No More Magic
Chapter 1
I had just been woken up by a knock on my door after I had that same recurring nightmare again that I’ve been having for the past week. I found myself sitting at my kitchen table when I awoke. I must have only had two or three hours of sleep, considering how tired I was compared to when I usually wake up. As I looked up, I noticed that stupid tomato plant that I have yet to get rid of. It was nice and ripe, it was the perfect tomato and I hated it. Just like I hated myself for what I did to her.
I got myself up and went to the bathroom to get a shower before the funeral. Not that I wanted to go, but I had no choice. It was only right to pay my respects to her. After all, I was the reason she was being buried. After getting out of the shower, I heard another knock at the door, but as I didn’t want to see anypony, I just left it.
“Twilight darling, are you home?” A voice called from behind my front door. “Please answer, we are all worried about you.” it.
“I’M FINE! GO AWAY!” I shouted. “I need to get ready.” I lowered my voice some.
“We haven’t seen you since the accident.” Rarity said
“Well, you will see me at the funeral. NOW JUST GO AWAY!” And with that, I heard Rarity’s hoofsteps retreat from my doorsteps.
I heard footsteps coming from behind me, so I turned around to meet a disappointed Spike. “She was only trying to see if you are ok. You didn’t need to shout at her like that!” Spike exclaimed.
“Not now, Spike” I said, rather frustrated. “I don’t need this right now.”
“You have been like this since Rainbow’s-”
“I told you not to bring that up Spike” I interrupted before he could continue. “And get rid of that damn tomato, too.”
“Twilight, if you won’t talk to your friends about what happened, can you atleast talk to me?”
“I don’t need to talk to you, or to anypony. Now just leave me alone!”
A few moments later, I left the library with Spike, and we made our way to where the funeral was being held. Neither of us spoke the entire journey there. We just walked in silence.
As we entered Town Hall, we heard the saddening funeral piano tune that caused Pinkie to shudder. We walked toward the front of the room and sat on the bench to the right of the dark slate casket.
Pinkie cast me a smile from the other side of the room, but I just looked away as the minister walked up beside the casket. He asked for us to bow our heads in silence to remember the times we had with Rainbow ‘Jennifer’ Dash, and to think back on how we worked together to fix problems and saved Equestria on more than one occasion. What pains me the most is that out of all of the deadly villains we faced and defeated, I, her best friend was the one that did her in, the one that took her life.
I can’t think, because when I do, all I see is her lying there wrinkled and lifeless on my floor. I see that image every time I close my eyes, and I hate myself a little more each time.
Tears formed in my eyes and were running down my cheeks. I was so angry yet so sad at the same time. I wished it had been me who died that day and not Rainbow Dash. I loved her so much, if I hadn’t tried aging that stupid tomato plant, she would still be here! I miss her more than anything.
I saw Pinkie starting to cry over at the other side of the room, and I felt so guilty that I’d taken the life of her best friend. She had known Rainbow almost as long as Fluttershy had. I could see Fluttershy crying into Rarity’s mane and soaking it with salty tears.
As I looked at the ponies around me, and the pain and sadness on their faces, I knew that it was all my fault they were mourning, because I took away their friend; a hero, the pony I loved, and for that I will never forgive myself. I know my friends have already forgiven me, but I wish that they hadn’t because I don’t deserve them anymore. I wish they would just go away before I hurt them, too.
I just sat there in silence; staring at Dash’s casket and listening as each one of my friends trotted up to the podium and gave a brief speech about the deceased pegasus. I had no speech; the pony who was always prepared for any situation with note cards or a book had nothing at all, and that just made me feel worse as I sat there in my pit of guilt and self-hatred.
What only took an hour felt like days as the funeral finally came to a close and her casket was slowly lowered into the ground and buried. All of her closest friends walked up to the gravestone and said their goodbyes. We all went up and sat in front of the marble stone engraved with a lightning bolt. I could not help but read it over and over again as I continued to remain silent. I could not bring myself speak or even look my friends in the eye.
R.I.P
Rainbow ‘Jennifer’ Dash
Beloved friend, teammate and
artist
975-1001
Pinkie sat in silence trying to find her words, until she finally she thought of something: “Dashie, you were the best friend anypony could ever hope to have, I’ll miss you, always and forever.”
Rarity put a hoof on Pinkie’s shoulder for support. I couldn’t help but just stare at them in sorrow. Applejack scooted over beside me and gave me a sad smile, as if to say ‘it’s not your fault’, but I knew it was. I just looked down at the ground, another tear running down my cheek, and then another, and another. Before I knew it, I was sobbing and heaving again.
“It’s ok sugar cube. Let it all out.” she said while rubbing my back. I shuddered at the contact. “Ah know how you feel.”
After that I must have flipped inside or something, because the last thing I remember is shouting at her.
“NO, APPLEJACK, YOU DON’T! YOU HAVE NO IDEA HOW I FEEL! UNTIL YOU KILL ONE OF YOUR BEST FRIENDS, YOU WILL NEVER UNDERSTAND MY PAIN!”
