “The others, miss?”
“Yes.” She twitched her ears in exasperation. “The others. The other applicants. I wish to know where they are.”
“Ain’t no others, miss. Just me.” He inclined his head. “I think the bits in your advertisement about just room and board and needing to be tolerant o’ pain might’a skeert 'em, miss.”
The mare digested this for a few moments, glowering at him as though she held him personally responsible for the lackluster response, and then muttered, “Right. Fine. You’d better come in, then. I’ll need to interview you, and there are other things. A questionnaire, waivers…” She waved her left hoof vaguely. “Don’t go near any of my books, and if you see a purple-black symbol burned into a bookshelf or chair or something, don’t touch it.” Leaning outside to cast another suspicious glance up and down the street, the mare muttered something under her breath in a language that did not quite sound like Common Equine and then slipped back inside the house, shutting the door in the mule’s face.
There were several moments of silence during which the Mule remained where he sat, a bemused expression on his face. At length the door swung open with a petulant little creak, and the pegasus peered out and snapped, “I said you’d better come in. You can operate a door, I suppose? That shiny thing is a latch. It turns.”
“Yes miss, only I—“
“Good.” Slam.
The sound echoed and died amongst the tall, leaning houses, losing itself in gray-blue shadows and malnourished sunbeams. Haybale Lane drifted back into placid silence.
“Well now,” mused the Mule. “I do believe she’s a loon.”
Raising a hoof, he scratched absently at one of his ears, while the lair (such as it was) of the Dark Lord Sassaflash loomed above him, waiting. He could turn away. Miss Carrot Top would be needing help with her harvest soon, and until then the grass around Ponyville wasn’t so tough to the tooth, and the bank under the West Ponyville bridge wasn’t so cold. Not so cold at all. He’d roughed it before.
With a whuffing chuckle, the Mule shook himself and trotted up the vine-strewn steps to the door. His life had been a mite dull lately, and a little looniness would do him good. Besides, he never had liked roughing it. The door drifted open under the gentle pressure of his hoof, and he ambled inside.
-----
Every autumn, the Mule begin saving up bits for his annual Hearth’s Warming visit to Canterlot to visit friends and family. He liked walking through the snowy streets at night, his neck wrapped in five or six scarves and a festive hat perched jauntily atop his head, and taking in the sights, sounds, and smells of the holiday season. Sometimes the locals got a mite uptight when they saw him strolling along through their fine city, his body all knobbles and his legs all bones, but that, he felt, was their concern and not his. The fact was, the Mule had never spent a moment of his life feeling out of place. His body might not always do exactly what he wanted it to, but it was tough enough in its ramshackle way and any spot where ponies lived—or where donkeys lived, or griffons, or cows or sheep or diamond dogs or dragons—was somewhere he could call home. So long as he wasn’t on fire or wasn’t drowning, he figured that wherever he was was exactly where he ought to be.
As the door of No. 108 Haybale Lane closed behind him, the Mule found himself reconsidering this position.
It was the light that first unsettled him. The windows of the claustrophobic room were barred and shuttered, and there were no candles burning anywhere. Instead, arranged in the center of the room on a stout little wooden table was a collection of odd glowing glass tubes, sprouting up from a mass of gears and servos and glowing with a bleached white light unlike anything the Mule had ever seen before. Despite its intense whiteness it somehow managed to be quite colorless, and the unsteady stacks of books rising around it cast long black shadows across the room.
In fact, it seemed that there was much more shadow than light, which possibly had something to do with the fact that there seemed to be far more books than room. There were books everywhere, books scattered on the floors, books lining the walls, books towering overhead in great unsteady stacks, books pinned to the walls like great alien moths or dangling from the ceiling. Books of every kind and shape, every color and smell, every texture and age. Familiar books, foreign books, books ripped to shreds and scattered loose-leaved around the entire room, and ancient books padlocked to their shelves and held shut by iron bars bolted straight through their yellowed pages.
