Everlasting silence

We failed.

She was gone. The castle was ruined, the books were burning in the peaceful night of the Everfree Forest. Desolation and hopelessness was everything I could feel, like like if every part of my body was about to fall, torn apart by the emptyness of my heart, as I realized it :

We failed.

I couldn't say anything. All I was able to do was standing still, repeating what I saw over and over in my head, in the middle of the burning library, slowly turning into ashes. The princess was the first to break the silence :

"Why did she do that ?"

"She was tortured..."

"She was torturing herself! ! She was fighting against the spell, that was creating the lightning bolts ! It's like she doesn't want me to cure her, she wants to do it her way... Her book must have been really powerful !

«But the whole town is in danger now. Octavia ? Go to the town and send Princess Celestia a letter to warn her about what happened. I don't know what her book told her to do, but it could be anything. Tell everypony what is the problem, we have to find her before she does something bad! If you find her I'll be there, checking for books that could help."

Forced to get out of my lethargy, I had to face the reality : Vinyl was dangerous.

The forest was chilling in the night. Little dewdrops were dropping on my neck, stunning me every time, as the cold was paralyzing my broken leg. The vegetation in the night was creating black silhouettes, watching me through darkness. Every sound my hooves made on the ground reverberated in the entire forest, awakening birds in the trees. I was hardly able to see where I was going.

The path began to be more visible as I was approaching the edge of the forest. I heard someone teleporting behind me.

"Where is Princess Twilight Sparkle ?", I turned back, and to my surprise I saw someone I used to be afraid of.

"Princess Luna ? What are you doing here ?"

"I saw the explosion in the ancient castle, but I didn't found Vinyl Scratch, where is she ?"

"I don't know, where looking for her, and Princess Twilight is still in the castle... do you hear that ?"

Through the night's silence, we could hear voices shouting. Princess Luna went to a dark path, covered by leaves and bizarre flowers. Vines were hanging down, some of them was touching my back and my head as we were going through the forest, their gluey mucus sticking on my hair. The path was leading to Zecora's hut. We hid behind a bush, as we were close enough to hear the voices

"You will do it, zebra ! Or your head will be part of my collection ! It is only a matter of hours until I'm completely deaf, if you haven't prepared what I want until then, you'll die, and I'd prepare it myself !"

"I can't, have you lost your mind ? Nopony can do a magic of this kind !

You will not be yourself, just an empty shell, of what you used to be before that book launched its spell...", I suppose Vinyl still had the book. I needed to get it !

"You... will... DO IT!"

I stood to see what happened, and I saw Vinyl's horn glowing, preparing herself to kill Zecora, the same way she wanted to kill me a few hours ago. I ran towards Vinyl and fell on her, surprised, she stopped the spell. Princess Luna created a shield around Zecora to protect her. When Vinyl realized what was happening, she teleported behind me, kicked me in the back, and I bumped on a tree, the same way she launched me in the library... I was stunned, and watched. The princess broke the shield around Zecora and lauched a bright yellow laser beam straight to us. The strength that was emanating from the beam was incredible, it could kill her. Vinyl launched a beam too, but deep green, the two beams met in the middle, exploding, the blast shoving me back. Vinyl was really forcing to keep up with the princess, she took her voice from beyond the grave :

"Leave... Me... ALONE !"

She used her entire strength, the meeting point was slowly moving towards the princess. I dashed towards Luna and shoved her, Vinyl's spell continued its course a few inches above my head. She ran away through the trees, I hardly got up on my legs, and came to see how was Zecora, and to ask her a few questions !

"What did she asked you to do ?"

"Some magic must not be told, or the world will fell into desolate cold. She's not a normal pony anymore, but she's not corrupted to the core! You want to help her tortured mind, or her sanity will be left behind."

Was there hope ? I doubted it ! Zecora led the Princess and me to her hut and threw some plants into the cauldron in the middle of the room. She told us she was making some potion to help my leg heal, I thanked her for this, as my leg wasn't doing good after all this mess.

The Princess of the Night came to me, looking grave.

"You were really brave, and I want to thank you for what you did. But Vinyl Scratch is still running, and this time towards Ponyville. You must tell everypony to hide, and then take some rest, you deserve it ! I'll be with Princess Twilight to tell her what just happened and to help her find out a solution."

Zecora applied a deep red gluing thing on my leg. Besides the coldness and the consistence of the thing, it was feeling really good. A few seconds after my leg wasn't hurting. She took it out of my leg, I wasn't completely healed, but I was definitely better.

When I arrived in Ponyville, everypony was awoken, worrying about what happened, screaming of terror everytime something was moving... I never saw so much chaos in Ponyville, not even when Discord came !

As soon as I was in sight of the ponies in the town, everypony went around me asking what happened, and I couldn't say anything. It wasn't until Pinkie shouted to make everypony quiet that I could explain what happened.

"[...] so make sure you stay in your homes, we don't know what she plans to do, or even what she can do. If anybody sees her, please tell me or a Princess

«I need a few ponies, to guard the town for now, if you see Vinyl tell me, even if..."

"NOOO !", a scream was coming from the center of the town. I recognized BonBon's voice, screaming, crying, asking why... why what ?

I ran as far as I could towards where the scream came, and it was leading to Bonbon and Lyra's house. She stopped screaming, we could only hear her crying through the wooden door.

"What happened Bonbon ?"

As we had no response, I, with the help of a few Ponyville citizens, started to break down the door. It finally broke, leaving a cloud of dust filling my eyes. I looked for BonBon. It wasn't long until I saw her, the pony I wanted to see the most, because she was the only pony who had supported me since Vinyl became deaf. The one I saved the life a night ago. I would have been so happy to see her smile.

But I wasn't happy to see her smile. Maybe because she wasn't smiling.

Maybe because she had not any smile.

Maybe because she had not any head.

The body of Lyra Heartstrings was lying on the ground, headless.