I got up and started running. I heard them call after me. They wanted me to stop, but I just ignored them and ran. I ran to the only place I could think of: my library. I swung the door open and it made a loud thud as it hit the wall and closed itself with its own momentum from the impact. My library was a mess but like most things now, I didn’t care anymore. Books and papers were strewn across my floor, but I knew that Spike would clean it when he got back; he always does.
I went straight upstairs to my bedroom, jumped into bed, buried my head between the pillows and started sobbing again. For a long while my sobs echoed through my home, but eventually I cried myself out, and there was only silence in the library until I heard the front door to the library open.
I heard multiple hoofsteps come up the stairs, “Twilight, darling you in there?” A voice I knew to be Rarity’s called from the other side of the door. But I didn’t want to see or talk to them, so I ignored her, rolling over and adjusting my now damp pillow.
“Sugarcube, Ah’m sorry.” Applejack apologized. “Ah shouldn’t have said what I said. Please let us in,” She sighed.
Again I remained silent, hoping they would go away. There was no way I would say anything to her, even if I did overreact a little, she still had no right saying that.
“Twilight ah know you’re in there,” Applejack said again, this time more frustrated that I was ignoring her.
“I have nothing to say to you.” I said.
I got out of bed and walked over to my window. I stared out as Celestia’s sun was shining. I was tempted to go for a flight like I did with Rainbow a lot, but I just sat there, looking out my window up at the bright blue sky. The more I stared, the more it reminded me of Rainbow. ‘Why did she have to die? Why did I have to kill her?’ I thought to myself. More tears dropped from my face as I remained still. Before I knew it, I found myself crying again. I just could not forget what happened, no matter how hard I tried or wanted to.
“Umm, Twilight, can we please come in, if that's ok with you?” Fluttershy asked quietly.
“Please don’t” I pleaded failing to hide the depression and sadness in my voice.
I knew I should have locked my door, because like any concerned friend would do, they came in anyway. And as I turned to them, I could clearly see the look of worry on in their faces, and they could see the pain in mine.
“I told you not to come in,” I said a little angry that they came into my bedroom without my permission. “Please leave, all of you.” I pleaded again to no avail.
"No Twi we ain't goin’ nowhere. Now, Ah’m sorry for what ah said, and you can be mad at me all you want, but you gotta stop blaming yourself, girl." AJ said to me in an authoritative voice as they all got closer to me.
“Please Twilight, we know you are hurting. We all are. But you don’t have to hurt alone, we can get past this together.” Fluttershy said sadly, trying her best to assert herself.
“Fluttershy, I have already said to you and the girls that I have nothing to talk about.” I said through gritted teeth.
“Twi!” AJ raised her voice to get my attention. I turned my head to look at her, and the second we made eye contact, her hoof made contact with my cheek, and I heard the rest of the girls gasp.
Applejack had slapped me.
“Get a hold of yourself girl,” she said sternly as I rubbed my now sore cheek. “Quit tryin’ to block us out, we are only tryin’ to be there for you. Gosh, and here I thought I was the stubborn one.”
Applejack was caught off guard when I embraced her in a tight hug, buried my muzzle in her shoulder and wailed, but she quickly hugged me back.
“I’m so sorry girls, for the way I’ve been treating you lately. You too, Spike.” I did my best to sound apologetic through my tears. “Every time I close my eyes, all I see is the accident. Every time I manage to fall asleep, I have nightmares about that day. They are so vivid and they just won’t go away.” I cried even harder.
“I loved her and I never got to tell her. I killed the pony I loved,” I wailed again, soaking AJ’s shoulder with my salty tears. “I miss her so much!”
“You didn’t kill her sugarcube,” Applejack said, hugging me even tighter. It took a few seconds for me to realize it, but she was crying too, along with the rest of my friends. “We all miss her more than anything, but it was an accident. You have to believe that and stop blaming yourself.”
I felt another pair of hooves wrap around me, then another, and another, until all of my friends were hugging me. We all sat there in a big hug and cried together, mourning the death of our friend that I killed. I made the mistake of closing my eyes to enjoy my friends’ embrace, and when I did, those horrible memories flashed in my mind as vivid as the day they happened.
“Twi this should be easy for you,” Dash told me as I placed the tomato seedling on a small round table in my living room.
“It’s actually much more complicated than it sounds, Rainbow.” I explained to her. “If I age it too much, then it could die. And if I don’t age it enough, it won't be edible.”
“Details, Twi. Nopony cares, it’s gonna be awesome. You’re the best when it comes to magic” Dash said.
I felt a slight blush coming up from the compliment that Rainbow had just given me. I focused my magic on the plant. For a while, nothing happened as I continued to feed magic into the little dirt filled pot on my table, but after a few minutes a tiny vine started to sprout from the pot.
“Hey Twi It’s working!” Dash exclaimed, putting her hooves on the table which made me excited in return. “Put some more power in that sucker!”
I did as Rainbow instructed. I closed my eyes and focused even more of my magic into the spell, and the glow around the pot became more intense and the little vine started to grow quicker.