It wasn’t a library, or even a storehouse. Libraries and storehouses were built with the expectation that ponies would visit them and use them, but this place offered no such concessions. It had been utterly given over to the books, scrolls, tomes, and scraps of paper filling its every corner, and although it might be willing to tolerate living things, the Mule felt that it clearly didn’t like them.
“I know I specified low intelligence as a desirable trait, but I had hoped that any applicants would have at least seen a book before. The sight appears to be a completely novel one to you.” The pegasus who had met him at the door popped out from beneath a suspended bookcase, hung by chains from the ceiling, and glared up at the mule. “Are you quite done gawking?”
He rolled the question over in his mind, considering it carefully from all angles, and came to a conclusion. “I ‘spose so. You got quite a fine lot 'o books here, if'n you don't mind me saying so.”
The mare frowned. “Your approval is appreciated. Follow me.”
She disappeared back under the bookcase like a snake down a burrow. The Mule hesitated a moment, and then knelt and squirmed in after her to emerge in a very slightly less bookish area. The odd pegasus glanced up at him behind the room's single surreal lamp, her hooves folded in front of her as she eyed him through a pair of gleaming half-moon spectacles. Sitting at her right hoof was the little unicorn filly the mule had seen earlier, a stern, official look on her tiny face.
The pegasus said nothing until the mule had risen to his hooves and brushed the dust out of his fur. Then, addressing a patch of air about a yard in front of her face, she said, “Acolyte Sweetie Belle! Present the applicant with writing materials!”
“Yes, Miss Sassaflash,” said Acolyte Sweetie Belle, her voice soaring up a few dozen registers halfway through the “Yes” and then cracking open like a frozen soap bubble at “-flash.” She bustled forward, planted herself directly in front of the mule, and squeaked, “Quill!”
A tatty quill that looked like it had been chewed at one time landed in front of him.
“Ink!”
An inkwell slid off the filly’s back and rattled to the floor, nearly spilling its contents in the process.
“Paper!”
A sheaf of paper—more, the mule hoped, than he would actually need—flopped down at his feet. Acolyte Sweetie Belle opened her mouth as if to announce a fourth item, paused, shut it again, and scuttled back to Sassaflash‘s side. The teal pegasus nodded. “Well done.”
Sweetie Belle beamed.
Turning an austere eye on the mule, Sassaflash continued, “As the first applicant—“
“I think he’s the only applicant, Miss Sassaflash,” interrupted Sweetie Belle.
The mare blinked several times and continued, her voice tinged with just the tiniest hint of ice. “Yes, thank you, Sweetie Belle. As the only applicant thus far, you have shown commendable promptitude and initiative. However!” She barked the word, and several particularly unstable stacks of books bumped and thudded to the floor as Sweetie Belle started back against them. “That will not be enough. In my employ, you will be expected to jump when I say jump, freeze when I say freeze, and run when I say run—or when being pursued by unholy relics of the distant past brought to horrific life, either/or, let’s just hope it doesn’t come to that.”
“I beg your pardon, Miss?”
Sassaflash raised an eyebrow. “Granted. Furthermore, your duties—should you be blessed with the honor of being my underling—will involve exposure to extreme cold and carrying heavy burdens for long periods of time under harsh conditions. A certain minimum level of durability will be expected. Do you consider yourself suited for this? Will you die of exposure, your numbed legs collapsing beneath your frigid body as wendigos howl overhead, or are you only likely to die in such a manner?”
The mule hesitated. “I ain’t sure I understand exactly what sort o’ job I’m bein’ called to do.”
A cold smile. “Exactly the sort of job? You aren’t expected to. Answer the question.”
“Well, I did spend a couple o’ years up North in griffon country, helpin’ them move stones up one o’ their mountains for a castle they was workin’ on. Pretty cold up there, and the work weren’t easy, neither.”
