A Spark Neglected

Icarus yawned and squinted her eyes in the dim, orange light. The window in her room faced the east, so she was used to being awoken by the sunrise. It was deceptively pleasant, to lay in the sun and do nothing while everypony else was still asleep, waiting for day proper to begin.

She rolled over to face the window, and opened her eyes to survey the town in its golden hour. Instead of the warmth of the sun she was accustomed to, however, she was immediately impaled on a great icy spear as she saw, across the sea of moonlit shanties, the grand mission building, her one and only sanctuary, engulfed in flames.

She immediately leapt from bed and shoved through the massive wooden door of her room, out into the hallway, and down the main staircase. In a small parlour next to the entrance hall, her father sat in a large, expensive chair, surrounded by discarded bottles of alcohol, and with an unfamiliar mare sitting on his lap, doing unspeakable things to one another. As soon as Icarus reached the bottom of the staircase, her father looked up.

"Icarus? What the hell?!" he shouted, pushing the mare off of him.

"Shut up!" shouted Icarus in response. There'd be heck to pay for talking back to him, but she didn't care right now.

"Why you..." he said, standing up and knocking his escort to the floor. He began to step forward, but Icarus was already out the door.

She dashed through the slum, where ponies were just beginning to rouse and clamor about the blaze.

She passed the edge of that district and entered into the town center, where the monumental library building stood. Had stood. Icarus staggered to a halt, a tempest of emotions raging inside her as she beheld the burning remains. Most of the structure was still standing, but it was well beyond rescue at this point. Flames poured out of the shattered windows. Most of the roof had fallen in, allowing the stories-high flames to reach freely into the sky and illuminate the night.

How?

As she watched, something inside shifted and fell, sending a geyser of embers and dust into the air. A few feet in front of her, a sheet of paper landed, its edges aglow as it audibly crackled and began curling up into itself, soon leaving only a small, rose-like piece of char.

Why?

Firebrand's cheeks burned with excitement. This was good.

The fire had started right on time, and had spread much quicker than he'd anticipated. Probably the books; all that paper would have served as extra fuel.

Firebrand winced, then grinned, as thunder pealed from within the blaze.

Fire was perfect. When the blaze made its way through a door or wall, from an oxygen-starved envronment to a virgin, oxygen-rich environment, it consumed voraciously, creating a veritable explosion called a backdraft.

Firebrand sighed. This was good.

The explosion sent something inside—shelves or desks or doors—tumbling, which in turn caused sparks and debris to belch out from the opening in the roof.

A single, mostly intact sheet of paper had been blown straight up into the air, and was now lazily drifting back towards the ground. Its corners were gilt with fire, and its surface was entirely blackened. It landed and began to crumble and twist in upon itself.

A mare stepped from the darkness. Her features were dark—only a silhouette—against the infernal backdrop of the library. She reached down and, trembling, tried to pick up the charred remnants of the page, only to have it disintegrate under her hoof. At this, she recoiled, and turned to run.

For just the briefest of moments, Firebrand could see Icarus' face illuminated by the blaze: her wide, empty, tear-filled eyes, her disheveled mane, her jaw agape, hyperventilating in panic. The burning Firebrand felt was supplanted with an unwonted chill, a mix of pity and regret. He watched as she disappeared into the shadows.

He stared at the spot where she had run to for a long while. It had never occurred to him that not hurting anypony was not necessarily the same thing as not burning anypony.

One of the building's burning supports fell, crashing through the wall facing the street. This began the process of a total structural collapse in the building, the supports of which, weakened by the heat, were breaking under the increased stress. Normally, Firebrand would be elated at this, the climax of the show. Instead, he felt cold. He regarded the burning, collapsing building for a few moments more, then sulked and turned around, heading deeper into the alleyway.

Icarus ran as fast as she could away from the pyre. She had nothing now. She could go home to her father, and face the inevitable storm from talking back to him earlier, and for everything else she's ever done. No. That would be suicide.

Nonetheless, Icarus found herself making her way through town towards the slum, and towards her father's mansion. Rather than going inside, she waited across the street, where one of the shanty huts was unoccupied. She had made a habit of hiding here, for numerous reasons (all stemming from her father), so there were some rudimentary accommodations there. She curled up on the small, dirty mattress, and stared listlessly into the unlit interior of the hut's single room for what felt like a few minutes, but in actuality was hours. She cried on and off as her mind wandered, always landing back on the library, the effigy of her happiness up in flames.

After a long while, the sun began to rise, and, at about the same time, she heard movement outside. She wearily raised her head and peaked through a hole in the wall, to see the mare from earlier, her father's throwaway partner, come through the gate to the manor, look warily in both directions, and march off down the street.

Icarus knew her father well enough to know that he would probably be passed out right now. She cautiously uncurled and exited the small hut, then crossed the street and caught the gate right before it shut and slipped in, pulling it gently to behind her.

She slinked across the yard, and cautiously approached the grand double-door. She didn't know why she bothered coming back here; the only thing waiting for her on the other side of that door was her drunk, angry father, who would probably be—all too literally—out for blood once he woke up. In a sense, this was all she had left: her stupid fancy bed, her stupid heavy door, and her measly book collection.

She carefully pushed the door open. Her head poked in and scanned the room: the entrance hall was entirely unlit with the exception of rising sunlight shining through the large, round window above the door, casting a spotlight on the main staircase. The scene inside was that of a chaotic aftermath: there were bottles strewn over the ground, mostly empty; a massive shattered plate of stale hors d'oeuvres dominated one quarter of the room; several ponies lay about the room, unconscious. She stepped inside, gingerly stepping over a sprawled-out stallion still clutching a bottle.

