And Goddes-be-damned, she had looked everywhere.

Everywhere there was a mare, she had looked. Everywhere there was a stallion also. The globe. All of Ponyville. Nopony. And so she had come to the horrifying conclusion that ‘soulmate’ was just a made up word—a word for true understanding that anypony could slip in or out of at their convenience. And many ponies wanted to—but nopony wanted to stay.

And Vinyl ached for them to stay.

They must be at home, Vinyl reasoned, at home herself, where she did here reasoning. So the reason I can’t find them is that they’re hiding from me.

How do you bring someone out from hiding, dear?~ Eris asked, as always the musical lilt in her voice and the snakey lisp at the end if you felt like it, ~~~, <3 too. Eris loved threes, but refused to explain why. “Go read Terry Pratchett,” she’d say, “except he doesn’t exist in your universe. So stop asking.” And Vinyl had.

Vinyl had no answer to that question.

“You can’t, can you?”

Eris nodded in Vinyl’s head.

That’s right. If you have a million true soul-mates, if not one of them wants to be with you, then you’re the loneliest soul in all of Equestria. And we’re sorry but that’s true. We know. We made up ‘lonely’. Sort of.

Well, Vinyl thot, at least everypony in the world is my friend.

That’s true, Eris said. We did that also. Sort of.

Why do you say ‘we’, Vinyl asked.

Old royal thing, Eris said, rolling her eyes. I’m done with it if you are?

Deal, Vinyl thot, and the ‘we’ vanished forever. Wheee!

So how do I find true love, Vinyl asked.

You go out and give true love. Make your very self into true love, and everyone you meet will truly love you. Does that make sense.

Yes, but in a way that makes me sort of upset, Vinyl thot.

I know what you mean, Eris said, sighing. Imagine having to talk in italics all the time. Right? Another sigh—tho any sigh from the form of the female Oroborus had become sexy to Vinyl long ago, and sometimes she and Eris even ‘did the nasty’ on nights when nopony else was available. But that was sex. And what was true love?

Go find true love, Vinyl Scratch. You’ll know it when you see it.

But I’ve been looking, Scratch said, her inner voice at peak frustration. As it often was when people accused her of not trying.

Eris shook her head inside Vinyl’s mind.

We’re sorry hun, we didn’t mean that.

What we mean is… you have to treat life like a game.

What do you mean, Vinyl asked.

You have to treat every encounter like a random encounter—like anything could happen.

But anything could happen, Vinyl thot.

Exactly! Including…?

True love? Scratch thot.

Exactly!

So the way to find true love is just to realize you can love anypony, and give everypony a chance?

Anyone and everyone a chance, Eris said. Griffons and Zebras and anyone else who can understand what something is and consent to it. Okay?

Vinyl nodded.

And the search for true love began.

It took one week and two days for Vinyl Scratch to stumble into Octavia Melody, in the middle of the town-square during the Saturday market, which made Vinyl drop her basket of oranges, and the fun hat she had taken to wearing, which was of her favorite Hoofbal team, the Las Pegasus Lightning Bolts.

“Oh,” Octavia said.

And that was it.

No sorry. No, “Oh, about your hat, let me…”

She didn’t even move to pick anything up. She looked down at Vinyl Scratch like she was a piece of gum waiting to be scraped off the grass.

And Vinyl fell in love.

Because she saw herself—in that moment where a broken pony had shoved her, not just bumped, but shoved her, and had not a shred of remorse in her—she saw her old self. She saw a killing machine that somehow managed to play music instead. Because everypony knew Octavia played music.

Was she a serial killer too?

“Oh, um, it’s fine, about the hat & oranges…”

Octavia stared, and said nothing for a moment. Then: “Fine. Yes. I agree.”

Vinyl stood up, brushing dirt off and collecting up her oranges. Octavia was still standing there.

“Will you let me repay you for your physical scuffle as a result of my carelessness?” Octavia asked, staring directly into Vinyl’s eyes, while at the same time proffering her a wad of Equestrian bits.