“Hm.” The pegasus peered over her spectacles at him. At length she smiled. “Well, perhaps you’ll do. Perhaps. The main questionnaire is yet to come, of course, and that will be the true deciding factor, but you aren’t completely unsuited, at least. Just one more thing.” She turned to the young unicorn at her shoulder and bent down to whisper into her ear. The filly’s eyes widened and she vanished off into the stacks of books, shoving and pushing her way through in a papery rustling commotion.
Several long moments passed. Sassaflash stared up at the ceiling, apparently fascinated by the joists. At length there came a few muffled clanks and thuds somewhere off in the forest of books, and Sweetie Belle burrowed her way out of a pile of thin librettos.
“All clear, Miss Sassaflash.”
“Excellent.” The mare turned her attention to the mule, coughed, and in a voice like a snake with bronchitis hissed, “Y'sll'ha c'chtenff.”
“Bless you,” said the mule, politely.
“Aklo nafl'ai? Mnahn'uh'e wgah'nshugg, mnahn'f'nyth, mnahn'grah'n. Lloighrii ya k'yarnakeeog. Kadishtu?”
The mule tilted his head, looking at the mare with a worried expression. “You feeling alright, Miss?”
“Naflkadishtu—mg'naflmnanh'.” she finished, and then continued in Common Equine, “Yes, fine. Your opinion, Sweetie Belle?”
The filly, who had been staring intently at the Mule the while, looked up at Sassaflash. “Well, he kinda twitched when you said Mannanannagranna—you know—but I think that was just because you accidentally spat on him a little. I don’t think he understood it. And, um, did you mean any of that?"
"Of course not." The mare smiled. “But I agree. Well then, mule,” she added, “I think it not impossible that you might be worthy to serve the Dark Lord Sassaflash. Kindly fill out the form provided for you, give it to my acolyte when you’re done—“ She motioned to Sweetie Belle, who raised a hoof and waved energetically, “—and I’ll get back to you shortly. Thank you for your time, Mr.—ah—?”
“I’m the Mule,” said the Mule.
Sassaflash blinked. “Your name, not your species.”
The bony creature smiled tolerantly. “You don’t understand, Miss. That is my name. Or if’n you want to be formal, I’m the Ponyville Mule. Begging your pardon, but do you got something in your eye? Only you done gone all squinty."
"Um. Thank you for your concern, but no. 'The Ponyville Mule?'"
“Yes indeed.” The Mule inclined his head. “Ain't but one mule here in Ponyville, and I'm him. It's the same for other cities, or leastwise the small ones. Ponyfolk don't fall in love with donkeys much, you know, or t’other way round, so mostly there ain’t enough o’ us for it to make much sense to bother with names.”
“I see,” said the teal pegasus, massaging her yellow-maned forehead. “And how many of you are there, exactly…?”
“Eightee—no, sorry, I’m a liar. Seventeen. The Dodge Junction Mule died this last summer. We all misses her; she was such a fine ‘ol molly. But then, we've all got to go sometime, don't we?"
“No. I mean yes. I mean...” The Dark Lord shook her head, and snapped, “Be that as it may, ‘Mule’ is hardly an acceptable form of address. Supposing that, improbable as it may be, you prove worthy to be my minion, I refuse to refer to you by your species. It’s—it’s gauche.”
“Okay.” The Mule shrugged. “Howsabout Mister Mule?”
Sweetie Belle tried to suppress a giggle and failed spectacularly. Sassaflash started to respond, stopped, and then shrugged hopelessly. “Very well. ‘Mister Mule’ it is. At any rate, complete that questionnaire, Mister, ah, Mule, sign the attached waivers, and return the completed forms to my acolyte. We should have finished looking through the other applications in three to five days, by which time—“
“But Miss Sassaflash, nopony else applied for the—“
“Acolytes should be seen and not heard, Sweetie Belle. As I was saying, the applications should be processed in three to five days, by which time you will be hearing back from us. Good day, Mister Mule.”
