Not too Late to Change

by UberKinetiX

Rating: teen
Tags: Sad, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, Rainbow Dash, Romance, Gilda, Tragedy, Slice of Life
Length: 1147

Gilda the griffon regrets her past actions with the citizens of Ponyville, but cannot think of any way to make it up to them or Rainbow Dash. Seeing no other solution, Gilda seeks a way out...

Gilda's heart is filled with unbridled emotions, doubt, self-hatred, and regret. She wishes she could have changed the way she acted at Pinkie Pie's party, and now she feels like there is no way for anyone to forgive what she's done. Now with seemingly no other choice, Gilda finds a solution in one of the worst ways possible...

Published 2014-04-03 05:20:01 UTC
Last updated 2014-05-02 04:42:44 UTC

The Plunge

Gilda the Griffon looked down at the rural, Earth Pony originating town of Ponyville from a cloud perched about fifteen hundred feet in the air. Her eyes were red, puffy and streaked with tears. With a long piece of rope hanging from her beak, she expertly tied the rope around both of her wings. A trick I learned in flight camp...with Dash She looked at the setting sun as it's orange hue cast a faint glow over the horizon. Sighing and looking back, Gilda had a flash of hope, a regret of doing what she was about to do. However, as quickly as it came it was gone. Taking a deep breath and closing her eyes, Gilda jumped off of the cloud, flying straight down. The force of gravity plus her downward motion sent her straight towards the ground at break neck speeds...

Falling...

Falling...

Falling...

1 hour ago, location: Rainbow Dash's house

Gilda landed on Rainbow's front lawn, her eyes shining with tears and looking down at a picture of her and Dash as fillies. Man those were the days...but then I had to go and screw it up.

In her other talon was an envelope, addressed to Rainbow. She opened the envelope and gingerly placed the memorable photo inside. Too conflicted to do anything else, she dropped the envelope on the "Welcome" mat at Rainbow's door. She knocked loud enough for the pony to hear if she was home, then bolted away from the cloud house as fast as she had ever flown before, not even noticing that one of her primary feathers had fallen from her wing and landed on Rainbow's front lawn.

Just waking up from an afternoon nap, Rainbow Dash groaned loudly as she gave her stiff body a stretch, sighing as she felt a few joints pop, and then opening the door. She raised an eyebrow when no one greeted her at the door, and she hovered lazily around the front part of her house in search of somepony. The first thing Dash noticed was the chestnut feather, and picked it up quickly. G-Gilda...? Now noticing the envelope as well, Rainbow opened it as was astonished to find the old Flight Camp photo, and a hastily written letter. Curious, she began to read:

Dear Rainbow Dash,

If your reading this, then that means my one attempt at an apology has failed and I can't think of any way you'll want to be friends with me again. I understand this now, I realized the mistakes I made, I just wished I had more time to tell you to your face. Any-who, after finally understanding what I did wrong, I've decided that the only way for me to make up for what I did, I have to stay out of your way forever...which means I'm going to kill myself and make sure I don't ever get in your way again. At around 6:00 o' clock pm I will fall fifteen hundred feet in the air and dive-bomb onto the streets. Please, I ask that you don't try and stop me... this is for the best.

Your best friend,

Gilda Grif-

Rainbow Dash had read the whole thing with wide eyes, and her eyes teared up as she noticed the blotchy ink spots on the parchment. Gilda had been crying...she cried for me, and now...NO! I MUST STOP HER!

She left her house as quickly as possible, her signature rainbow trail following her as she flew higher and higher, searching for the Griffon who was trying to end her life...

Suicide? C'mon Gilda...what could possibly cause you to think of doing such a thing!? T-that's not fair to me..or to any of us...I understand your upset but...I never got to tell you...h-how....how I..

So...as Gilda the Griffon looked down at the rural town of Ponyville from a cloud perched about fifteen hundred feet in the air. Her eyes were red, puffy and streaked with tears. With a long piece of rope hanging from her beak, she expertly tied the rope around both of her wings. A trick I learned in flight camp...with Dash She looked at the setting sun as it's orange hue cast a faint glow over the horizon. Sighing and looking back, Gilda had a flash of hope, a regret of doing what she was about to do. However, as quickly as it came it was gone. Taking a deep breath and closing her eyes, Gilda jumped off of the cloud, flying straight down. The force of gravity plus her downward motion sent her straight towards the ground...

Falling...

Falling...

Falling...

Gilda opened her eyes for a brief moment to watch the ground speed toward her, and she readied herself for the impact of the cold hard ground, However, within the span of less than 10 seconds, all she could see in her eyes was an explosion of color, and a familiar cyan coat, her whole weight shifted as she felt herself be carried...carried all the way to an also familiar cloud house...

Rainbow let out a sigh of relief as she landed in front of her house. Her biggest priority now taken care of, it was all about preparing for the confrontation that was sure to ensue soon. She gently set the griffon onto her front lawn and noticed that she was unconscious. Her body is probably in shock...

Taking initiative again, she brought out some blankets from her house and wrapped them around both herself and Gilda. She snuggled in next to her best friend, and watched Gilda's chest rise and fall in tandem with her breathing.

"You stupid griffon...your lucky I love you" she mumbled, nuzzling Gilda's cheek and snuggling in under Gilda's wing. Rainbow soon felt the plague of sleep drawing over her as her eyelids grew heavy. Before falling asleep, she put her most confident smile on her face as she realized that she seriously prevented the death of someone that was dear to her, and the fact that this person was her crush...

Hope

To be honest, when I saw some of the comments and saw words like "can't wait for more" or "hope you'll keep going". I was in a "WTF" stage. I had not realized that I forgot to put this story down as a complete one-shot. My plan was for this to be a one-shot story, and then follow up with a sequel that would be multiple chapters. I'm sorry that I mislead everyone and I just don't have the drive to "force" a second chapter into this. Again, i'm terribly sorry and i'm sure this won't help with me leaving a good first impression. I may still do the sequel at a late date but right now I don't have the drive to add to what was originally supposed to be done. My apologies...rookie mistake.