“What—no! You didn’t do anything wrong, it was just a bump—“

“We bumped into you deliberately. Your hips seemed inviting and we couldn’t help ourselves.” Octavia bit her lip. “This whole ‘free love’ thing is very hard for us, ever since things have changed, our mother would be rolling in her grave if she knew I—“

And Vinyl kissed her.

Because the hip-compliment had been sign enough.

And that was all a kiss was anyway—a compliment. A way to say “I like you so much I wanna make you feel good. And you know what feel’s good?”

This kiss felt good. It felt like sour-sugar candy. It felt like every flower blooming in the spring, the lips of a pony caught off guard, then given her all to this new sensation, Octavia sighing and leaning forward and Vinyl catching her and the whole world was this moment and this kiss and that was true love? And who knew anyway.

And the kiss ended eventually.

Vinyl was panting. Octavia was too, tho she tried harder to look composed. Several ponies were staring. One of them whispered a small ‘nice’ to himself, then walked on. The others followed quickly.

“That was… a kiss,” Octavia said. “You kissed us… me. You kissed me. Sorry. Old habits.”

“You have a habit of kissing random people you bump into in the town square?” Vinyl asked, sidling up so their hips were touching. Feeling the shiver of Octavia’s body immediately.

“Um, I… that, I mean, I don’t have a habit of… usually if I indulge myself on someone I… compensate, and you’ve…”

“You need to get rid of that habit now. A compliment is a compliment, not a debt. Capiché?”

“Ca… what?”

“Just say yes.”

“Yes.”

“Why did you say what I told you to?” Vinyl asked, even tho sadly, or perhaps otherwise, she knew the reason.

“Because you… told me to?” Octavia scratched the back of her head with her left foreleg, and scrunched up her left eye to match. The expression of ‘confusion’ in the dictionary, if you want.

“Right. Anyway. Are you…” Fuck, she’s practically already hypnotized, you need to… “Are you…” Fuck, inquiry…

Vinyl was struggling with every one of her instincts, telling her how to interact with normal ponies, which this new pony, Octavia, was definitely not. No wonder she was so good at music—that was her laser beam. Vinyl shivered. She felt a lot more like a prism these days than a single lens. All the colors. Not just black and white, burnt or unburnt. She sighed.

“I like you and would like to go on a date with you some time.”

Octavia shuddered, shivered, drew in close to herself.

“I don’t know. I’ve never, a date, we haven’t…”

The prom. His hooves. Gold, the speakers, you remember—

“No! No dates, please,” Octavia said. She realized herself, the hysteria, and then composed, as Vinyl watched, seemingly invisible. “I mean, we’re allergic. To dates. So perhaps we could just… um…”

“Hang out?” Vinyl Suggested, smirking.

Octavia smiled, and then noticed Vinyl’s smirk, and something about it made her blush—was it sexy? Or was it just…

“Yes. Hang out. We could hang out.”

“That sounds good to me. How can I get in contact with you again.”

“Oh! I’ll give you my phone number at my apartment in Canterlot. Call me there, and if I’m home, I’ll answer.

Yes, Vinyl thot, that is how phones work. She smacked herself on the ass in reproach. But that turned her on… dammit!

“Right. I’ll definitely give you a call. I would love to talk to you again as soon as possible.”

“Then let me call you! What’s your number?”

And Vinyl’s jaw-dropped.

Because for once, somepony had surprised her.

Because hers was the phone that never rang.

No matter her friends, no matter her lovers—she always called them. Never the other way around.

And here, someone wanted to call her.

She couldn’t stop the tears. Or the hug.

Octavia was taken aback. “Did I… I’m so sorry, did we… by call, we meant—“

“No one’s ever called me before!” Vinyl said, sobbing. “My phone never rings, and no one ever comes to visit, and I wish for once things were different… and you just made them different.” Vinyl steadied herself, and wiped the tears from her eyes. “You made… you made my day. My whole life. You made my whole life.”