He nodded. “Good day, Miss Sassaflash.”
“Yes. Well.” The pegasus gestured for her acolyte to come close, hissed “Don’t let him touch anything,” and disappeared off into the jungle of books. A moment later the Mule heard the clump of hoofsteps ascending overhead, which he supposed was the Dark Lord retreating to some more hospitable and less bookish region of the house. With a vague smile, he turned his attention to the first page of the questionnaire, filled in “The Ponyville Mule” and “I can’t rightly say” for the “Name” and “Birthdate” fields, decided that the other bits about previous employers and suchlike were dull and could be filled in later, and moved on to the first question: “1. How do you feel about deicide?”
The Mule nibbled pensively on the quill. Yup. Definitely a loon. He was glad he hadn’t decided to wait it out ‘til Miss Carrot Top’s crop was ready for the harvest; this was going to be much more interesting. He dipped the nib of his quill into the inkwell, and began writing.
Don't know if it was intentional for the way he talks or accidental, but you put "here for to answer".
"seen" is on its own line. Unsure if it was intentional.
You have all the words but "Equunomicon!" italicized in the story. I am unsure if that was intentional, since I am assuming it is possibly the equivalent of the Necronomicon, or accidental and figured I would point it out.
Same as above with "Al-Hisan!".
You have multiple spaces here.
I believe there would be a comma after "smile".
I think you meant "previous employers".
Feel free to delete this.
YES!! FINALLY! I was ecstatic when you said this would be posted soon. And it has lived up to what I expected from you (so far...). That moon needs to hurry up and get filled. I can't wait for more. I have no other words to say. The awesomeness has frazzled my thought. I bid you adieu.
You have my attention. I can't say I've ever read Lovecraft, but have at least one friend who tells me they're good. And I never thought about what it must be like for mules in equestria. I've always felt that their existence in our world was an ugly example of mankind tampering with superior natural processes, but I suppose the fact that the creation of such a creature, and by extention even the romantic relationship between ponies and donkeys, would be sort of taboo. I appreciate an author willing to dive into such controversial topics as race and make a point with them. Reality Check was doing a 'Hearths Warming History/Why all the Chrystal ponies are Earth' thing in his story Nyx's Family. Anyhow, please continue.
...
Hold on a moment, I just noticed the Sweetie Belle tag.
Deicide... god killing? If I'm reading that right, then this will likely be quite exciting.
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Ooh, many thanks. I was half-asleep when I was finishing this up, so it's only inevitable that a few errors should have slipped through the cracks. I fixed the last two issues and the "seen" formatting problem, but the rest are actually all intentional; "here for to answer" is due to Mr. Mule's dialect, and the unitalicized words are due to the fact that they, athough associated with the Mythos, are still pony words rather than alien phrases, and don't require three tongues and chromatophores to be properly pronounced. The two spaces between "Yes." and "Well." are basically a formatting choice on my part; I prefer to separate sentences (or in this case, sentence fragments) with two spaces rather than one.
Anyway, thanks for mentioning those points, and thanks all for your kindly comments!
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I actually figured most of that is what it was, just figured I would point it out for if it wasn't. And I figured those double-spaces were probably formatting choices, but it seemed as though they were the only parts that had them (maybe because they were fragments so they stood out to my eyes. Meh.). (Ruirik use to use double-spacing. It can be a BITCH to edit. Plus, I didn't know the rules for it (I use single) for certain things.)
But yeah, glad to be able to help a bit and can't wait for more.
Yes. This is awesome and I will require more of it.
I'm enjoying it so far, and all of the racial notes you've put in seem to be coming through just fine.
All in all, I'm very much looking forward to more.
Well, so far so good. Effective use of humor, good characterization. And it's not like the inhabitants of Ponyville haven't been racist in the past (Zecorah comes to mind, but for that matter just using 'everypony' around Spike should probably count). Lovecraft's racism always amused me, since many times the poor savages turned out to have a better grasp of the universe than the educated white protagonists. Maybe that was supposed to be another point of horror, I don't know. It did end up leaving me forming inverted opinions of which group was actually superior in his universe. Well, inverted compared to what I suppose his to be.
