Beauty of an Illusion

[Derpy]

        Warmth covered my entire body. I yawned and opened my eyes and looked around me.  Rarity was upside and sprawled out in a very un-ladylike fashion. On the contrary, Spitfire was curled up in a small ball of yellow and orange.

        I chuckled lightly at seeing them sleeping in positions very unlike their personalities. I shifted my body until I was able to grab hold of the blanket on top of us and pulled it off.

        I folded it up as much as I could manage and stuck it inside my mail bag.

        I lifted my rump off of the ground and straightened my back until my body was in a diagonal position. My wings unfurrowed to their full length. Small audible pops travel down my spine as I stretched.

I furled my wings again and relaxed all of my muscles until I was parallel to the ground and then pushed myself to stand onto my hooves. I could feel exhaustion in all my limbs and pangs of dehydration touching my lips. My knees felt weak just standing.

I feel… uuugghh. I’ve done nothing useful for anypony at all so far.

Spitfire is leading us home, Rarity has the craftsponyship and magic to do things much better and faster than I ever could. All I’ve done is follow them and use up our supplies.

Even now I am holding the two of them back with my injured wing. A chain is only as strong as its weakest link. I am that link and I am about to snap under this guilty weight.

        I sighed and I prodded Rarity with a hoof.

        “Wake up Rarity, you too Spitfire. I think we should get going now.”

        “Uuuh- I need water.” Rarity moaned.

        Spitfire uncurled herself and stood up.

        “You know what to do then, Rarity.” Spitfire commented dryly.

        Rarity got up and started combing her coat with a hoof to wipe off what remained of the sand in her coat.

        “I rather not, sleeping in the sand alone was a dreadful experience, I don’t want to add anything worse to it.”

        I trotted up to Spitfire and sat on my haunches. “I’m ready to go when you two are.”

        Spitfire stretched her wings and turned to me and Rarity. “As ready as I’ll ever be.”

        Rarity seemed to have a little less luck as she was still hopelessly trying to remove every grain of sand from her fur.

        Spitfire walked over to her and laid a hoof on her shoulder. “Give up already, we are going to be treading through this desert all day anyways. Would you rather spend the morning sitting here, slowly losing more and more water because of your fruitless efforts to stay ‘clean’, or would you rather get up, follow me and look for a stream or pond of some sort that we can drink from?”

        Rarity looked up at Spitfire, “Bu-ut-t… it’s so uncleanly!”

        “Just give it up Rarity,” Spitfire stated in response.

        Rarity sighed in response and waved a hoof. “Alright, let us head off. I doubt I could get this sand out without a proper brush anyways.

        As the sun slowly rose higher into the sky, we trekked further across endless dunes of blasting sand. I don’t feel any better from earlier.

        My mouth has never been as parched in my life. I started to contemplate taking up Spitfire’s suggestion, but felt instantly repulsed just imagining it.

        The deserts dunes started to flatten after a few hours of walking. Instead of treading up and down countless dunes, the desert laid flat from horizon to horizon, completely bare of any life.

        The three of us were slowly trotting forward. I lost hope that we would make it home hours ago. The sun had reached its peak around that time and started its descent to the horizon.

        I lifted my head up and slowly took in a panoramic view of the desert. No signs of life, just endless sand and the occasional rock.

        Sighing, I let my head hang down and kept pace with Rarity and Spitfire.

If only I could be doing something useful.

“Eeep!”

My face suddenly found itself buried in purple hair. I stepped back and pull myself out from Rarity’s tail.

Rarity was staring off into the distance.

I scrunched up my face. “What did you stop for Rarity?”

Spitfire turned around to look at Rarity.

Instead of a verbal response, Rarity took off running in a complete different direction than we had been traveling for the past two days.

Spitfire flew after her. “Rarity, what are you doing?”

I stared after the two until I realised I should probably catch up before I lose them. Rarity does not look like she will be stopping anytime soon. I picked up a brisk pace and followed the two.

I was starting to catch up and closing the distance between the three of us when I heard Rarity yelling.

“Wait! Don’t leave! You have to help us!”

I continued running after them as I thought about what Rarity just said.

There’s another pony here, who is she chasing?

