Everyone stared down at the letter. It was a small scroll that had been marked with Twilights own seal. Spike reached down and slowly unraveled it. Twilights neat, cramped writing was sprawled across.
"My dearest friends, I'm informing you that I'm leaving. Troubles been brewing in the north, and Celestia needs me to head out. I'm sorry, I love you all"
And that's all it said. Next to it was the scroll that had been sent a few days later. Celestia and Luna had arrived in person soon after. The note read with five simple words.
"She's dead. I'm so sorry"
As it turns out, the 'troubles' had been a full out civil was in Yakyakistan. They tore themselves apart, and Twilight got caught in the crossfire. It worked though. The death of a princess had stopped the war, seeing as how royal blood had been spilt due to them. The entire nation was in an uproar, grieving and anger sprouted up all around. The country itself was crying. You see, when an alicorn, a god, dies, it impacts the world around it. It rained nonstop for months. The pegasi couldn't stop it. The unicorns couldn’t stop it. The alicorns couldn’t stop it. Nothing could. The land threw temper tantrums, causing minor but many earthquakes. Celestia tried to coo it back down, back to sleep, but to no avail. Luna tried to force it down, pushing it to be calm. It refused that too. It would only calm back down months later. It took years for the magic to feel normal and natural again. It was foreign again, after years of having to force magic, drain it out of the ground. Speaking of the ground, it was hard and infertile. Luckily, this was fixable. So long as the earth ponies kept it well tended to, it would produce food. But if they missed even a day of plowing, it would clump again.
Well, that's how Equestria reacted. How about her friends, you may ask? Not well. Celestia and Luna forgot their responsibilities as day and night, and Equestria was in a permanent twilight. Rainbow dash denied it, refusing to acknowledge the fact that she was gone. Pinkie deflated and became sullen and irritable, staying in her bedroom for days on end and barely eating. Fluttershy was unreachable and stayed in her cottage, only speaking to her animals. Applejack fell into a stupor and would drink endlessly. Many nights she would pass out at a bar, causing stress and worry from her family. Rarity, surprising as it is, took things the worst. She got terrible nightmares and ran off of caffeine and spells alone before she would black out for a few hours.
She would be fine one moment, and suddenly something would remind her of Twilight and she would be sobbing. After a few weeks of this, she became catatonic. Nothing her friends did could cause a reaction. She would simply go to bed, then lie there the whole night, awake, and get up at dawn. She would stand in the shower for a minute, forgetting to turn it onto warm water. But that didn’t matter, her numb body couldn’t feel the icy spray. She'd eat a bite of dry toast or part of an apple before sitting at her workshop and not doing anything until the cycle repeated itself. While her other friends began to heal, Rarity just got worse and no one knew why. Spike was sad too, sitting in his room for entire days. He kept trying to make the library gleam, and gave one of two answers when someone asked him why. The firs was:
"Because this Library was the most important thing to her, and she'd hate to see it get messy!". The other worried his friends. He would say cheerfully:
"Twilight will want it clean when she gets back home!"
He did that sometimes. Little comments like that. One time he said at dinner,
"Wait! Don’t eat yet, Twilight still isn’t here!" And Rarity flipped. Her. Shit. She slammed her hooves on the table and shrieked;
"Dammit Spike! Don't you understand she isn't coming back!? She's dead! A cold dead corpse! When will you get that through your thick skull and stop playing this silly game!?"
The other four girls helped her up to bed. It crushed Spike inside, and he sat stalk still for a few minutes. Eventually Fluttershy came down and gave him a hug. Without a word, she opened a small door with a key and mixed two drinks. They hid all of their alcohol from Applejack these days. She sat down and handed one to Spike. You see, Spike is much older than he appears.
Dragon’s body’s age slowly, so he was about the same age as the other girls. Early twenties. Spike was actually about to turn twenty three. He and Fluttershy quietly sipped their drinks without making eye contact. Eventually pinkie joined them and also mixed herself a drink. Her hair was more wavy than puffy, but she was slowly looking more and more like the old Pinkie. The three followed on their patterns and quietly drank together. Applejack showed next and held up a hoof when they all went to hide the liquor.
"Don' worry. I'm going sober" she said and sat down with a can of coke. They had just fallen into their old pattern when Rainbow thumped down the stairs. She stuck her nose in his face and hissed through her teeth:
"What. The. Fuck. Was. That?"
"Rainbow! Stop!" Yelled Fluttershy, standing quickly. Rainbow threw Fluttershy off of her, sending her crashing into the table. Glass shattered and Pinkie and Applejack jumped up. In a flash, Spike was on the ground, blood oozing from his nose. Applejack and Pinkie both held her back. After all, what was one Pegasus against two earth ponies? Rainbow muttered angrily and left, slamming the door behind her. Spike shook off their help and went to go take a shower, carefully cleaning his nose. Afterwards he walked carefully up to the guest room that Rarity was in. He was expecting her to be asleep, but instead she sat, tapping on her laptop. She turned at the doors creak and watched Spike approach slowly. She got down from her chair and the two embraced. When they broke, both were crying. Spike pulled up a chair and watched her screen.
"What are you doing?" He asked quietly.
Rarity smiled and blushed.