The door closed harshly behind her, making her jump. She took a moment to calm herself, during which the stallion on the floor stirred, roused by the noise, and attempted to stand up.

"Hey baby," he slurred, turning to her, "want some f-huheugh!" His advance was interrupted as he vomited loudly on the carpet, and promptly passed back out.

"You're going to clean that up!" shouted a dreadfully familiar voice from the adjacent room.

Icarus was crushed with dread. The room, the passed out stallion, the entire world seemed to fade out, save for her and the doorway to the side room. In this, appeared the shadowed silhouette of a stallion, imposing and upset.

Icarus shrunk as her father stepped forward.

"There you are." he said softly, his sudden calmness unsettling. He lowered his head, leveling eyes with her. She shrunk even further, withering under his gaze. His green smoking jacket was messy and wrinkled; his eyes were bloodshot, and he smelled like liquor.

"Where have you been?" he asked gently.

"I... I had to go—"

He raised one hoof and swung it hard, knocking her to the ground. "I don't care." he said sternly. "Get up."

She tried weakly to stand.

"You said something to me this morning." His voice was rough and quiet, but seemed almost deafening in the silence of the house. He leaned in even closer. Their faces were inches apart. "Do you remember what it was?"

"I-I'm sorry, I—"

"No, I don't think that was it," he said, his voice mockingly friendly, as if he were playing an innocent guessing game with a young foal.

"Let me give you hint." He raised his hoof again.

Icarus ducked under his swing, and began running up the stairs. Her father, still more than a little drunk, was thrown off-balance by his swing, and fell to the ground.

"Icarus!" he screamed, blotting out every other sound in the universe. "Get back here!" he said as he clumsily got back on his hooves.

Icarus reached the top of the staircase and bolted down the hallway. Her father pursued, taking the stairs two or three steps at a time, bounding after his rebellious daughter with a overwhelming rage.

Icarus reached the door to her room and began frantically leaning into it, pushing, trying to make the monolithic slab of wood move. Her father had reached the top of the stairs, and was now moving down the long hallway at a full-on gallop. Spittle and drool were trailing across his face. No emotion could be seen in his eyes other than a white-hot rage which she'd only ever before seen in those of her mother.

The door finally budged, only barely enough to allow Icarus through. She kicked it shut behind her, and looked around her room for some way to hinder the approaching madman. Positioned right next to the door was a tall, ornate bookshelf, filled with exquisite expensive books and leather-bound tomes.

She positioned herself on the opposite side of this and, with a mighty gulp, leapt up, aided by a flap of her wings, and kicked the bookshelf over, wedging it in place in front of the door.

Not even a second later, the door was struck with an immense force from the opposite side, accompanied by a loud bellow: "Icarus!" Thud. Thud. The walls shuddered with each impact, but the crude barricade held strong.

Icarus sighed with relief, then turned around and went numb.

From her large window overlooking the town, she could now see all of the buildings cast in early-morning sunlight as the city slowly began to wake. Every building except...

Near the center of town, where once stood the proud mission building of the library, now stood nothing, save a smoldering black crater. Ponies were swarming all around: some were emergency response ponies, working to control the damage, but most were simply bystanders, come to marvel or mourn at the giant hole that had been torn in their city.

Icarus fell back onto her hind legs and sat, staring numbly at the wreckage. What was left? She surveyed her room. A large, luxurious bed. An overturned bookshelf, shuddering periodically under her father's unrelenting advance. A closet full of expensive, never-worn clothes. A small, leather-bound journal.

She stood slowly and approached the last item: it lay open on her bed, yesterday's page marked with a slender, purple ribbon.

"Yellow coat." she said out loud. "Fiery mane." She allowed herself to collapse forward onto her bed, and began sobbing anew.

The bookshelf shuddered again. Her father was screaming on the other side.

Icarus turned her head to look at the bookshelf. The impacts were growing stronger and stronger. She turned again, and looked out over the city, pausing on the scar that had been the library.

No way out.

She shakily picked up the quill laying on her bed, and began to write.

Icarus' father was livid. He wound up once again, and rammed the door with his shoulder. It barely budged.

"Dammit, whore! You open this door!" he yelled.

His shout was answered by the sound of shattering glass on the other side. This unexpected sound redoubled his seething rage, and he once again tackled the door, this time using a running-jump start to bring his whole weight down onto it.

The door held fast, but the frame it was set in tore itself loose from the wall, and it collapsed forward into the room. Evidently, Icarus had been barricading herself inside with her bookshelf. Clever, he thought, but now she's made things even more difficult.

He began scanning the room for his daughter, but his gaze froze when he beheld the room's single, large window: busted outwards, and the curtains blowing in the wind.

He rushed over, not sure whether to be furious or worried. As he reached the window, he stepped in something warm and wet. He glanced down at his hoof to discover that he was standing on a pile of broken glasses, some of which was covered in blood.

He peered out of the window and saw the crumpled, still form of a pegasus, draped over the ornate wrought-iron fence. Blood was pooling underneath her, both from the countless lacerations from the shattered glass of the window, and from the three fleur-de-lis shaped spikes perforating her abdomen.

"Fuckin' useless." he spat, before turning around and heading back inside.