Don’t get carried away, dear, Eris said.

Right, right, sorry, Vinyl thot. Moment. Another moment. Three moments. Breathe. Be. Breathe. Be.

“Sorry. I mean… yes. Here’s my number.” Vinyl pulled out a card, which she gave to anypony who wanted to call her. Her business card.

“’Vinyl Scratch; Pony-Party Professional’,” Octavia read (at some length. Did she need glasses?). “You’re a professional partier, are you, Miss Scratch?” High school. You remember that feeling too, don’t you?

Vinyl smiled.

“I like to think the party follows me.”

“Then consider me a part of your party,” Octavia said, and giggled.

Vinyl laughed hysterically.

“That’s brilliant! How did you do that?”

“The same way you did it—just playing with words. You like to do that too, don’t you?”

Oh.

“Um…”

Vinyl shook her head.

“No, not really. I mostly just play with… everything but words these days.”

“Well, let me teach you a trick. We’ll have a salad. Lettuce leaf immediately!”

Vinyl’s side immediately ached.

“Argh. Bad pun. I know how to do those…”

“Oh, hush. This then. Vinyl Scratch had a tiny scrap, but finally found her private path?”

Scratch’s head hurt. Rappers did that, the ponies that held microphones and spoke so quickly that even Vinyl could barely make out the words, and then there were references and wordplay and oh gosh what was she supposed to say back…

“Octavia… I’m… not… fakin’ ya?”

Octavia nodded, but it was obvious her heart fell

Because here is what she had thot:

“At last,

“Someone else who understands the world.

“Because I have lived the whole world.

“I have seen it’s every cruelty thru my mother to me.

“And I am a self-made mare.

“And here is one too.

“And I thot

“For the briefest moment

“The tiniest flicker of an instant

“That she was my true love

“Because she understood that words

“Just as music

“Just as art

“Just as any form of expression

“Are the true beauty of being alive.”

Octavia sighed.

“Anyway,” she said, “I’ll—“

“Vinyl Scratch… can finally dance…” That line. Do you like to dance?”

Octavia thot.

And she thot.

“No,” she said. “I’ve never tried it.”

“Would you like to?”

Octavia looked up to the clouds, wishing for a wisp of white or grey to hide behind. But she saw only color; only truth; only beauty, only what was and nothing more than could be there by her and anypony else. Octavia saw the sky, and she began to cry, because it was green, and she didn’t know why.

“Vinyl,” she said. “Why is the sky green like that?”

“I don’t know,” Vinyl said. “Don’t worry about it tho. Just enjoy the moment.”

And for the first time in her life, Octavia let go. She let go of every instrument she’d ever known and became herself, and that was true love, and beauty, and she knew it, and so did everypony in the world.

And Vinyl Scratch too.

“I think I might be falling for you,” Vinyl Scratch said, her eyes cloudy, but still managing a wink. “Would you care to dance?”

“But there’s no music,” Octavia said.

Vinyl smiled her brightest smile.

“I hear music.”

And she stood up.

And Octavia stood up.

And the two of them danced in the town square under the moonlight, where there was no pain and no hurt, and only the two of them tho any pony could look, because no pony could have what they had, which was that moment that would be with them forever, and if they were to part and have it haunt them it would be cruelty, but they knew that life was not cruel, it merely was, and everypony could know that if they wanted to—that life had no spite in it, simply to be, more than the sun rose or the moon did, and the darkness no more a spirit to slay you than the night that welcomed you to sleep.

And no matter how long you asked, you would never get to a better answer than that.

“Thank you, Vinyl Scratch,” Octavia Melody said. She was crying, but short of a sob, wiping her eyes on her foreleg.

“Thank you, Octavia. Can we be friends?”

Octavia nodded.

“I think I’d like that,” she said, sniffling, but with a soft smile—so soft that no words can touch it here.

“Me too,” Vinyl said.

And the sky was still green, for some reason or another.