"Oh, I've just been writing. I haven't made any progress with my fashion, but I realized that I'm also a good writer. I read an article and just felt inspired. Here. Would you like to read?" She said, turning her computer to him and he read.
Sometimes when I sit alone in bed at night, I can almost feel her standing at the foot of my bed. But I'm not scared. Her presence had always been a calming one. I can see her outline from the corner of my eye. The first few times this happened, I would look directly at her and she would cry out, crumpling to the floor. I ran to her and tried to help her, to do anything to stop the blood pouring from her chest. But it would always be too late. She was already gone. I would shriek in the endless pain and agony it caused me, but my lungs filled with water and I would start drowning. Just before I died, she would appear once again and say;
"You did this. You could have saved me, but you didn't. Now I'm dead and it's all your fault"
And she would be gone and the water would turn to blood and I'd wake up, screaming and crying and covered in sweat. And every time I know what she's talking about. One day, after one of her 'missions', Twilight showed me a long, jagged scar that ran all down her back left leg. When I asked her what had happened, she said that she had gotten injured, and that her missions kept getting more and more dangerous. When I urged her to go to Celestia, to tell her that she couldn't be her blade anymore, she denied. She didn’t want to 'let her down'. And I went along with it. Some of you out there might be thinking I did indeed let her die. That I deserved it for not telling Celestia that Twilight was getting seriously hurt. What kind of a friend would do that? Well, let me ask you this. Did I really deserve to lose a friend? A companion? A partner? A lover? I didn't think so
Spike sat back and noticed now that Rarity had gotten up, and was staring out the window. A tear slid down her eye as Spike spoke.
"I didn’t realize you two were..." he started, trailing off.
"Yes" said Rarity in a hoarse voice. "We hadn't been dating for long, but god I loved her. And she loved me. We were so in love. And I let her go"
At that, Spike opened his mouth to speak, but Rarity continued, "She hated me bringing up how dangerous it was, so I didn't. But we both knew she would die one day. It was like she was dying in front of me. I could see her deteriorating, just as clearly as she saw the black wave getting closer to her. It's the worst pain you can imagine, times ten. Because you can’t imagine it. The lights in her eyes flickered out, as did the light that always surrounded her. I would try to stifle my sobs, and she would do the same. But we both knew, we both knew one day she would leave and not come back and I would be-" she said as her voice caught. "Alone"
Then the dam broke and Rarity sobbed harder than she ever had before. She waved Spike away and he left, knowing she wanted to be alone. She bellowed her heart out and her pain filled sobs carried on the wind. Her broken heart could never be repaired. She had loved Twilight for so long, and so deeply, and god it hurt. She felt like she was being crushed from the inside out, and she couldn't get any air in. She was yelling in pain, in the worst pain. She was sure that sooner or later her tears, her grief, would have to end. It didn't. She felt like she was in a deep hole, looking up but seeing only darkness. There was no end to her grief. She wanted it to end. She opened her very, very high window and took a step out onto that balcony. She was swaying, lack of sleep making her feel loopy. She looked up and saw a purple star glittering in the sky. And for the first time in months, she smiled. Soon she would be with Twilight, with her Twilight. She took a step closer to the edge. Just a few inches more, and- her breath caught. A familiar, soft hoof was placed on her shoulder. She looked back and saw Twilight. She smiled sadly, tears streaming down both cheeks.
"Don’t do this. Suicide isn't the way out. Please don't. I love you" she whispered into Rarity’s ear.
"I love you too" she sobbed out. Rarity’s mind couldn't even begin to comprehend why this was happening, but she didn’t give a shit. All she knew was that Twilight was safe in her arms, and she would never let her go again. Slowly, they broke apart. Twilight led Rarity back in and whispered to her before disappearing.
"I’ll always be near you"
Rarity only now noticed that her friends had been been banging on her door. She must have locked it earlier. She unlocked it and they tumbled in. Hugs and tears were exchanged. Hours later, Rarity was stepping out of her shower. She exited into her bedroom and saw a small package awaiting her. Tied to it was a small note. In Twilights neat, cramped writing, was written.
"Call when needed"
She opened the parcel and inside was a tree sapling. Rarity grinned and instantly ran out to the garden. It grew rapidly until a full Twilight tree stood before her. There she found another note. "If you feel like you're slipping, pick a flower and think of me"
And Rarity cried and smiled. For the first time, she truly thought things would get better. And they did. They all did. She only let herself use a few flowers a year, but Twilight always came. And for those few hours, things felt normal again. Though her nightmares remained, her real life improved.
She continued writing, but as a hobby. Her fashion continued. Her life went on. When she did feel herself slipping, when she thought her heart couldn't take one more moment, she called twilight. She would tell her about her writing. She wrote romances and mysteries, but her real talent was in tragedy. Twilight told her to burn a copy of her stories, and they would find their way to her. And they did. And Rarity knew that her life was perfect.
***
Almost sixty years later, at the age of 82, Rarity the unicorn died of natural causes. There was grief, but this was expected. As the last element still living, it was also an almost joyful occasion. Almost. One soul mourned the most. Spike the dragon, who now lived in Canterlot, working under Princess Celestia, mourned their passing in private. He knew he should be happy. The passing of the old bearers allowed for new ones to be chosen. Six new ponies were chosen, and the six old ones passed together, into the next chapter of their lives.