Life is Beautiful

The young gryphon paced the length of his room. It was a nice room, which was certain, it had a large bed, it had an attached bedroom, he could get anything he wanted from the kitchen, it even had a gorgeous view out the window from the balcony, overlooking half of Canterlot, and then the sheer drop below of almost half a mile down the sheer cliff sides! But he was a child, and he was growing bored!

It had been three days since he had arrived at the palace, he still remembered the first day, the beautiful and frightening princesses, the fight with his father, then being taken to the infirmiry and seeing her there. Even for one so young, seeing that lavender mare laying there as doctors busied themselves around her lifeless looking body was frightening. He had tried to go look, but his escort had quickly stopped him.

He thought about her as he walked to the window doors, opening them up with a claw and stepping out. Thinking about her made her sad, made something inside his chest hurt. He remembered seeing his father doing that… terrible thing to her, it still made him wake up in cold sweats at night hearing those screams.

And to top it off, he had wanted to make him do that to that pretty little filly! It made Gerald’s blood run cold, a cold little hatred for his father, and he pawed at the railing, leaning up to look over the edge. Gerald had heard that little filly outside his door the prior day, and had gone to investigate, he had wanted to tell her how sorry he was, his mind playing over what had happened.

Gerald opened the door slowly as he heard the little tittering voice of the filly, and the sound of hooves of several more ponies. A guard stood outside his door, glancing down with a frown at the gryphon, but Gerald ignored him for a moment, stepping forwards, looking to see who was coming. Coming down the hallway was an adult alicorn, her pink coat and magenta, purple, and pale yellow mane, she almost could have been the mother of the tiny little pegasus prancing between an older unicorn filly, and a pegasus colt that looked to be about a year younger than that.

The guard cleared his throat, “You should go back inside your room, mister Razorbeak,” his voice sounding gruff.

Gerald looked up a bit surprised, “I just wanted to say hi to…” his voice trailed off, looking down the hallway as the four ponies approaching all stopped. Three of them were glancing at him curiously, while the one that Gerald knew was named Glorious Dawn stared at him with wide eyes filled with terror.

Gerald took a slow step towards them, “I’m…” he started to say when the little filly let out a scream that made the gryphon cringe, before she turned and bolted the other way down the hallway, her little wings flapping wildly as she sprinted for all she was worth, startling the three other ponies that had been with her.

The alicorn gave Gerald a bit of a concerned frown, but Gerald barely noticed, shrinking back, before he bolted back into his room crying, the door slamming behind him.

Gerald sighed to himself, That was a swell way to make friends, he muttered to himself, looking down the long drop to the ground below. He had heard the alicorn and the children making their way back down the hall again later that night, gently coaxing the timid filly along, and he had heard them a few times today, but he hadn’t even thought about going to see her again, just that look of fear, and the memory of the scream making sure he gave them their space.

But that still didn’t fix the problem that Gerald was bored out of his mind! He looked off to the setting sun, and thought for a bit. He wanted to explore, but he was told to stay in the room, but he just couldn’t take it anymore!

Gerald huffed a moment, before he pulled himself up onto the railing, perching carefully as he spread his wings, then took a leap off, flapping his wings as he turned around, scanning the building and everything, noting which perch was his room, as there were quite a few balconies around, before he flapped off.

Gerald wasn’t sure where he was going to go then, he just didn’t want to get caught my guards and dragged off somewhere, so he kept close to the building. He landed on another balcony carefully, and peeked in, before hopping off again.

After peeking in a number of windows, Gerald got bored with that, and spotted a garden below, a rather large and sprawling one. Gerald swooped down, and landed lightly by a statue. Looking up, Gerald recognized the statue as one depicting Celestia herself besides her little sister Luna. Gerald smiled a bit, before looking around, trotting off as he started exploring, pausing here and there to sniff a flower, and hopping up with a flap of wings to snag a fruit from an apple tree.

Munching on the fruit, Gerald rounded a corner and froze a moment, spotting a small group of ponies rounding a corner ahead. Panicking a moment, Gerald darted the other way, diving behind a bush to hide.