“It’s working Twi! Keep it up.” Dash continued to encourage me. But she went silent after several minutes, and then I heard her shriek in pain.
My eyes shot open and my spell ceased. I looked around to see what was wrong, and at first I saw the tiny pot which now had a perfectly ripe tomato in it. After that, I noticed the table that the pot was sitting on was now rotted and falling to pieces. The realization of what had happened dawned on me. I got up and leaped over the table and was horrified at what I saw next. I panicked and let out a shriek of my own.
“DASH!” I yelled as I quickly knelt down next to the fallen pegasus. “Please say something, anything!”
Just like the tomato and the table, I had aged Rainbow as well. The colors from her coat, mane and tail were almost completely faded to gray, she was incredibly skinny to the point where her bones were easily visible through her skin. I had to have aged her at least one hundred years.
“Rainbow I’m going to fix this, I swear.” I told her frantically as I tried to reverse the spell.
As I made contact with Dash’s pained eyes four things all happened at once.
My whole world came crashing down around me.
I realized I didn’t have enough magic left to reverse the spell in time.
Spike came running into to the room to investigate the noise.
Rainbow Dash took her last breath.
“Oh My Celestia!” Spike gasped when he saw Rainbow Dash. “What happened, Twilight?”
I turned to him with a look of pure sadness that he had never seen before with tears flooding down my face.
“I killed her.”
That’s what I’m forced to watch replay in my mind every time I sleep, or even close my eyes, but with all my friends holding me close, It hurt a little less this time and I didn’t want the warm embrace to end. We sat like that for quite some time. It felt good to just let out all my bottled up frustration.
I sobbed, screamed, and shouted to the heavens while my friends just held me tighter each time. By the time the sun had started to dip, my throat was hoarse and my tear ducts were empty; I had completely cried myself out. Even though it was only early evening, I was exhausted and I wanted to just crawl up in bed and sleep, and one by one my friends slowly let go of me and dispersed the hug, but I keep a tight grip on Applejack.
“Will you all stay with me tonight?” I asked a little shakily. “I don’t want to be alone.”
“Sure thing, sugar.” Applejack didn’t hesitate to answer.“Anything for a friend in need.”
I finally raised my head from Applejacks shoulder to look at the rest of the girls, who all nodded in response to my question. I gave them a small smile and sat up.
“Thanks girls” I thanked them. I motioned them downstairs and asked Spike to cook us something for dinner. He scurried down the stairs and got right to work. A short time later, we all sat around the table as Spike put six plates of pancakes on the table, and then sat down and ate.
A little while after that, we all went back upstairs, and I got two air mattresses out; one for Rarity and Pinkie, and another for Applejack and Fluttershy, and we all went to sleep. And for the first time since that fateful day, I slept peacefully and soundly.
It was a week ago today that all of Ponyville attended the funeral of my best friend. The funeral that I caused, the best friend whose life I cut short. I was so stupid to think it would work. All I wanted to do was perfect a spell to age a tomato plant, that was all. I decided to keep that tomato plant by my bedside so I will always remember what I did to her. I didn’t mean to kill her, Rainbow Dash, the pony I loved more than anything, but I will never get the chance to tell her now. Every time I look back to that day, I feel the same pain and guilt. Throughout this past week, my friends have been a big help to me as I try to put my life back together. I thought long and hard this past week, and I ultimately made the hardest decision of my life. My friends thought I was crazy when I told them as we all sat around my new living room table. I asked them here just so we could be together and to tell them this.
“Are you in your right mind Twilight?” Applejack said, not believing what I had just told them. “You can’t be serious.”
“Yes Applejack, I’m perfectly sane, thank you very much,” I gave as a rebuttal. “My decision is final.”
“Twilight darling, don't you think this is a little extreme?” Rarity asked, also not believing me. “This is your special talent we’re talking about here dear. Your element of harmony.”
“I am well aware of that Rarity,” I said, getting a little frustrated by their reactions. But could I expect this. I pretty much dropped a bombshell.
“This Is your special talent, Twilight.” Applejack spoke up again. “It saved us more times than Ah can count! You can’t just give it up!”
“I respect all of your opinions, I really do, but I have made up my mind,” I told them sternly. “To make sure I never make the same mistake again or hurt another pony the way I hurt the one who meant the most to me,”
“I, Twilight Sparkle will never use my magic again.”
Twilight groaned as she awoke from a long and terrible sleep. Her dreams - nightmares, really - made it almost impossible to get any form of proper, peaceful rest.
With the recent memories currently brewing about in her mind, this came as no small surprise at all to Twilight Sparkle as she half clambered, half fell out of bed and onto the unforgiving hardwood floor of her loft. She peered about to inspect the room through irritated eyes, and was greeted by the chaotic sight of messes and unruly clutter that only the absent mindedness of the grieving could produce.
Books were fallen from their shelves and scattered about. A tipped over chair lurked in one corner, a tear-stained quilt draped over it. Piles of used tissues lorded over what little surface there was that was not occupied by the repulsive miasma of unfinished meals, cluttered writing utensils, and half-written letters and other assorted documents.
