“Twilight Twilight Twilight Twilight!” Spike called out, the clack-clack-clack of his feet echoing down the crystal hallway and into the study.
Twilight looked up from her book on archaic reading techniques and yawned. Catching up on the Crystal Empire books had stretched well into the afternoon, but she didn’t feel the need to take a break. Her list of books to read wasn’t getting any shorter. That is to say, it was getting shorter, but the length of the list was shortening at a relatively slow rate, such that it felt like the length of her list wasn’t changing very much at all.
Twilight rubbed her face. She tended to overanalyze when she was tired. That, or while in deep denial. She definitely needed a break. “What is it, Spike?”
Spike skidded to a stop on the glossy crystal floor, almost losing his balance. “Are you busy? I want to show you something.”
Twilight stretched, settling into her cushion and smiling. “Sure thing, buddy. Fire away.”
“Good one,” Spike said, pointing at Twilight and winking. “You’ll get that in a second. Watch this.”
He rolled his shoulders and puffed out his chest, sucking in a torrent of air. He tilted his head back and heaved, not unlike a cat trying to cough up a furball. Instead of a furball, though, out came a fireball, bright green and about the size of an apple. Spike caught the fireball in his claw and presented it to Twilight. “Ta-da!” He tossed it back and forth between his claws, the ball making a low fwoof sound with every toss. He gave a sly grin. “Isn’t it cool?”
Twilight stared at the fireball.
“You get it?” Spike said, tilting his head. “Because it’s, you know, hot?”
Twilight did get it, and it was a clever play on words—Spike had used the word “cool” to describe both its impressiveness (in an informal sense) and its degree of warmth (where the intention was to describe the hot fireball as “cool” for comedic subversion, though it was true in a relative sense compared to hotter objects, such as the sun, for instance). However, the urge to laugh in a show of appreciation for such a prime example of comedic mastery was far from her mind, though overanalyzing and using big words did make her feel better.
“It was just a joke,” Spike murmured. He stopped tossing it back and forth, his smile fading as Twilight stared at the little ball of flame in his claws.
Spike held it out to his right, and Twilight’s eyes followed. Then to his left. Then to his right again. “Twilight? What’s wrong?” he asked.
Twilight stared at the fireball, and saw nothing but utter devastation. Ponyville was set ablaze in an unearthly balefire, the blinding green flames reaching for the heavens. The roaring inferno spread from one thatched-roof house to another like wind in a cornfield. Ponies ran aimlessly through the streets, terrified, reduced to their primitive instincts of self-preservation and a somewhat considerable aversion to very hot things.
Spike’s shoulders drooped. The fireball shrank in his claws. He crossed his arms. “Twilight, you’re doing the eye-twitching thing again.”
Twilight forced a laugh, much louder and higher-pitched than she had intended. “Oh, don’t be silly, I am not.”
“You are. Both of them, actually.”
“That’s just, uh, squinting. Involuntary and somewhat shaky squinting.”
Spike put his claws on his hips and sighed. “What’s wrong?”
With a jerk, Twilight straightened up. “Oh, nothing in particular.” She leaned on a hoof, the corners of her mouth stretching into a smile. Perhaps he could be talked out of this one, like the time he went off on a professional acting kick. “I thought you liked knitting?”
“There’s really no point. Nopony wears clothes.”
“How about reading?”
“That’s more your thing.”
Twilight put a hoof on her hip and waggled her other hoof at Spike. “Spike, reading is everypony’s thing.” She winked.
“Are you patronizing me?” he asked.
“Base jumping?”
Spike folded his arms. “Jumping off the roof of town hall isn’t as fun as it sounds.”
Twilight bit her hoof, lowering her voice to a whisper. “Professional acting?”
“Not since you gave me a lecture on the statistics,” Spike mumbled. He gazed down at the little fireball in his claws. “I like playing with fire, though.”