It wasn’t more than a minute more before a group of five ponies, an alicorn, and a dragon came trotting by, “Ah don’t understand princess, what is all this secrecy about? Yah haven’t called us all together in years, not since…” the southern accent of the orange coated earth pony trailing off and hanging in the air.

Princess Celestia spoke softly, “This isn’t about secrecy so much… I wanted to discuss this with you in private, and the gardens are rather comfortable and serene at this time of year, please, relax, and sit, this looks like a good place.”

Gerald slowly peeked out from behind the bush, standing stock still for the most part, seeing the gathered ponies of all colors, an orange coat with a long yellow mane and a hat, a cyan pony with a rainbow colored mane and tail, a pretty white pony with a purple mane standing besides a purple dragon with a green underbelly that was just a hair bigger than her, a pink pony with a fluffy looking mane, and a yellow pony with a pink mane that looked heavily pregnant.

The yellow pony slowly settled to a lay beneath the willow tree they had settled under, huffing a little, “Princess,” she started, her voice delicate and soft, “I think we all want to know why we are here.”

Celestia looked to her, and nodded, “Of course Fluttershy, I realize that this was a difficult journey for you in particular, how is Big Macintosh and-“

“Princess please,” spoke the white pony in a very proper sounding voice, “I don’t mean to be rude, we can talk about the pleasantries later, what was so important you called us all here?”

Princess Celestia looked to the white pony with a bit of shock, but she nodded, “Very well. Something happened a few days ago, something that you should all be made aware of. Twilight Sparkle was found.”

A collective gasp ran through all the ponies gathered and they all started asking questions at once.

“Where is she? I’m gonna kick her tail for-“

“You found her?! Is she alive?!”

“How is she doing? What happened to her?”

“This! This! This will be the biggest party ever! A welcome back Twilight party like the world has never seen! And never will see!”

“I’ve missed Twilight so much! I have so much to tell her!”

The yellow one, Fluttershy was silent, looking with big eyes, and she just started to cry, pulling herself to her feet, and almost lunged at Celsetia, wrapping her hooves around the princess’s neck, hugging her and breaking down sobbing as the questions and comments of the others broke off rather quickly.

Celestia was a bit surprised, falling back a step to sit, before she lowered her head to touch the soft spoke mare’s back, nuzzling into Fluttershy’s back, “She is alive, my little ponies, though she is badly hurt.”

The pink earth pony moved forwards, wrapping her arms around the pregnant Fluttershy’s back, hugging her, “It’ll be alright Fluttershy, won’t it princess?” behaving oddly serious for her, though Fluttershy continued to cry, just shaking.

Celestia nodded, “Physically, she will, but I feel she is going to need you, all of you very soon. I have never seen a pony survive what she has gone through… things I have tried and failed to protect all of my little ponies from. Those who hurt her will be punished, many of them already have been.”

The rainbow maned pegasus snorted, pawing at the ground before she started hopping around, rearing up, and shadowboxing her hooves in the air, “What did they do to her? I’m going to clean the clock of anypony that hurt Twilight! Anypony and everypony!” stomping her hooves back down on the ground for emphisis, her wings flaring and flapping.

The orange colored earth pony snorted and rolled her eyes, “that’s not helping Rainbow Dash,” she looked to Celestia, “what was done to her?”

Celestia shook her head, “I don’t think it is my place to say quite yet, I think Twilight will tell you when she is ready to talk about it. It might take time, but if you are there for her, you will be able to help her through this.”

The pink pony started to sniffle as well, “I don’t understand why she ran away, why she left us, or why anypony would hurt her. Did we do something wrong? Did we mess up and make her run away?”

Watching all of this was starting to make even Gerald upset, though with all of the ponies so focused on Celestia and the one they called Fluttershy, he took a chance, turning and slipping away around a hedge, hearing Celestia speaking, “She was going through a rough time I think, and things just… got out of hand, and she got herself into a bad place. Ask her about it, talk to her about it, she…” the princess’s voice fading away as Gerald made a break for the edge of the garden.

