Inkie Pie did not know about empathy, but she knew about pain. She never understood the difference between physical and mental pain, however, as for her there was no real distinction. Pain was absolute, simple, and omnipresent. She didn’t think about it, because she never needed to. She just felt it.

Quartz Pie was an honest mare that never stopped feeling guilty for Inkie’s illness, always thinking that somehow, her daughter’s hooves were her fault. She could not keep her baby inside of her long enough, and Inkie would always suffer because of that.

Inkie understood that. She always told her mother that it wasn’t true, that she didn’t need to think like that, but it never worked. Quartz kept seeing Inkie’s disability not as a failure, but as a punishment, both for her and for her daughter. And where Igneous stood tall, proud and respectful, she would kneel down to help Inkie as soon as she could.

Forced to work from dawn to dusk to keep the farm moving, she was the first one screaming when Inkie passed out, the first one telling her she had to give up, and the first one that would end up hurt when Inkie refused to listen to her. Quartz Pie treated her daughter with pity, love, and guilt, and she always tried to be the best mother she could be.

Knowing that her entire existence was a cause of suffering for her mother, Inkie always had to fight an inner conflict, that of her pride forcing her to live a full life and that of her mother’s love forcing her to be safe and quiet. She would always end up hurting herself, too selfish to let her own safety get in the way to prove the world how a fake pony like her could live, and the pain would always be greater the moment she saw her mother’s eyes.

When Inkie Pie came back from the store with the guitar, Quartz felt both relief and anger. Relief, as her child would not try to work at the farm anymore. Anger, because Inkie would end up hurt by the guitar anyway.

Inkie didn’t know how to play it, and nopony ever taught her. She just sat down and tried to play it.

A horrible sound came out of it, her hooves hurt, and she started bleeding. She kept on trying.

And Quartz looked and told her to stop.

And for the first time, Inkie listened to her mother.

She hung the guitar on her wall and stopped playing, but she didn’t go to the West Fields either. She had given up the farmer life the moment she got her instrument, but she couldn’t start a new one without her mother’s approval.

Somehow, it was different. Inkie knew from the very beginning that she could never break the granite, that she could never achieve anything in the same way her parents and her sisters could. The only reason why Inkie tried, the only reason why she kept on fighting that hopeless battle against herself, was pure determination, pure pride, pure pain. She had done that because there was nothing else she could do, and because she refused to think less of herself.

But the guitar was not the same. Inkie didn’t know how Igneous had known, but she knew he was right—that black guitar, that instrument of torture, was the key for her to live. It was a painful way, but it wasn’t hopeless, and it could easily be her only chance to ever achieve something. That guitar would mean changing her entire self, turning into something different. She couldn’t do that unless Quartz accepted it.

So for many months, the guitar hung upon the wall, and Inkie grew up just a little stronger, just a little healthier, just a little better than before. She would obey her mother and be careful. She would wear the boots. She would not hurt herself. She would do nothing.

Igneous didn’t say a word, and Quartz was left alone with her decision. Inkie Pie was finally listening to her, she was finally taking care of herself. For the first time in her life, she didn’t have to worry about her child, and the guilt disappeared, if only just a little.

Only then she realized that she had always seen Inkie’s rebellion as an attack, as an insult. Only then she realized that she had always believed, if only in a subconscious level, that her daughter was angry with her because she had given her a weak and delicate body, and used it to punish her.

And only then Inkie realized that maybe she had been doing exactly that.

So life was good, and life was safe, and for a long time Inkie gave up on her own life for the sake of her mother’s mind. She buried her pride and showed her love for Quartz. She would smile more often, talk more often, and she would never look at the guitar on the wall.

But Quartz did. Every night, before going to sleep, and every morning, before going to work the fields, she would go to Inkie’s room to remember that she was safe now, and then she would look at that black, heavy guitar. And she would think about what it meant.

It meant giving Inkie the opportunity to grow, to maybe become something greater than herself, or maybe suffer the most crushing defeat that she would ever experience. It meant giving up everything she had been clinging to and realizing that Inkie was more than a simple disability, more than her daughter. It would mean recognizing Inkie’s existence, and seeing that her motherly love was not enough.

And she didn’t know if she could do that.

Until she did.

One morning, she finally saw it. Inkie had to live her own life, and that guitar meant just that: a chance to be herself. It meant pain, it meant learning something completely new from scratch, it meant risking her health every single moment that she played it, but that was exactly what Inkie wanted. And maybe, just maybe, that’s what Inkie needed, too.

She didn’t eat breakfast that morning, and neither did Igneous. She walked to her daughter and looked at her straight into the eyes.

“You’re healthier than ever before,” Quartz said with that soft voice of hers. “But, still… your hooves…”

Inkie said nothing, but looked at her own legs. Her hooves, covered by those boots she hated, were stronger, but still too weak. Playing the guitar wouldn’t be impossible, but would surely be a challenge.

“Just be careful, okay?” Quartz said, hugging her daughter and resting her head upon her shoulder. “Be careful. I’ll always love you.”

And Inkie nodded, and they told each other everything they needed to know, everything they needed to say. Inkie took off the boots and burned them in the fireplace, and she never wore them again. And that same morning, she said goodbye to Blinkie and to Igneous, she took all the money she had and then some more her mother gave her, hung the guitar on her back and walked away. Her hooves, which hadn’t touched the ground in years, started to bleed sooner than expected.

Neither Quartz nor Igneous worked that day. They just sat on the porch, looking at their daughter’s red hoofsteps until they couldn’t bear it anymore, and then they sat there a little more. Only Blinkie kept on, knowing that even then, the rocks had to be broken, sculpted, and moved. The sweat hid her tears.