“Okay, let’s choose our words carefully, here.” Twilight cocked her head. “Don’t you think it’s the slightest bit dangerous? Maybe?”
“It doesn’t hurt,” Spike said. He patted the fireball against his face to prove it. “See? I’m a dragon. My entire body is fireproof.”
“Well, sure, but it’s not you I’m worried about.” Twilight gasped. “Sorry, that’s not what I meant to say. I mean that ponies are distinctly un-fireproof. And if something were to go wrong, somepony might get hurt.”
Spike nodded. “Oh, yeah, I know that. I know how dangerous fire can be. But, I’ll be really careful, I promise.” Spike put his claw to his chest and saluted with the fireball.
Twilight took a deep breath in. She could trust Spike. Spike was responsible, for the most part. Sure, he may have gotten a little carried away in that whole Princess Spike ordeal, but he’d so responsibly taken care of her and her friends’ pets when she went to the Crystal Empire that one time. Spike would be more than capable of acting with integrity and trustworthiness.
“Okay.” Twilight approached Spike and stooped so her eyes were level with his. She rubbed his shoulder with a hoof. “But we’re going to have to be safe, okay?”
Spike leaned his head back a little as Twilight leaned in. “Yeah. I pretty much just said that.”
“Right. We’ll just have to be safe. Safety will be our highest priority.” Twilight nodded. She trotted away to fetch some safety gear, then turned right back around and approached Spike again, placing a hoof on his shoulder. “You can only practice under my supervision, okay?”
“Sure,” Spike said.
Twilight smiled, then turned in a circle. “We should make sure to be—”
“Safe, yeah, I get it.”
“Good.” She left the room to gather emergency supplies. If Spike really wanted to practice using fire, then that was okay, but proper and reasonable precautionary measures would have to be taken, to prevent any undesirable calamities from occurring. Ponyville would not burn down on her watch.
Though, it still could. Even if they were safe about it, the possibility of things going wrong would be tiny, maybe around 1%, but it wasn’t zero. She had to be prepared for that, too, just in case.
~ ~ ~
Spike looked around the wide, empty field. The grass tickled his toes. “Twilight, why are we here?”
“We’re on the outskirts of Ponyville, with no other ponies or buildings or thatched-roof houses or anything else in at least a one-mile radius.” Twilight planted her rump on the ground, smiling at Spike. “This is the perfect place to play—er, practice with fire, in the safest way possible.”
Twilight set her supplies down: a welding helmet, a wide pane of fire-resistant glass, a bathtub full of water, and an impromptu emergency preparedness kit—filled with first aid kits, fire extinguishers, a checklist of all 317 residents residing in Ponyville, and two days’ worth of dehydrated peas for said residents, all stuffed into one of her dressers. The food could be rationed to two-thirds portions if necessary, lasting them all another day, before they had to resort to grass or take refuge in another town.
They wouldn’t need that, though, of course. Nothing bad would happen, because Spike would be practicing under Twilight’s direct supervision, and Twilight was a responsible and prepared and safe adult who knew precisely what was best for her number one assistant.
“Twilight? I can’t breathe,” Spike said, trying to push off the welding helmet crammed onto his head.
“Oh! Sorry,” Twilight said, lifting it off of Spike. “That’s for me.”
Spike took a moment to catch his breath. He shook his head as Twilight set up the fire-resistant glass between them. “I don’t really feel like it anymore.”
“It’s completely safe, trust me. Look, even if something goes wrong, I’ve got a little bit of water.” She pointed to the bathtub.
“Yeah, I noticed.”
Twilight set out three fire extinguishers and a first aid kit at the ready. She left one dresser drawer open to the checklist of Ponyville residents, the pencil tucked into the clip of the clipboard, accessible at any time. “I’m all set,” she said. “Give it a try.”
“Kay,” Spike said. He made no sudden movements, or any movements at all, really. He looked down at his feet, wiggling his toes in the grass. Occasionally, he looked up at Twilight, or at her equipment.