Gerald found himself closer to the castle after a few minutes of running, and moved to climb into a little tree, sniffling a bit. He couldn’t help but think about that purple unicorn he saw, he knew that she was the one those ponies were all there for. With a bit of thought, Gerald remembered where the infirmary was, and tried to picture where in the palace it was from the outside.

Slipping out of the tree, night was quickly coming down, and the moon was rising over the horizon. Gerald took a little run to get some momentum, and hopped into the air, flapping his wings to get into the air, and winging off.

It took the young gryphon a few minutes, and checking a few windows, but finally he found a window that led to the infirmiry. Hovering outside one, he peeked in, before he moved to another and another until he saw the one that had the purple unicorn in it. Pushing at the windows a moment, he saw them held closed from the inside with a latch. With a little push, he slipped a claw through, and slipped it up, successfully unhooking the windows.

Once Gerald pushed it open, he slipped in, pulling his wings against his back, and kicking his back paws at the wall outside until he flopped over the edge and tumbled into the room with an oof. Quickly covering his beak, Gerald looked around a moment, before he climbed to his feet. The room was simple, some medical equipment and monitoring equipment set up, hooked to the lavender unicorn that laid in the only bed in the room.

Gerald slowly approached the unicorn, who suddenly whimpered and twitched, causing Gerald to cringe back. When no yelling at him, or further retreats came from the unicorn, he looked again, and realized she was asleep.

The unicorn suddenly screeched out in her sleep, writhing in pain, before settling down a moment later, panting. Gerald slowly approached, but noticed a chart on a clipboard, so he skirted to that, and after glancing around, he started reading it. It was difficult for the young gryphon to decipher some of the things written, but what he saw in the condition notes did interest him.

Condition: guarded, physical injuries appear to be deep, but not lifethreatening, change bandages daily. The serious injury to the throat was healed, no lasting damage. Bloodloss was severe, patient in coma, though in distress. Distress determined to be withdrawl symptoms from Moon Sugar addiction. Severe level of muscle atrophy found.

Prognosis:

What did prognosis mean again? And for that matter, what did atrophy mean? Gerald couldn’t remember, and shook his head, reading on.

Prognosis: Chances for recovery seem good, however she will need extensive physical therapy. It is suggested that counseling be provided when patient regains consciousness.

Gerald shook his head as another set of seizures seemed to grip the lavender pony, and Gerald dropped the clipboard back where it had been. Gerald moved to half climb up onto the bed, leaning over to reach to touch the unicorn, and that seemed to calm her a moment as she let out a deep sigh, falling still again.

“I know you can’t hear me, Miss Sparkle is it? My name is Gerald, I just saw all your friends, one named Rainbow Dash, one named Fluttershy, and a white unicorn, and a pink earth pony, and an orange earth pony, and a purple dragon. They are all your friends… I wish I had friends like that. I am sorry for what my dad did to you, I never wanted that… and I never wanted to hurt your little daughter. She is pretty, but I think she hates me.”

With the young gryphon’s words, and the light touch on the mare’s shoulder, Twilight Sparkle seemed to calm some. After a minute, Gerald yawned and smiled, “I hope maybe I could be your friend too, I know, you probably hate me, I am just so bored here. Princess Celestia said she would try to find me a home to stay, I don’t know what a pony home is going to be like…”

Gerald sighed after a moment, “I know, you likely don’t care… I just hope… I hope your daughter is alright, and I hope you are alright,” he murmured, laying his head down, realizing how tired and worn out he was. He closed his eyes a moment, the bed felt comfortable, and he could take a short little nap there…

***

Voices outside the door woke Gerald up suddenly, and he jerked awake, his eyes wide in panic, realizing the sun was out. He saw shadows on the fogged glass window on the door leading out of the room, and he scrambled off of his bed, leaping out the window just as the door opened. Landing just outside the window, he pressed himself to the wall, they were on the ground floor after all, and the voices in the room sounded familiar.

Gerald very slowly peeked over the edge of the windowsill into the room, though he was not surprised to see all of the ponies, and the dragon from the previous day filing into the room, led by a unicorn doctor.