Normally, such a state of domestic unrest would have driven the orderly alicorn borderline catatonic, but it was something else entirely that instead proved to be a cause for distress, that morning.
It was the seemingly innocent-looking planter of vegetables and fruit-bearing plants on the nearby windowsill, illuminated by rays of sunlight that shined through in golden beams. The very sight of the plants caused Twilight’s throat and chest to tighten into knots, and her bed-weary face fell into one of intense guilt and anguish. The cherries, green beans, blueberries, and tomatoes in particular, were unnaturally large - the product of a very recent experiment of Twilight’s into the underexplored field of unicorn magic-enhanced food cultivation.
And what a costly experiment it had been.
“Get out of my sight,” Twilight grumbled in a low, strained voice as she enveloped the plant box in a lavender-colored telekinetic field. The plants swayed about passively as they and their container were ushered out onto the balcony. She resisted the urge to simply chuck the cruel reminders of her research off the balcony all together.
Confident that the plants were now well out of her field of view, Twilight collected herself and finally set about preparing herself for the long, hard day ahead.
All the trivial morning activities like showering, brushing her teeth, wing preening, and grooming were made into daunting trials, for Twilight personally felt as if the skies and heavens themselves were collapsing down on her shoulders from above, as if in retribution for having lost one of their best and brightest. While the warm waters and soap ran through her coat, she pondered how science and magic could have carried such a hefty price tag, in the end.
Twilight had always known that her research and almost inequine-grasp on magical power were not without their risks, but how could even she have anticipated such a tragedy from so simplistic an experiment?
It was not supposed to turn out the way it did! Cast the spell, and the plants grow bigger. Cast the spell, and the plants grow faster. With a simple finalized spell, Equestria could triple, no, quadruple her already impressive agricultural output, not spontaneously grow rampaging, pony-eating...A knock on Twilight's bedroom door broke her out of her brooding thoughts as she finished grooming her mane - a half-hearted effort that left it barely neater than it had been when she’d first awoke.
“Twilight?” Spike’s voice called from the other side of the door. He sounded concerned. “Are you ready, yet? Everypony is waiting for you over at Town Hall before they begin the service.”
Twilight swallowed a lump in her throat and tried to compose her voice as she slowly made her way to the door. “I’m...I’m coming, Spike.” Tactfully, Spike did not recoil at the sight of Twilight’s semi-haggard appearance as she opened the door, but he did begin twiddling his talons nervously, nevertheless.
“Do you need anything, anything at all…?” Spike inquired.
“No, I’m fine, Spike, thank you. Let’s just go.” Twilight scooped him up without another word and put him on her back, and the two made their way outside.
For Spike, it only took a few minutes, but for Twilight, the walk in silence between the Golden Oak Library and the front entrance of Ponyville Town Hall was nearly tantamount to traversing across the whole of the kingdom itself, at a snail’s pace. The central town streets were almost entirely deserted of citizens in respectful observance of the funeral, and Ponyville was eerily quiet, as if the land itself was in mourning. The sun hung gracefully amongst a sky of fair clouds, a beautiful morning that belied the goings on in town, below.
Inside, the pegasus mare standing beside the memorial stone garbed in red gold sun vestments inclined her head solemnly to the pair from the stage, as Twilight and Spike entered and took their seats beside their friends. There were a few sympathetic murmurings among the other attendees of the service greeting Twilight’s presence, but all voices hushed as soon as the priestess began to deliver her carefully-composed requiem for the departed.
The pony in question was serenely floating one meter above the memorial marker, covered in a pegasi shroud composed of the whitest of bundled cirrus clouds, and interred in a thin veil of constrained storm clouds molded into the shape of an open casket.
Twilight half-grimaced, half-frowned as the funerary rendition of the Cloudsdale city anthem played in the backdrop of the pegasus’ sermon. Sensing her anguish, the girls and Spike turned to her on occasion to give her saddened smiles of reassurance, but Twilight could not bring herself to meet their gazes, in spite of herself. The music faded out, and it was now time for the friends of the deceased to give their eulogies, and say their final parting words. While Spike chose to remain seated, the five girls arose and proceeded towards the stage, with Twilight bringing up the rear.
The shroud was gently removed by the priestess to reveal the dead pegasus within. A single gold bit was placed on her forehead as a blessing of good fortune to the dead in the worlds beyond, and then the friends went one after the other. First Applejack, then Pinkie Pie, who burst into heavy choked sobs soon after, followed by an equally tearful Rarity, and finally, Fluttershy. As the most timid of the Elements of Harmony gave her speech - the longest yet of the group - with a stoic firmness almost uncharacteristic of her, Twilight finally mustered up the will to meet her friends’ eyes, but not enough to look upon the deceased.
Not yet.
She turned and read the inscription clearly etched into the granite stone.