She scanned her surroundings, in case he’d noticed a shortcoming in her setup. Her eyes drifted from her dresser to the fire extinguishers to the welding helmet to the—
“Wait!” Twilight said, scrambling to reach for the welding helmet. She slipped it on, tightened the strap, and lowered the visor. It was a special helmet made for unicorns, designed to pivot over and cover her horn. “Phew. Thanks, Spike, that was close.”
“Um,” Spike said, glancing around. “I didn’t do anything.”
“Exactly, and thanks again. You can start now.”
“Uh, okay.” Spike tapped his fingers together, rocking back and forth on his feet. He looked around the field, seemingly everywhere but where Twilight was standing. Through the tinted glass on her helmet, she watched for any bright spots of light, but none appeared.
Spike stood there and fidgeted, doing nothing. This was a stark contrast to the enthusiastic and naive Spike in the library earlier that afternoon, too eager to really recognize the health and safety hazards of fire. But now, it was as if Spike acknowledged the risk for major consequences so much, he was stricken with fear at the power he wielded in his fireball-filled claws (and understandably so).
Twilight lifted the visor on her welding helmet. “Is something wrong?”
“I dunno, Twilight. This feels weird.” Spike shrugged. “It doesn’t help that you’re staring at me.”
“I’m not staring.” Twilight lowered the visor. “I’m supervising, like a responsible adult. Now go on, make a fireball.”
Spike stood there and didn’t move, perhaps to let the fire collect in his throat. Eventually, though, he tilted his head back and gurgled, then lowered his head slowly and let a fireball roll out from his tongue. He held it in his claw, staring at it, then looked up at Twilight.
Twilight blinked, her eyes keeping track of the fireball, her telekinesis magic partially formed on the corner of the bathtub.
Spike rolled the fireball from his right claw to his left, then back to his right claw. He stared at Twilight, seemingly waiting for something. Then, Spike brought his claw down. “This isn’t fun anymore, Twilight.”
A dandelion by Spike’s feet grazed the ball, catching some of the flame. The dandelion then burned down to its stem and ignited the field of grass, the trail of flame running off in a straight line to her dresser, engulfing her checklist in a bright flash. The trail of fire carried on right towards Ponyville. With an explosion louder than a hundred fireworks, Ponyville erupted in destruction. Ponies ran aimlessly through the streets, horrified, reduced to their primitive instincts of survival and a desperate need for an ordered checklist.
Well, not actually, but it was well within the realm of possibility. The way some ponies were so disorganized, they wouldn’t know whether stop, drop, or roll came first.
Twilight grabbed the bathtub in her magic and dumped it over Spike, safely extinguishing the source of the fire. However, the fire hadn’t spread quite the way she imagined. Ponyville was still standing, the grass hadn’t been reduced to smoldering ash—even the dandelion seemed only moderately bothered by the whole affair.
Spike, however, was dripping wet and scowling. He wiped his eyes and folded his arms tight, shivering. “C-c-can we go back to the castle now? Th-th-this sucks.”
“You’re safe, though, and that’s what matters.” Twilight set the bathtub back down on the grass. A responsible supervisor’s job well done, certainly.
Still clutching his body with one arm, Spike pointed a quivering finger at Twilight’s dresser. “D-did you p-pack a towel?”
“No, sorry.” Twilight pulled out a spare piece of paper and slid it into her clipboard. “So it’s not fun if I watch you.”
Spike wrung out his tail. “No.”
Twilight made a note. Spike didn’t want supervision, then. But supervision was essential to being safe. Somepony had to be there to ensure nothing went wrong. The only way to ensure nothing went wrong without somepony supervising was to completely eliminate the possibility of the fire from spreading.
Twilight rubbed her chin as she studied the grass. There were still flammable objects in the immediate surrounding area. A thoroughly incombustible environment would be the ideal place for Spike to practice fire in, like a desert or a cave of some sort.