If I have any complaints it's that I would have called Sweetie Belle off-white (or one of the not-really-colors in that end of the spectrum) instead of pale-grey so I didn't realize it was her at first and pictured someone darker.
EDIT: No, wait, complaint number two: The job advertisement being answered should be reprinted in the story itself and not just in the summary. Several reasons for this include that it's really best to have everything you want your audience to see present in the work itself and also that anyone who archives this using the site's 'save chapter' features won't get it as things stand.
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Ooh, many thanks, ForSpite. Both are excellent suggestions, and the story'll be adjusted accordingly forthwith.
The things some ponies will do to get their cutie mark.
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Cutie Mark Crusaders Necromancers YAAAAAY!
Ah, when you realize why the common folk has no knowledge of the sea ponies.
Tekeli-li! Tekeli-li!
The first characterization of Sash was as Caramel's marefriend, so this fic will be the first to actually define Sash's role and characterization as a standalone character.
I hope it spreads out like (your) changeling-Bonbon and gigolo Cloud Kicker.
2335407
Sassaflash is nothing if not ambitious. And I'm glad that you brought up that particular line, actually. I rather shamelessly appropriated it from Ursula Venon's phenomenal webcomic Digger, which I can most heartily recommend to anyone who finds pirate queen shrews, pragmatic wombats, sentient statues of Ganesh, and vampiric squash to be appealing concepts.
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That actually does sound pretty interesting. I'll be sure to check it out later when I get the chance.
I almost skipped over this, but decided to read it after deciding I was bored enough. I'm now glad that I didn't miss out on this story, because it has piqued my interest.
A side question: How does one kill a god? I've always thought of it as "even if you kill them, they'll just regress back to an elemental state and eventually have their physical state restored after a certain amount of time." The only plausible way to "kill" a god would be to absorb its essence, and even then it would technically still exist. Granted, mortals are the ones granting the title of "god," so anything that seems to be obscenely powerful and displaying even a small god-characteristic is labeled accordingly, but may actually be incredibly weak in reality.
This is excellent as always, and I'm excited to see you writing again. I am curious as to why Sweetie Belle is the only Acolyte, and why her fellow Crusaders aren't. But I guess all shall be revealed!
2339629 There are such things as mortal Gods even in regular mythology: the Norse Gods, for instance. And I wonder if the "Deity" in question is the one that raises the sun...
No reference here to cutie marks: I wonder if Sweetie Belle already has a mythos-related cutie mark Mr. Mule failed to take notice of (which would explain why her friends aren't hanging out - the mention of a filly on a scooter at the start indicates they haven't just been, say, fed to Tsathoggua). Perhaps as a mule he doesn't find such things particularly important.
2346139
Aye, but can one truly kill a god?
Oh, this is pretty unique! I'm intrigued, and I'll be following along!
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This takes place a bit before Discord's return to Equestria, so Sweetie Belle is still very much markless; you're right in that it's the sort of thing that the Mule typically wouldn't pay attention to.
Oh, and another note for y'all; I've changed the cover image to something that is hopefully slightly less of an assault on the eyes, and I've also made some minor edits. Most of them are insignificant, just little bits of polish here and there, but I have made some significant changes to the Aklo/R'lyehian/Cthuvian spoken towards the end of the chapter--and Yes, it does actually mean something. Nothing terribly plot-relevant, but if any of you are keen on a puzzle, then googling "R'lyehian" might be a good first step towards getting a translation. Mind, considering the squishiness of the language, I can't guarantee that anything you extract from what I patched together will necessarily make much sense.
Oh, and one final note; with an acceptable cover image now in place, I've submitted this to EqD, so if it proves acceptable hopefully it'll show up there sooner or later.