The doctor was speaking softly as she led the ponies in, “She is in rough shape, she is suffering from withdrawl symptoms from the Moon Sugar she was taking, its worse at night… but she is still in a coma from the blood loss. It is unlikely she will awaken for a few days, but we are optimistic for a good recovery.”

The dragon was first into the room, almost shouting, “Twilight!” taking a leap across the room for the bed before he was caught in mid air by the doctor’s magic.

“Please be careful, she is injured, and she is very weak,” the doctor chided, “Or I will have to ask all of you to leave.”

The dragon gave a weak, sheepish grin, and scratched at the spines on the back of his head as he was put down, “Sorry, I forget how big I am sometimes.” He turned to the bed, walking towards it and sitting beside it, reaching to take one of Twilight’s hooves gently in his paw.

The other ponies started spreading out around the bed, but the yellow pegasus, Fluttershy if Gerald remembered right, moved in close to the bed, sniffling as she tried not to cry. She gingerly touched a side of the unicorn’s shoulder that was covered in heavy bandages, “what… what happened to her?” her voice came softly, the other ponies almost straining to hear.

“She was clawed rather deeply by a gryphon there, it is likely going to leave a rather spectacular scar. As for the rest… she shows signs of prolonged torture and sexual abuse, as well as suffering from withdrawal symptoms from Moon Sugar. If she makes any noise of pain, it is likely the withdrawal that is causing it.”

Fluttershy looked up at the mention of prolonged torture and sexual abuse, her lip quivering before she burst out sobbing, a hoof gingerly touching Twilight’s chest, before slipping it around her to hug the unconscious unicorn gently, “how could anypony do this to another?”

The other ponies started murmuring to each other at the words as well, looking between each other with horror and anger on their faces, while the doctor softly excused himself and slipped out of the room.

The rainbow maned pony stomped her hooves lightly, her wings flapping and lifting her off of the ground a bit, “I’m gonna smash some pony’s face in when I find out who did this!” dropping back down to all fours, her teeth bared.

“That’s not helping Dash,” the orange pony said.

“I know AJ, it’s just… ugh! I hate seeing Twilight like this!” She shook her head, and walked to the bedside, trying to keep her bravado up, but it was cracking, tears hanging in her eyes. “Why did you have to leave Twilight? I wish I had been there, I would have dragged you back…” she started breaking down, folding her arms on the edge of the bed and burying her head in them, “nothing has been the same without you, you stupid egghead.”

The orange pony, AJ, moved up behind the rainbow maned pony, Dash, and put a hoof on her shoulder, before giving her a bit of a hug from behind, “We all missed her, we are all glad she’s back… we’ll be here for her, even if she doesn’t want us, or is afraid, we’ll make it alright again, we promise Twilight,” her voice thick with emotion, having a hard time seeing her friend like this.

The pink pony had moved up besides Fluttershy, and had slipped a hoof around her shoulders, hugging and trying to soothe Fluttershy, “I don’t understand it either Fluttershy… I am so used to being friends with everypony… I think I would give some pony’s a good one two in the face if I ever found out who did this to Twilight. Or a three four. Maybe even up to a nine ten, I think they deserve that, maybe more. Definitely more.”

The white unicorn had moved up next to Spike, leaning her head on his shoulder, and rubbing against it, silent tears falling down her cheeks onto his scales, though finally she spike, “The Princess said that those responsible were going to be punished, if they hadn’t been already. Come back to us Twilight… we’ll be here.”

Gerald was well into tears as he listened to all of this, but with the ponies there, he couldn’t close the window, so he started to sneak away.

“Hey everypony, remember the princess said that we could go see Princess Cadance when we were done visiting Twilight today,” the pink pony’s voice came, with some excitement.

“Yeah, Twilight’s daughter is supposed to be staying with her, Glorious Dawn, wasn’t it?” the white pony’s voice sounded.