Or, a crystal castle! Twilight beamed. “C’mon Spike, we’re going back to the castle!”
“G-great—Hwah!”
Twilight scooped up Spike in her magic, then collected all her belongings and trotted toward the castle. She’d have no trouble at all finding a room in the castle that Spike would be absolutely ecstatic to practice fire in, all on his own!
~ ~ ~
“The broom closet?”
“The former broom closet, yes. It’s Spike’s Closet now!” She presented the modest little room in all its glory. The walls were a plain deep blue, as was the floor, and the ceiling.
Spike crossed his arms. “It’s small.”
“It’s economically sized.” Twilight stepped inside the room, spotting a stray sponge and chucking it far down the hall. “It’s the perfect place for practicing pyromancy! It’s a room entirely made of crystal, with nothing flammable inside. And, the best part is: I don’t have to supervise you while you’re in here!”
At that, Spike didn’t jump up and down with excitement quite like she’d expected. He strolled up to the doorway and inspected it from outside. Then, he sauntered in, taking in the room. It didn’t take long.
“This is, um, great,” Spike said, patting the door, which was a large slab also made of deep blue crystal.
Twilight beamed. “You like it?”
Spike cleared his throat. “This is temporary, right?”
“Permanent!”
“Like, permanent for now, you mean.”
Twilight raised her eyebrows. “That’s not what permanent means.”
Spike held up a thoughtful finger. “But what if it could be, for the sake of this situation here? Would you consider, like, an addendum? A note in the dictionary, right below permanent. Something along the lines of ‘note: could also mean not permanent’.”
Twilight shook her head slowly. “That is not how it works. At all.” She pointed to the room, patting the wall. “Look, Spike, I’ve already cleared out a windowless broom closet for you. It’s your own personal space to practice using fire.”
“Don’t get me wrong, I totally appreciate the five minutes of work you put into this,” Spike said. “And you’re right, it’s safe and everything, just like you wanted, but—”
“Wonderful!” Twilight slammed the door shut. Not supervising was a lot easier when he wasn’t in sight.
Twilight did a little hop as she walked away. She’d found a way to give Spike exactly what he wanted! Spike was finally alone, unsupervised, and safe as could be.
Twilight closed her eyes. Ponyville was no longer burning. Its citizens were roaming the streets, carefree, enjoying their daily lives full of talking with their friends and occasionally munching on one of many dishes prefixed with either “hay” or “apple”. The world was safe, and it was thanks to Twilight’s precautionary measures. She was an unsung hero, the hero Ponyville deserved but nopony would really have needed if Spike had just taken up knitting or something.
Then came a knock from Spike’s Closet.
She strolled back to the closet, opening the door to Spike.
His claws were empty and hung by his sides, no fireball to toss back and forth between. He gazed up at Twilight. “It’s dark in here. I can’t see.”
“You can use your fire for that,” Twilight said. “We can’t have any candles or torches in here—you’d run the risk of compounding any stray fire.”
“Okay, but—” Spike’s eyes wandered up and down the room “—I can’t even have a window or something?”
Twilight drummed her hooves on the crystal floor. “I was hoping to completely cut you off from the outside world, though.”
“Uh, that’s reassuring.”
“Mhm. Making it impossible for any objects or even flammable gases from entering the room would make it completely safe. Oh, but…” Twilight paced. “Making the room airtight, or even virtually airtight, would also impede the flow of oxygen into the room. And since not only is the fire rapidly consuming oxygen, but you’re also consuming oxygen by breathing…”
Spike scratched his head. “It’d make it hard to breathe?”
“It’d put out the fire pretty quick. Oh, and that too.” Twilight blinked, then nodded. “I had not considered this. I’m impressed, Spike.” She summoned a laser in her horn and shot it at the crystal wall, the beam crackling as she carved a small hole in the upper corner of the room.