Rainbow Dash
Dearest friend, teammate, and hero
Your Loyalty ennobled us all
May your steadfast bravery
Serve as a model for all Equestria
975-1001
Twilight’s violet eyes remained glued to that epitaph until they began to mist over, and her vision blurred. Fluttershy laid a gentle hoof on Twilight’s shoulder, signalling that it was now her turn. “Go on, Twilight. We’re here for you, just speak from the heart,” the pegasus encouraged with a soothing tone.
All eyes turned to look expectantly upon Twilight, but the young alicorn stood stiffly and hesitantly, as if petrified into a stone. Fluttershy’s words unfortunately seemed to have almost no effect. The very thought of turning to her side, to gaze upon Rainbow Dash’s limp form for the first time since that ill-fated experiment, caused Twilight’s heart to turn upside down in her chest. Her rational mind had taken flight for that moment, and a voice in her head shouted that even laying eyes on the fallen friend would strike herself dead in an instant.
One other volatile thought was repeatedly, and mercilessly, detonating itself inside her head with the force of a supernova. A repeating chorus of guilt, disbelief, and self-loathing: I am responsible for this! Rainbow Dash is dead because of me!
Twilight was so overcome by her grief, that she let loose an anguished cry and immediately bolted from the stage. She stormed out of the assembly hall without saying a word, fighting back tears and swerving around several stunned and incredulous ponies as she went.
The last thing Twilight heard was Applejack and Pinkie Pie hollering her name before she erupted out into the sunlight of the late morning. Whether they’d shouted her name out of anger or fear, she did not attempt to discern. Twilight’s strained eyes, pushed almost to their limits from crying, found the light extremely harsh as she paused in a moment of sheer disbelief at her own outburst.
Urgent hoofsteps were bounding towards Twilight across the cobblestones, and purple wings flared, their owner currently wishing to avoid any and all further contact with another pony in her current state of distress.
As Twilight hovered, ignoring the familiar voices pleading for her to come back down, a destination popped into her brain, one that in a more rational state of mind, would be considered highly illogical, given the circumstances. “Rainbow Dash…” she murmured.
Feeling as if she were coasting through some form of terrible dream she had yet to awaken from, Twilight made a beeline for Rainbow Dash’s former place of residence.
It wasn’t long before her friends caught up to her, their instincts having told them exactly where she would be hiding. She was in Rainbow Dash’s living room, surrounded by pictures of the former weather pegasus and Wonderbolts trainee, as well as memorabilia of her many accomplishments over the years.
The mare was downing cloud mugs of apple cider in between sobbing fits, the mugs that were empty of their cider now full of alicorn tears, instead. Twilight quickly stifled her sobbing with a fit of sniffling as soon as Fluttershy approached her, followed by the others, who were held aloft in the cloud house by Rarity’s magic.
“Twilight…” Fluttershy ventured, slightly put-off by Twilight’s strained attempts to contain her emotions.
“I...I need some more time to be alone, you guys.” Twilight declared with as staunch a voice as she could muster. Some of the words still quivered off the lip, nonetheless.
“Don’t ya think you’ve had plenty of that, already?” Applejack inquired, her eyes narrowed with concern. “It’s been several days, and the funeral is over with, for landsakes!”
Twilight was preparing a rebuttal, but Rarity quickly interjected. “Twilight, dear, it may be hard, but you have to get over your guilt! Grieving for a lost friend is one thing, but wallowing about in self-loathing and regret won’t get you, or any of us, that much closer to moving on from this.”
“What makes you think that we even can move on from this? That I can?” Twilight murmured, as she sipped more cider and stared distantly into a picture of Rainbow Dash that lay on the coffee table in front of her. “I can see the obvious: things will never be the same, again. Nothing but time travel could change that, and my magic has already caused enough damage, that to even think of attempting such a thing makes me sick…”
“...Which is why we need to get through this together, Twilight.” Fluttershy said, moving a bit closer to her beleaguered friend. “Um, regardless of what happened, you’re not alone in this, and you do not have to be! We’re all grieving.” The others followed suit, chorusing their agreement.
“Guys, go! Leave me alone, before my sorrow spreads to you too! I…” Twilight looked into each of the other mares’ faces as they refused to budge, each one as determined and stubborn-looking as the last, even Fluttershy’s. Something finally stirred in her mind, and she relented with a long, drawn out sigh. “You know something? You’re...you’re absolutely right.”
The others smiled lightly and shared a moment of relief.
“We should all get out of here,” Pinkie Pie remarked as she paused and surveyed the interior of the cloudominium with misty eyes, her high-pitched voice cracking on the word ‘here.’ “This place just has too much Dashie for me to handle, right now.”
Twilight offered no further argument, and the others firmly agreed. They decided to head to the Golden Oak Library; Twilight’s house had always been a common meeting point for all of them, countless times in the past.
As they all sat around a table discussing the matters at hoof while Spike attempted to bring order to the messes upstairs, there was one thing regarding Twilight that still remained largely unaddressed amongst the group, and it was something Fluttershy could sense festering inside the alicorn, spreading through her like an insidious, self-destructive plague.