2346177 For Pete's sake, I pointed out that there are killable gods in actual mythology. You are apparently using some sort of definition of "god" that you made up yourself, which is fine for you, but is irrelevant to the story unless it's author says "I fully agree with and endorse KingoftheMuffins views on gods". From the Merriam-Webster online: "a being or object believed to have more than natural attributes and powers and to require human worship; specifically : one controlling a particular aspect or part of reality"
Nothing there about unkillability.
Now, if we're speaking about Lovecraftian deities specifically, there is some evidence that they are may be impossible to ultimately get rid of: Cthulhu dies when the stars are wrong, but returns to life when they are right, and if Yog-Sothoth is indeed "coterminous with all time and space", it's hard to see how there could be a time and place it would be dead in. Of course, much is left often to interpretation...
For the purposes of this story, I'm going with the idea that it is indeed possible to kill at least some deities--just like, as B. Munro pointed out, the various mythological deities who were very emphatically killed, dead, ended, kaput, no more, not comin' back. Now, whether "killed" in this context means something like mortal death, or is more akin to a Cthulhuesque "dead but dreaming" state (whatever THAT means)...well, you'll just have to wait and see.
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Woah, dude... don't bring Pete into this. (yes, I know it's a colloquialism)
That first paragraph felt like a cannon hit me D: (perhaps I should have added a [teasing] tag after the previous comment) I suppose my original and very vague question is whether a "god" is actually a "god" from the start, or just a title bestowed from lesser races. You know what? I give up on trying to communicate what I'm thinking-- words have failed me (or have I failed them? Gah, I don't know...) and my mind is about to self-destruct.
( side note: I generally refer to Lovecraftian lore when I think "gods" though, so yeah. I should be more open to other ideas as well)
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We're back to square one now. Why u do thees 2 us? :C
This is the closest I could translate the R'lyehian
"I invite you to our brotherhood.
Do you not speak Aklo? Worthless [inhabitants] of Earth, their worthless servants, worthless insects. [something about her followers' minds and sharing answers] Understand?
You don’t understand... yet you’re not useless."
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Considering the agrammatical and fragmentary nature of Aklo/Cthuvian, that's actually a pretty durn good translation. You got the beginning and end exactly right, and the middle bit was supposed to convey something along the lines of the following:
"Worthless are the inhabitants of Earth (this, I had trouble with. It's ambiguous/misleading as it is, but 'Sash is actually talking about minor Great Old Ones, here; Things with a capital T that, despite their powers, are still parochial beings that don't approach Cthulhu/Tsathoggua levels of importance), worthless are their servants, worthless are the (not really translatable, but an intended sense of childishness combined with a lack of awareness of their place in the universe). Followers of (the way of) the mind (scholars, the curious, etc.) I will share answers with (this last emphatically, with the sense that it is ONLY those with inquisitive minds that will find answers)."
I should probably have joined "hrii" and "lloig" together into a compound word, to indicate that the two concepts were closely bound to one another; that'll be something I'll be trying to be more careful of in future. There WILL be more Aklo showing up in the story, and although it will never be critical to the plot itself (it really wouldn't be fair to my readers, I don't think), those who take the time to translate it may end up coming away with a slightly more complete understanding than the rest. In a perverse sort of way, though, I'm glad that it's still obscure enough that you weren't able to come away with a completely accurate interpretation of what she said. There should always be unclear, half-hinted things in any Cthulhu Mythos story, and I have to admit I like the idea of expressing such things using partially translatable dialog rather than just writing out a few fragmentary English sentences and baldly stating that they're hard to translate.