I stared past Rarity to try and see whoever she was chasing, but had no luck. All I see is sand blowing around in the distance. I don’t see anything but sand ahead of us.

That and- Well, I’m not sure.

The heat of the desert distorted my view, but far out there seems to be some blocky shapes sitting by each other.

I quickened my pace and passed Rarity. Spitfire seemed too pre-occupied with Rarity to see what we were both seeing. Even though it does not look like a pony, it looks like something besides sand.

As the three of us closed the distance, the blocky shapes grew until I could make out that each block was a building. Spitfire finally noticed that Rarity was running towards the shapes and flew ahead of us to investigate.

Buildings mean ponies and ponies mean help.

The town was a sight for sore eyes. That is until I realized nopony was actually in the town.

We were close enough to see large cracks and sections of each building falling apart. A few windows were shattered and one building had a giant hole gaping out the side of it. The hole looked as if a pony had slammed into the wall and collapsed a large section of it. Trash of various sorts, namely bottles, sat on the ground between buildings.

The entire  town was a mess and nopony was there to explain why.

Rarity and I slowed to a crawl as we moved in-between the desolated buildings.

“Hello? Is anypony here?” I called out, hopeful that somepony was still in the town.

Spitfire circled around the various buildings in the town and returned to us. She came to a halt and panted, “Empty, nopony has been here for a while. However, I did see some items scattered inside. Let’s split up and search each building for supplies. Yell if you find anything.”

She took off to a nearby building and landed outside the door. The door creaked as she opened it slowly and walked inside. Taking a similar route, Rarity walked into a building with a small wooden sign with the image of a bag.

I looked around the town until I saw a building with a sign that depicts a bottle.

Oooh! I think this is a bar, it must have drinks then!

I trotted up to the doorway and pushed open a small chest-height door that led inside.

On the first table inside, a muffin sat. A chocolate muffin, completely untouched.

I stretched my wings out and prepared to fly to it. I lept towards the muffin and aimed my hooves to grab it. Instead of feeling a muffin in my hooves, I felt my injured wing give in to pain and it quickly snapped shut, resulting in my face slamming into the bottom of the table.

The table flipped from my weight off-balancing it and the muffin went flying and smacked into a wall, sending the delicious baking in every direction at once. Disappointed and hurt, I brought myself to my hooves and looked at the wall where the remains of the muffin slowly slid down the surface.

Rarity poked her head through the doorway. “Are you alright dear? I heard a loud thud.”

I turned back to her with a frown. “I’m fine, I just forgot I couldn’t fly.”

They would get mad at me if they knew I accidently destroyed that muffin… especially after not sharing. I can’t tell them! I have to clean this up before they see the mess!

Rarity continued to stare at me, unsure.

I gave her a nervous grin as my eyes slowly unfocused. “I’m fine! Trust me! I’ll let you know if I find anything!.”

She shrugged. “If you say so, call me over if you need anything.”

“Will do!”

Rarity slipped back through the doorway and I sighed in relief. I potted a napkin on the floor and picked it up. After wiping the muffin off of the wall, I threw the napkin in a corner of the room.

Now with the evidence gone, I searched the room. On one side there was an empty bar counter. Behind the counter there was a tap and several shelves stocked with various bottles, each bottle had a unique label.

The rest of the room was just tables and chairs.

I trotted past the bar counter and over to the shelves and I inspected each bottle.

As I checked each one, I moved them to the bar counter. Sadly none of the bottles had anything in them, so I walked over the the tap behind the counter and pressed down a small lever on top of it.

Out of the tap’s nozzle came a mostly-clear liquid. I quickly shoved a hoof under the nozzle and sipped some of it.

Water! Actual water!

I let go of the lever and ran towards the door.

“Rarity! Spitfire! I found water!”

Spitfire immediately flew out of a nearby building and nearly tackled me as she soared through the doorway.

“Where?! Where’s the water?”

I pointed a hoof over to the tap and exclaimed, “The tap! Press the lever and water comes out!”

I shook my hooves in the air for emphasis of how much of a miracle it was.

Spitfire activated the tap and started drinking greedily from it.

Rarity ran through the door and shoved Spitfire away so she could drink from it.

The two of them pushed each other back and forth, trying to be the first to drink. I felt the parchness of my mouth and waited for the two to finish so I could relinquish the feeling of dehydration.