Fluttershy caught Twilight’s attention with a short, simple sentence that stopped the others’ conversations in their tracks. “You still think you killed her, didn’t you?”
The pegasus’ face was unreadable for the moment as Twilight immediately locked eyes with her in surprise. The rest of the girls looked between the two with baited breath. Twilight’s own expression slowly darkened, and her voice came out barely clearer than a ragged croak.
“I know what I did, and so does Rainbow Dash. None of you were there at the time, so if you think you can convince me that I didn’t-”
Fluttershy snorted through her nostrils and slammed her hooves onto the table with enough force to send half its contents into the air. “No!”
The sheer force in her voice alone was enough to root Twilight to the spot as quills, cups, and assorted objects fell to the floor around them. But Fluttershy’s fierce stare went even further, for it completely stole whatever words Twilight could have retorted with right out of her mouth with its burning fire. “You are eating yourself alive with guilt! I swear by Celestia, that I’d tear out my own wings before we lose you, too! For our sakes if not your own, you must forgive yourself!”
In the aftermath of Fluttershy’s spontaneous wrath, barely a sound could be heard in the room, and the silence was nearly palpable. Pinkie Pie, Rarity, and Applejack all stared at Fluttershy with their mouths agape like open mailboxes, while Twilight stared at Fluttershy wide-eyed, biting her lower lip, which was quivering rapidly.
In almost the blink of an eye, Twilight closed the distance between them and wrapped Fluttershy into a bearhug, burying her face in the pegasus’ golden coat and bawling her eyes out.
Fluttershy could do little more than pat her friend gently on the back and cry as well, as Twilight nearly hyperventilated from the torrential waves of heavy sobbing that shook her to her very core. The others broke out into tears as well and joined in the embrace.
“Girls-I-I-am s-so-s-sorry!” Twilight sobbed, barely able to speak. “It’s j-just, every-everytime I-I sleep...I can’t-I can’t stop seeing h-her! It’s l-like the memory is...burned into-into my eyelids!”
Twilight’s hiccuping sobs gradually turned into a stream of quiet crying as the mare ceased attempting to speak. Her friends said nothing in response, instead simply letting their physical presence convey their mutual grief and understanding in a way that words could not. Eventually, Twilight shut her eyes, and nestled herself further into the comfort of her friends’ warm embrace.
In a final show of defiance, the lingering bastions of Twilight’s guilt summoned the memory of Rainbow Dash’s last minutes to the forefront of her mind, and the images of that event flashed before the alicorn’s mental eyes with an almost terrifying crescendo.
***
“So...giant fruit, eh?” Rainbow Dash asked Twilight with an undertone of curiosity as she fiddled about with a scientific treatise in her hoof she’d just finished reading. The duo were outside in an empty, partially fenced-off stretch of grass near the Golden Oak Library.
Twilight looked up from a large potted box full of edible plants of various species, smiling. “Uh-huh.” She snatched the scroll from Rainbow Dash and levitated it over to her to peruse its contents once more. “Not only that, but vegetables, legumes, all sorts of foodstuffs grown across Equestria could benefit from this spell, growing to larger, and hardier proportions.”
Rainbow Dash started hovering and went over beside Twilight to inspect the plants that were about to be tested with Twilight’s new spell. She scratched hair in thought. “Benefit? I’m no egghead like you, I mean obviously…” she paused to smirk as Twilight frowned at her in mild annoyance. “But even I know that Equestria already produces like what, a third of the world’s crops?”
“True, but think of how much money the kingdom could make exporting three, maybe even four times as much food as we do, now.” Twilight rubbed her forehooves together jokingly. “We’d be rich!”
“Well, when you put it that way…” Dash chuckled as she idly plucked a ripened tomato from its vine and began eating it, much to Twilight’s chagrin. She shrugged. “What? I haven’t had my lunch break, yet.”
“Those plants are there for the expressed purpose of scientific experimentation,” Twilight pointed out. “That particular specimen you’re eating is the Everfree Creeper Tomato, very fast growing, highly sought after by gardeners, and VERY hard to obtain!”
Rainbow Dash shrugged again. “Alright, alright. My bad. So just cast the spell already, then.”
“Okay, but if you’re going to hang around with me while I do my research from here on, please ask me before you touch something, okay? Experiments can be very delicate, and one single error could blow the resulting data way out of proportions, or ruin the whole thing entirely.”
As Twilight stepped away from the stand of plants and readied herself to cast the spell, closing her eyes in concentration, Rainbow Dash hovered beside her and finished the tomato, making mocking robot-like gestures and suppressing a snicker.
Twilight started reciting an incantation from the scroll, and her horn gradually began to ignite with its usual violet aura. The aura enveloped the plants nearby, and the spell’s effects began to manifest.
Blueberry plants miraculously sprouted new stems bearing more fruit. Heads of lettuce and cabbage almost doubled in size. Tomatoes grew as large as grapefruits, and their stems struggled to prevent them from falling to the ground from their sheer weight.