“I still can’t believe Twilight had a daughter,” came the dragon’s voice, “But I want to stay with Twilight a little longer, I’ve missed her so much…”

“We all have… she’ll be back on her hooves in no time, she is a strong pony, one of the strongest, you’ll see,” came the orange earth pony’s voice, the sound of other voices agreeing with her fading away as Gerald took flight.

***

Gerald could hardly see where he was going through his tears, ending up back in the garden, almost crashing into a statue, which clipped his wing, and sent him spinning out of control, crashing into something dark navy blue that let out a cry of surprise as he let out a yelp.

A midnight light surrounded Gerald and lifted him up while he started struggling and flapping his wings in protest, wincing in pain at his bruised wing, but panicking. A sweet, strong voice sounded from the navy blue form, an Gerald rubbed his eyes to clear the tears.

“My my, what do we have here?” Luna asked, “What is so wrong that you are off flying around in such tears little Gerald? Are you not supposed to be confined to your chambers?”

Gerald blinked in fear as he realized that he was actually being held by a princess, his legs tucking in to his chest however as he was being held up, “I… yeah I am, I’m sorry, I got bored, and I went out my window.”

An amused look crossed Luna’s face, and she slowly lowered as she chuckled, “Of course you went out the window, perhaps we should have had you staying in an interior room, but I thought you would like the view. That however does not tell me why you are crying, you are too young to have such reasons to cry,” she lifted a hoof to the young drake’s cheek, who cringed slightly for a moment, but all she did was wipe away a tear, and he relaxed.

“I um… I overheard Miss Sparkle’s friends in the infirmary, they were so upset, they love her so much, it just… it hurt, listening… to what had happened to her, and how upset they were over it,” the young gryphon lowering his head and closing his eyes, his wings fluttering a moment before they settled on his back.

Luna’s expression turned far more serious, lowering her head to touch the back of the gryphon’s neck, trying to offer some comfort, “those are things one your age should not have to worry about, but your father plunged you into that world far too young, not that anypony, or any gryphon for that matter, should ever have to deal with some of these issues. What were you doing at the infirmary?”

Gerald dragged a claw along the ground, “I uh… I wanted to see her, I wanted to just talk to her for a few minutes, so I went there last night… She was having a nightmare I think, so I talked to her a bit, and she calmed down. I guess I didn’t realize how tired I was, and I fell asleep as well, I woke up just before they came in.”

Luna nodded, considering, “Why were you tired? Are you not sleeping well?”

Gerald looked up, and shook his head a little, “no… not really, not since that night.”

Luna nodded, “But you slept soundly enough last night to not wake up till just as they were arriving?”

Gerald nodded, his brow furrowed, “Yeah, I guess I did… I guess… I like Miss Sparkle, she is a nice pony, and she has nice friends, I wish I had friends like that…”

Luna frowned a bit at that, “Don’t you have friends like that? That is why I was surprised you asked to stay, do you not have gryphon friends back at your home?”

Gerald shook his head, “Not really, a few I sometimes play with, but… they weren’t friends. As the son of an ambassador, I was moving a lot, I spent a lot of time here, I didn’t have the time to make so many friends… except for those that my father wanted me to be friends with, those like him… but I didn’t want to be like him, or them… I like ponies, they are nice, but my father didn’t like that I liked ponies… so I never got to make friends with them either,” he sighed, shaking his head.

Luna frowned, “Every young creature, pony or gryphon should have friends… what did you do instead?”

“I spent a lot of time reading, I got to read books while we were traveling, and I could bring them with me where I went. Father didn’t like that so much either, but I was able to hide them and read them sometimes… can I borrow some books from the castle? I am really bored during the day…” Gerald complained softly.

Luna smiled at the young gryphon, “You know, I think that Twilight Sparkle would like you a lot, she used to live in a library in Ponyville, all the books you could ever read.”

Gerald perked up at that, “IN a library? All the books? But… no, no I don’t think she would like me, not after…” he trailed off.

“Nonsense. Look, lots of ponies make bad mistakes, Twilight has made some, some serious ones I feel. But forgiveness is important sometimes, I believe her friends will forgive her for running away, and I think she will forgive you, because you have done nothing wrong. You are an innocent in this, the mistakes were your father’s. And I know for a fact that Twilight will like you when she gets a chance to meet you.”