It’s the most I can do for being useless. Let them have the first of any supplies we find, I’ll wait until they are finished.

Eventually, Rarity surrendered and let Spitfire drink first. She sat besides the engorging mare and let out a huff while she waiting for Spitfire to finish.

After Spitfire finished, she prepared to continue searching.

“I’ll continue checking each building, now that we have water, we should be looking for food.”

She trotted through the doorway and flew away once she was out the doorway.

        Rarity was spending a long time drinking. I twiddled my hooves while waiting for her to finish practically getting off to the water. She was laying under the tap on her back and she held the lever down with a hoof while the stream flowed into her mouth. Her face was contorted into an odd face of pleasure.

        On one hoof I was mentally laughing at the sight, on the other I was kind of creeped out at the display. I turned around and tapped my hoof, pretending not to notice Rarity. I heard the tapping of hooves behind me and turned around to find Rarity with a nervous smile on her face.

        “Sorry you saw that, it was very unlike me. I was just very thirsty.”

        I whistled and watched as my vision doubled, “I’m not sure what you are talking about Rarity, I saw nothing- Yes nothing at all.”

Nothing. Like what I’ve done so far. I… I have to apologize.

        She was about to trot around me, but I held out a hoof and stopped her.

        “Rarity… can I talk to you for a moment?”

        She stopped and smiled at me. “Sure, what is it dear?”

        I rubbed the back of my head with a hoof. “Well, it’s just- jus-”

        I sighed and choked out, “I’ve be-been nothing b-but a …”

        I stopped and looked down and squeezed my eyes shut and I felt a tear trail down my face.

        Rarity looked worried. She sat down on her haunches and used a hoof to lift my head up.

        “Nothing but a what, Derpy?”

        I slowly opened my watery eyes and forced my voice to stabilize.

“I’m sorry Rarity. I caused this to happen and I’ve been nothing but a burden to you and Spitfire. I’m sorry!”

        Rarity stepped closer to me and put her hooves around me and gave me a firm hug.

        “It’s alright Derpy, it’s not your fault. It was just an accid-”

        I shoved my face into her shoulder and started bawling, “I’m sor-”

        My voice was quickly muffled as I shoved my muzzle between her neck and her shoulder as she pulled me in close and rubbed a hoof on my back.

        “Shhh… It’s alright, just let it out. It’s not your fault.”

        My chest heaved as my muffled cries escaped.

        “You’re not a burden Derpy. You were the one that had food for us to eat and you found water.”

        She pushed me back and forced me to look up at her.

        “Don’t dwell on this Derpy, you are worth every little bit. Now go drink as much water as you want. Now, I’m going to go and help Spitfire search the rest of town. Just stay and relax for the night.”

        Another tear hit the ground as I gave Rarity a nod along with a small smile of gratitude. She gave me another quick hug and left me to my devices.

        Breathing a sigh of relief, I trotted over to the tap and pushed down on the lever. I drank greedily from the tap until I felt rehydrated. I let go of the lever and sat back.

What can I do… I don’t want to not do anything. Even if Rarity did say I’ve done enough for the night.

Maybe I coul- No… That wouldn’t work.

Hmm. How about collecting some of this water.

I turned to the tap and thought to myself.

What could I use? My bag can’t hold water alone.

        I scanned the room to find something to use. I looked over the various chairs and tables and the various bottles that littered the floor.

Looks like there is nothing I ca- I facehoofed

The bottles, how can I be so stupid and forget about the bottles!

        I walked over to the pile of various bottles I had stacked on top the bar counter. I grabbed four of the largest ones and slide-on caps for each and placed the first one under the tap.

        I filled the first two easily, but while filling the third the water pressure slowly died down until the water was dripping only once every two seconds. I frowned at this and capped the mostly filled bottle. I placed the fourth bottle back on the counter. I put the first three into my mail bag and looked around the bar.

The bar was a mess. Both from whatever happened before we arrived and the empty bottles I stacked across the entire counter. I trotted up to one of the chairs and sat upright in it. I slumped forward and laid my head on top of the table in front of me.

I’ll just take a quick nap… Then I’ll tell them about the water and…

        My thoughts died down as I slipped into sleep.