All in all, the spell seemed to largely be a success as Twilight opened her eyes. Given, not all the plants were growing consistently in respect to the fruit or vegetable they produced quite yet, but these results were still quite promising for only a first trial. The spell continued to run its course on the plants as Twilight turned to Rainbow, who was watching the process with a look of wonder.
Twilight was about to ask Rainbow Dash what she thought of the results, but before she could formulate a sentence, she noticed a change appear on the pegasus’ face. Dash’s wonder had given way to shock without warning, causing Twilight to immediately snap her attention back to the garden with a similar expression.
Somehow, without being noticed, a stray parasprite had blundered into the still active lavender-colored magical field close to one of the creeper tomato plants, and the reaction was instantaneous. The insect’s body fused with that of the plant’s before the ponies’ very eyes, producing a growing, biological monstrosity somewhat resembling a tatzlwurm in miniature, crossed with a venus flytrap.
“Holy…” Rainbow Dash shouted, reeling back from startling sight. “What in Tartarus did you do, Twilight?”
“I...uh….I…” Twilight was positively dumbfounded by this sudden turn of events. She too stepped away from the abomination, on instinct.
The mutated plant, almost fifteen feet tall now and still possessing the same red skin as a ripe tomato, peered down at them, emitting a hiss and revealing row after row of needle-sharp teeth, many of which were still in the process of sprouting up. The leaves of the former plant had now taken on the semblance of a parasprites’ wings, giving the profile of a winged serpent.
“Do you suppose it’s mad that I ate one of it’s buddies a moment ago?” Rainbow Dash asked, trying to hide her growing paranoia and unease. Before Twilight could even think of responding, the mutant seemed to answer the question instead, snapping its jaws towards the alicorn like a predatory cat pouncing on its prey.
“Twilight, look out!” Rainbow Dash crashed into Twilight, knocking her out of the way of mutant’s path, but also putting a new target within the territorial beast’s reach. Dash attempted to get out of dodge, but a powerful tongue seized her by the barrel, and was pulling her towards the beast’s gaping maw.
On the verge of panic, Twilight briefly considered her options as she watched her friend struggle out of the abomination’s grip. “Rainbow!”
“I...I think I might be able to cut myself out!” Rainbow Dash hollered, angered at the prospect of becoming a mutant insectoid plant’s first meal.
Through either sheer force, good timing, or a mix thereof, Rainbow Dash was able get a leg free and seize one of the beast’s vulnerable teeth, prying it out. She then proceeded to hack and bite at the tongue’s midsection in a bid for freedom, but with all the flailing about, several of the other dozens of teeth repeatedly knicked her and drew blood as the beast roared in fury. The abomination’s gullet could be described as nothing less than a tunnel of enamel daggers.
“That’s it, I’m putting this monster down!” Finally coming to a decision, Twilight fired a destruction spell in a last ditch effort to free Rainbow Dash, who was beginning to yelp from her wounds, and was still only halfway through to freeing herself.
Unsure of her aim and concerned only with timing the discharge just right, Twilight’s beam spell hit its mark at a fatal angle for both the beast and its captured opponent. She watched in horror as her beam of white-hot energy burned Rainbow Dash's back and punched through the back of the beast, ending in a narrow trajectory that incinerated right through one the highest points in the trunk of the Golden Oak Library tree, like light concentrated in a magnifying glass.
By now, the commotion had attracted the attention of many others, who quickly came over to investigate, including a rather dazed Spike, whose head spines had been lightly singed by the concentrated energy. When he noticed the chaotic scene, he froze. “Oh no…”
The world seemed to slow down as Rainbow Dash fell limply out of the beast’s jaws and onto the ground. The abomination itself continued to roar and writhe in agony for several more seconds before it finally fell dead.
Twilight rushed over to Rainbow Dash’s side after what felt like centuries, her horn still sizzling from the discharge of raw magical energy that only the likes of unicorn soldiers would be used to. Rainbow Dash turned weakly to stare up at Twilight, her eyes wild with shock, and her skyblue coat slowly turning crimson and scarlet.
Somehow, likely due to her mounting delirium, Rainbow was able to find humor in the travesty. She managed a weak smirk as she looked at Twilight. “Yep, he was definitely pissed that I ate one of his buddies.” She coughed up a few flecks of blood. “You’ve always been the best unicorn at magic we’ve ever known, but even you have to admit it, that growth spell of yours sucks.”
While Twilight stared at her mortally wounded friend with a bizarre mixture of incredulity and grief etched across her face, Spike materialized beside her and began wailing for somebody to contact the hospital and get a medical wagon over.
Twilight finally noticed the strength rapidly fading from her friends’ eyes, and she began to borderline panic as she tried to determine what healing spells to attempt. “Rainbow, just hold on, okay? Just hold on!”
The pegasus had so many small, open lacerations that needed immediate attention in addition to the internal bleeding, and Twilight was a far cry from being a trained pony physician, her medical experience being mostly limited to several old medical journals she’d read to pass the time back in Canterlot Academy.
