The Night String: Frayed Knots
A bright yet unpromising Saturday morning tried and failed to cheer Lightning Dust as she trotted through Ponyville. She had come to see Rainbow Dash, who she had heard lived nearby, but when she arrived, she quickly learned that the chromatic pegasus was away for the week to take care of some business in Canterlot. Unfortunately, that meant that she had wasted a trip, since her rival wouldn't be back until she was long gone.
What was I even going to do? This was a dumb idea.
A loud grumbling from her stomach ceased any further pondering on the subject. Searching for somewhere to eat she noticed a sign that read: "BEST HAY FRIES THIS SIDE OF APPALOOSA" outside one particular diner.
Well, might as well get lunch while I'm here.
She strolled into the restaurant and took a seat at the counter. Thankfully a waiter was already standing behind the counter ready to take her order. "A daffodil sandwich and a large order of your famous fries." The pink unicorn smiled and nodded in understanding and walked back to the kitchen.
The pegasus mare had been just hoping to get a quick meal and leave but when a brown earth stallion in a trench coat swiveled around to her she knew she had probably lost that chance. For a moment, he seemed to be glooming at her but he quickly covered it with a large smile.
"Hi there. Haven't seen you around here before," he offered.
"Uh, yeah. I'm just visiting a friend, or something like that," Lightning replied, clearly still unsure of her purpose in the small country town. "Or I would have been, if she weren't out of town for the week."
"Something like that?"
"Yeah. I'm not sure if this is a visit or something..."
"Something less pleasant?"
"Heh. Maybe," the golden maned mare answered shamefully.
"Well, I suppose it's a good thing she isn't here. It gave you a chance to rethink things."
Lightning Dust chuckled. "Yeah, I guess you're right about that. Say, that's a funny accent you've got. What is that, Trottingham?"
"Yes. Well, no. Well, sort of."
"Sort of?"
"It is and isn't. I would explain, but I don't think you have that much time."
"It's not like I've got anywhere important to-"
A shrill scream pierced the air, interrupting the pegaus's reply. She turned, searching for the source of the noise and without another word she darted out the diner's entrance to find it. As she reached her destination, she quickly discovered the distressed cream earth pony who had screamed. She was being comforted by a mint colored unicorn outside a building Lightning Dust could've sworn was made of gingerbread and various other candies, candies that generally shouldn't be able to catch fire like that.
"Did everypony make it out okay?" the daredevil asked as she landed.
"I think Pinkie and the Cakes are still inside!" the unicorn answered.
"How many is that?"
"Including the foals, five."
"Foals too? Damn it," she said under her breath, clicking her tongue in frustration before turning back to the unicorn mare. "Got it. You go call the fire department." With that said, she flew head first into the inferno.
If Lightning Dust had time to evaluate the obstacles and limber up, saving everypony inside would be a cinch, but the bakery's roof looked ready to collapse. So she didn't have time to plan ahead. She didn't have time to stretch. She didn't even have time to think. She only had time to act.
As she entered, she was immediately blinded by smoke. She couldn't see much from the entrance and the sweat from the heat was making it even harder as she pushed onward, past the front counter. Thankfully, that is where she found the first two ponies. An orange earth pony stallion was keeping a collapsing wooden beam from crushing a passed out pink mare with all the strength his back would give him.
Spotting their rescuer he shouted, "Pinkie Pie first!"
She quickly surveyed the situation.
There's no way I'll have time to come back and get him too if there's still three other ponies in here.
This in mind, Lightning flew to his side, turned her back on the column, then bucked both her back legs out as hard as she could. The resulting kick was just powerful enough to make the column fall safely away from both earth ponies.
"Where are the others?"
"Pound and Pumpkin are upstairs. I think Cup ran up to get them."
"Okay. You get her out of here. I'll take care of the rest."
The stallion nodded in understanding and turned around to pick up the unconscious mare as Lightning Dust flew to the staircase, expertly avoiding several pieces of falling debris. As she flew up the stairs, she discovered the third victim, a blue mare with a pink mane, lying at the top, her leg pinned by a chunk of ceiling. Quickly removing the debris, Lightning Dust picked up her charge in her forelegs and flew back down the stairs. Just as she was about to reach the exit, her cargo began to struggle.
"Wait! Pound and Pumpkin!" the mare coughed. "They're still upstairs."
"I know. Don't worry. They're next," Lightning replied, setting her down next to the exit. The baker seemed hesitant until Lightning shouted, "Go! I'm not gonna rescue two foals just to let them become orphans!" and flew back up the stairs.
The relative ease with which the pegasus had rescued the other ponies swiftly became clear when she reached the top of the stairs and was immediately struck on her right wing by a flaming piece of ceiling. In addition, the smoke was much thicker and the fire had already consumed twice as much here as it had below.
Keep going, L.D. Walk it off. It didn't hurt. Not really.
Forced to finish the rescue on hoof, Lightning looked for signs of a baby ponies' room but the inferno had already claimed any decorations that might give any clues. Wiping the sweat from her brow, Lightning Dust advanced down the hallway, realizing she hadn't the faintest clue where the two foals were. Just as she was sure she had signed a check she couldn't cash, there came a noise. It was the same noise which had irritated her to no end at hundreds of restaurants but now it gave her reason to jump for joy.