“Really? You think so?” asked Gerald, “but… Princess Celestia is going to lock me up, she told me I was supposed to stay in my room.” The young gryphon looked down, growing upset again, “she is going to have me locked up in the dungeon when you tell her…”

Luna let out a soft laugh, shaking her head, “Princess Celestia is far kinder and understanding than most give her credit for. I was going to head in soon, for breakfast. Why don’t you join me little Gerald? Then I will see you back to your room. And I won’t tell Celestia if you don’t, mmm?”

Gerald brightened up again, “Really? You won’t? Thank you princess! I would love to have breakfast with you!”

Luna smiled, “Good, now come along, and wipe your tears away; you are going to be fine.” The princess turned and started to trot away through the gardens to the castle, and Gerald turned to move after her.

***

After a breakfast of blueberry waffles and scrambled eggs, Luna took Gerald to the library where he had a blast, and ended up taking out a number of books. Most of the books were story books, rather easy reading for the young gryphon, with a few Daring Do books that he had not gotten a chance to read before.

Gerald returned to his own little apartment after that, much happier about things, and with books to keep him company, though his thoughts did return to Twilight Sparkle in the infirmary, thinking of all her friends, and her daughter. As night fell, he had a hard time sleeping, troubling dreams disturbing him. Eventually he snuck out again, taking a book with him, and sneaking into Twilight’s chamber again.

Gerald spent a few hours there reading after that, reading a Daring Do book to Twilight, before he fell asleep, his beak resting on the book which was laid on the side of the bed. He managed to wake up as the sun rose however, and beat a hasty retreat out of there before any of the doctors came to check on her.

This pattern continued for a over a week, and Gerald started enjoying spending the night near Twilight. The young gryphon saw a good bit of the rest of Twilight’s friends, but he kept his distance, watching them from a perch in the gardens some days when he snuck out to read in the sunlight.

One morning, Gerald slept a little later than he intended, sunlight pouring into the room when a groan nearby woke him. Gerald’s eyes flickered open and he yawned, letting out a little squeak as he realize the pony in front of him was moving. His eyes met hers for a moment, startled.

Then the lavender pony started screaming, and Gerald panicked, screaming in fear as well, his wings flapping as he started to backpedal away from the bed. It all happened so fast then as a crushing purple glow wrapped around his body, and he found himself hurtling through the air before he hit a wall, letting out a squawk of pain as all he saw were stars.

Author's Notes

I was not anticipating this chapter. Not at all. I had envisioned Gerald's part in this chapter being a small little bit leading up to Twilight awakening, but then I realized that such a thing was not doing justice, Gerald had a LOT more to do and see in this chapter, and I had a lot more i could tell from his eyes.

I didn't get started on this chapter until really late in the day, I can blame my girlfriend for that. I recently started up in an old RP that I have played with her for a long time in, it had been on haitus for a few weeks. I have a terrible drive when I lack mental stimulation via Role Play of some kind, to write, and the RP that i was doing with her kind of wiped out my drive for a large portion of the day, until she went to bed and abandoned me with a burning desire to play. So here i am, finishing up chapter 8. Go Figure.

Anyways, i hope you like this chapter! it was more concrete than the last one, which was kinda designed to be rather fragmented, as it was going on in Twilight's head, something of a near death experience, or her mind keeping her entertained while she was in a coma, or something like that.

The story is almost over! maybe one more chapter? I know I said that last time, but this chapter just got away from me.

I think of myself something like Michelangelo right now after looking at this chapter. I had my own plans for this space of text, but once I got my fingers into working on it, I realized that that was not the way the chapter wanted to be written, there was a far better way for things to be written, and the chapter wrote itself, all I had to do was uncover what the chapter was supposed to be.

Also, arg! i didn't get an update in on the 28th! i'm so sad! i missed a day in my update scheule! i didn't manage to get 1 out every day! nooo! oh well.