Confounded by the lack of time and resources allotted to her, Twilight decided to desperately settle on casting as much restorative magic as she could with her remaining mana, but unfortunately to no avail. While many of the outer wounds began to close themselves under the golden light of restoration spells, Rainbow Dash was breathing her last breaths.
“Twilight…” Rainbow’s fading voice was barely more than a ghost of a whisper.
“Y-yes?” Twilight answered back in a helpless whimper, realizing that her spells were likely doing little more than dulling her friend’s pain. Even if true, the thought brought no amount of solace to the mare.
“Look after Tank, for me; look after everypony, ok?” Rainbow Dash coughed again, and more spots of scarlet bloomed across her the fur of her chest. “And remember this,” she weakly gestured at her magical burns. “I guess stuff h-happens sometimes. I...I don-”
Whatever she was about say was interrupted by another fit of coughing, and the last signs of life quickly faded from her as her eyelids fluttered closed.
Every one of Twilight’s limbs went limp and became lead blocks as the reality crashed into her with the force of a landslide.
Rainbow Dash was no more.
***
Twilight’s eyes shot open as her mind returned to the present. Momentarily confused, she looked and quickly saw that she was still standing there, in the embrace of her friends. They must have been like that for an entire minute at least for the duration of the memory, hardly moving and rooted to the spot.
Having produced all the tears her tear ducts could possibly muster, Twilight had more or less burned herself out. Fluttershy was the first to register the change, and slowly withdrew. Everyone gave each other some breathing room.
“Hows about we stay the night, Twi, huh? What do ya say?” Applejack offered. The others smiled hopefully in return as they awaited Twilight’s response.
For the first time in several days, Twilight managed to curl her lips into a smile. “You don’t even need to ask, girls. Of course you can,” she replied appreciatively.
As the rest of the day transpired and gave way to night, the group of friends, although now one soul short, drifted away from mourning, and made way for a celebration of the short but momentous life of Rainbow Dash. The mare that forever changed the face of the Equestria in a single moment, many long years ago.
Around a week later, when it had at last seemed as if the five ponies could finally begin to move on from tragedy, Twilight produced the biggest shock since their friend’s untimely death.
“My decision is final, girls,” Twilight declared in a tone that clearly expressed that nothing was up for debate. The air seemed to buzz with electricity as the alicorn and the other four mares stared each other down.
“This...this is simply beyond ridiculous!” Rarity sputtered. “Your special talent. Surely you’re jesting, darling?”
“You would actually give up such a thing?” Applejack asked, staring daggers at her.
“No jests, no jokes. I cannot use my Element, or any of my magic, ever again, you guys. If Rainbow’s death has shown me anything, it is that my raw magical power is simply too dangerous. I couldn’t possibly forgive myself if another pony got hurt, or worse, because of one of my spells going awry again.”
“Twilight…” Fluttershy closed her eyes and shook her head sadly.
“How could you possibly be so selfish?” Pinkie Pie chirped, bordering on anger.
“Pinkie-”
“Stay right there,” Pinkie Pie commanded, zipping off into the Library and emerging with an ornate box and six familiar objects. Rarity seemed to catch on to what Pinkie Pie was up to, caught all five amulets and the crown in her levitation, and held them aloft for Twilight to see.
“What are these?” Pinkie Pie demanded, pointing at each amulet as they revolved past in a floating circle.
“The...Elements of Harmony,” Twilight answered with confusion.
“And what do they do?” Applejack interjected, still glaring.
“They keep Equestria safe, and help restore harmony where there would otherwise be strife and trouble....Look, I know the point you’re trying to make, girls, but even if I were to bear Magic again, wouldn’t we still be fragmented without Loyalty?”
“Twilight, you should know as much as any of us, that the Elements always have a way of working things out in the end,” Fluttershy said.
“We’re still united, Twilight,” Rarity added, floating the crown with the six-pointed star towards her. “Even if one of us has fallen, the rest of us are now closer than ever.”
Twilight tentatively caught the crown in her own magic, and looked between her Element of Harmony and her friends with uncertainty.
“True friends stick together, even through the worst of it,” Applejack stated, her features softening up.
At last, Twilight seemed to come to a new decision, and promptly placed the gold crown atop her head. She adopted a determined and resolute expression as the last of the brooding stormclouds retreated from her mind with finality. “Once again, you’re all correct. I see that, now.”
The others clasped their Elements of Harmony around their necks with a series of metallic clicks, and smiled or nodded approvingly at Twilight.
Loyalty’s red, immaculate crystalline surface shined in the sunlight as Twilight levitated it over to her to inspect it. The Elements’ container joined it to the right.
Twilight carefully placed the sixth amulet into the box, and shut the lid firmly.
“Rainbow Dash’s loss caught us all off guard, not at the least myself. If I am to do her memory proud, to do it justice, I swear I will safeguard Loyalty just as we protect Equestria.” Twilight stared up at the banks of clouds and the distant mountain peaks in a brief moment of contemplation, before continuing.“Until the day that a new bearer, can take our friend’s place.”
“Farewell, Rainbow Dash. We love you. ”