Now, speaking of being unfair to my readers...Yeesh. The Moon has continued in its accustomed course through the sky, and not only is there no new chapter describing the lives and times of Sweetie Belle, Mr. Mule, and Miss 'Sash (I love that nickname for her, Farrier Nails; would you object if I borrowed it for later chapters?), but Mendacity has not received its promised epilogue and spit-shining. The latter was delayed due mostly to the fact that the school year is wrapping up and assorted physics classes were making demanding, baby bird-esque noises (also, setting its arrival to the New Moon was a bad idea, largely because the New Moon is typically not visible in the late night sky, and thus isn't something that forces itself on my attention. You would think that I would have thought of this. You would be incorrect), while the former is due to the fact that I heard back from the kindly reviewers at EqD, and they had some very valid criticisms of the first chapter of this story that I'd like to fix. So, the current plan is to finish the polishings of this chapter and Mendacity, complete chapter two of this story, and then release them all at once in one grand suffocating avalanche of purple prose (Actually, pruning down the purple prose is something I've been focusing on with the editing, so hopefully it'll be only about a meter deep or so in most places and y'all will be able to easily keep your heads above the surface). I'm very sorry about the delay, but hopefully it won't be too long before we get this fool's errand on the road.
Somehow I managed to read and be fascinated by this but not leave a comment. Thankfully it was pointed out to me again so I can remedy that. This sounds incredibly appealing and I love the character of the mule. I do hope we'll see more of this? *hopeful*
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Thanks! You're in luck, as it happens; I've finally gotten my act together, and both the latest chapter for this story and the necessary edits to the final chapter of my previous story have been attended to, and I'll be posting both once I've completed the epilogue to said previous story (which is moving along pretty well). I won't give a date, because when I give a date I invariably end up unintentionally lying, but...soonish, shall we say. Expect more soonish.
2725897 *Squee* Sounds awesome to me!
This...this is interesting. I'm liking the writiing style; I'd almost dare to call it Pratchett-esque, and that's always a plus for me.
2747219Pratchetsque?...ok i must read this shite
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Ah, a fellow Pratchett fan?
Go on, good sir.
2748251 I am new to pratchet, just uo to the weird sister (seventh book i think)
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I certainly agree. The general barmyness with Sweetie and 'Sass reminds me of the Elucidated Brethren of the Ebon Night scenes in Guards! Guards!.
I cannot wait to see where you will go with this.
Enthralled is a good word.
I'm psyched to see Sweetie Belle in a new role, and based on what little you've presented so far, you've got her personality down.
I always thought racism would be a fun topic for ponyfics, but it should never be the sole issue, so I'm glad to see you're using it sparingly.
Not far enough in to make a judgement call, but I want to see the end no matter what, now.
1 dislike.
FIND THE TRAITOR!
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Soonish? Well that is heartening to hear. I just had to look this story up again because one of the lines popped into my head and got me excited about it all over, so it's good to know it's not dead yet.
Intrigued, but not quite enough yet to definately give a thumbs up or down. I think I'll wait for more before making a judgement on this piece.
I see what you did there.
YE USED THE SUSSURUS!
Hardly any of em do.....
picking this up now, after the Mendax epilogue. Yayy for more reads!.
If it's a train wreck, it'll certainly be the kind that everyone just has to go and see.
i.chzbgr.com/maxW500/4313850880/hA7E8CEBE/
That was amusing. Don't think I've ever read one involving that Mule from the Running Gag before let alone Sassaflash.
Alright, about time I got around to this.
Fun first chapter.
I knew, as soon as you had the harmony of the town's babble being intruded upon by someone, that it was going to have racial undertones, because a similar scene had been in a cartoon once, where a super-stereotypical negro is walking down a sidewalk, whistling a tune, and everything around him keeps cringing or faltering in their own rhythms.
Holy hell. 3 years till u finished this story. And I think I've been waiting for most of it. Looking like it will be fun if this opening chapter is any indication.
Hey author,
Someone linked this from /r/rational, where I browse sometimes. So I put it under "Read It Later". Then I got around to reading it. This is stupendously written. Insta-favorite for both obvious Lovecraftian lulz and lovely Original Flavor.
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That was definitely supposed to be part of the horror.