Crying. Two crying foals. Heading towards the source, she found her way blocked by a closed door. Of course, she wasn't dumb enough to try the knob, instead opting to just kick it open. That obstacle cleared, she sprinted into the room only to discover it almost entirely engulfed by flames, and the crib where the foals sat was about to be consumed as well. Picking up the two baby ponies, she cradled one in each foreleg.
"I gotcha, kiddos. It'll be alright," she coughed.
As she turned towards the exit, a piece of debris fell across the door. She tried giving it a quick kick with one of her free legs but there was no way to move it without endangering her precious cargo.
Nuts.
Outside the burning bakery, a crowd of ponies waited on bated breath for the stranger who had put herself on the line for their friends, the Cakes. All but one watched in rapt attention. The exception sat a few steps away from the crowd, trying his hardest to find something, anything at all, to focus his attention on besides the very thing that he had come here to bare witness to. However, the sound of breaking glass forced him to put his attention back where it belonged.
When the brown earth pony finally turned his eyes back to the blaze, he saw Lightning Dust, stomach up, clutching the twins close as Cup Cake and Carrot Cake rushed to her side.
Picking up the foals, the earth mare wept with joy, "Oh, thank you! Thank you! Thank you!"
"Don't mention it," Lightning wheezed dismissively, not bothering to get up from the ground.
Carrot Cake let out a few tears of relief as well. "I don't think we could ever repay you. We don't even know who you are."
"Hey, it's okay. No big-" She let out a stomach-wrenching cough. "-deal," She finished, pulling her soot covered hoof away from her mouth.
"Oh sweet Celestia, no!" Cupcake gasped.
"Is anypony here a doctor?" Carrot shouted to the crowd.
The lone earth pony stallion somberly stepped forward. "I'm a doctor," he answered.
"Please! Help her!"
The brown pony approached the fallen pegasus and a flicker of recognition sparkled in her eyes as he knelt down beside her.
"Hey... It's you."
"Yeah. It's me," he said, half-heartedly waving a strange metal device to and fro over her barrel.
"So, Doc, what's the prognosis?" She coughed again, this time expelling quite a bit more soot than before.
"Textbook smoke inhalation. If you hadn't flown four hooves off the floor the entire time you were in there, this wouldn't have happened."
Lightning Dust just smiled. "If I hadn't flown, five other ponies would be dead right now."
Holding one of her hooves in his, he gave a sad laugh. "Well, I guess you're right about that. You were brilliant, by the way."
"Thanks. Say handsome, how about you and me get hay fries sometime?"
"Don't you remember? We were just having hay fries. Well, we were about to."
"Huh, I guess so. Just as well, I think I'm about to go on a diet anyway."
The earth pony just nodded somberly in response.
"Could you-" The blue pegasus let out another cough, not bothering to cover her mouth this time. "Could you stay with me?"
"Absolutely."
Realizing that the Doctor had fallen behind, Trixie back tracked to discover him gazing up at a statue of a pegasus outside Sugarcube Corner. Judging from the pegasus' uniform, she was a Wonderbolt, but Trixie didn't recognize her.
"Trixie doesn't recall any Wonderbolts who look like this. Does she get inducted sometime in the future?"
Returning to the present, the Doctor replied, "Um, no. She actually got kicked out of the academy, but when Rainbow Dash commissioned the statue, she thought that it would be best to capture her in one of her happier moments."
Trixie stepped up to the statue and read the plaque aloud, "In honor of Lightning Dust, who succumbed to smoke inhalation shortly after rescuing the entire Cake family as well as Pinkamena Diane Pie from a raging fire. It should be noted that she knowingly flew through the blaze, despite the risk to her own life, in order to guarantee the safe rescue of everypony inside."
"I was there, but there was nothing I could do." The Doctor let out a sarcastic chuckle before he continued. "It's stupid isn't it? All it would've taken me was a wave of my Sonic to save her, but I wasn't allowed."
"Wasn't allowed? Doctor, Trixie doesn't-"
"Time travel allows you to change history at will, but the one rule is you can't change fixed points in time. This was one of them. And the fixed part wasn't even that she saved those ponies. It was that she had to die that day in that exact spot and that I had to be there to witness it."
The unicorn sorceress raised her hoof in horror. "She had to die and you had to watch? But that's so... so cruel. I, I can't-"
"I have yet to see the laws of time be gentle to anypony, Trixie." the Doctor replied, almost angrily.
The time traveler turned to leave, but was stopped by a hoof on his shoulder. Looking up at Trixie, he was barely able to register the tears in her eyes before she grabbed hold of his neck and hugged him close. In front of Sugarcube Corner, in the quiet of night, a blue unicorn and the last of the Time Lords, wept together until dawn, mourning the loss of one otherwise insignificant pegasus.
Author's Note
Alright, first things first. Apologies.
I'm really sorry about the long gap between chapters of the real story and I realize that this semi-chapter can't make up for that. I've been busy lately, starting a new job and dealing with personal issues. I don't want to make any promises about when the next real chapter will be published because as I was writing it, I realized I hated it, so I had to start over. Also accounting for the lack of chapters is the fact that I'm writing a good number of other things that have no relation to MLP, so there's that. Sorry again.
Now, as for the mini-story you just read, I really hope that it didn't come off as cliche. If it did, tell me so, I'll need the feedback for later. Thanks in advance!