“Hey Twilight?”
Twilight stopped cutting. “Yes, Spike?”
“I think—” Spike shook his head. “Um, never mind. Thanks for doing this.”
“You’re very welcome,” Twilight said, carving out the rest of the window. Spike could practice safely now, at a small risk of some fire escaping the room, which was miniscule. The chances that the entirety of Ponyville could be set on fire at this point was still so, so tiny—probably no higher than about 0.01%. They’d be fine. Everything would be fine.
~ ~ ~
Twilight trotted up the road to Sweet Apple Acres to join the other refugees. Though “fulfilling” wasn’t quite the best word to describe it, her prophecy may have been self-fulfilling after all.
The town was on fire. Houses were burning and everything. Ponies filed in single lines through the streets, annoyed, reduced to their primitive instincts of indifference and, “Eh, I’ve seen worse in this town.”
But this time, it was real. All of it. As she had raced through the streets of Ponyville, she’d had to stop several times and ask herself if she was just imagining it again, encouraging herself to snap out of it, but then a bright green blazing building would collapse in front of her and her somewhat considerable aversion to very hot things would kick in.
She ticked off boxes on her checklist as she passed by all the ponies in line, telekinetically carrying her dresser full of emergency supplies. When she reached her circle of friends (or, most of them, minus Rainbow and Pinkie), she took a seat and set her dresser down in the dirt with a soft thud.
Rarity turned around, standing beside a dresser of her own. “Oh, you too?”
“Of course,” Twilight said. She checked her friends off the checklist and tapped her pencil on the clipboard. “Rainbow Dash is helping put out the fire, right?”
“Yup,” Applejack said.
“Great.” Twilight made a check. “Just one more left: Where’s Pinkie?”
Fluttershy looked down at the ground. “She, um… she dropped and rolled, but forgot to stop.”
All the ponies in the circle took a moment of silence. This made it much easier to hear the wildly screaming pink-and-green fireball rapidly rolling towards Baytenswitch Lake. Everypony turned to look as an immense SPLOOSH echoed in the distance.
“Oh, good.” Twilight checked off the last box. “Well, everypony in Ponyville is now accounted for. And we’ll have plenty of food—since I didn’t take into account the Apple farm, that’s about 25 acres worth of apple trees, and assuming a yield of 300 bushels per acre, at 32 apples per bushel, that gives us almost a quarter million apples on this farm. If all 317 of us ate five apples a day, that’ll last us… about five months. Well.” Twilight guffawed and waved a hoof. “Like I had anything to worry about.”
Fluttershy nodded. “Those were numbers.”
“Don’t worry, now.” Applejack nodded. “Her maths check out. I took applegebra, too.”
Twilight nodded. “That’s not a word.”
Rarity nodded. “I’ve barely started to come to terms with the fact that most of my life’s work has been absolutely obliterated, and my friends can’t seem to find anything more meaningful to talk about than math and made-up words.”
Everypony nodded in solemn agreement.
Fluttershy stared off in the distance at Ponyville. “It’s such a big fire.”
“It most certainly is,” Rarity said. “The weather team will have to pull in a lot of rain, I’d imagine.”
“They have.” Rainbow Dash flew in, huffing and panting and wiping her forehead. “All the rain in Equestria. This is gonna make for a nationwide drought and a whole month of wicked hot temperatures.”
Applejack swallowed. “Sounds like that’ll do a number on my crops. I have a feelin’ Ponyville’s in for a mighty harsh food shortage this year.”
“Oh, I hadn’t taken that into account,” Twilight said. “Yes, well, with no rain… We may only last about a month on apples alone. Hopefully we can rebuild all of Ponyville in just one month’s time.” Twilight shoved the checklist in her dresser and turned to Applejack’s barn. “Well, Spike? How about we claim ourselves a square foot or two in the barn for the night?” She turned around to face the dragon on her back.
Spike’s pupils were bigger than hoofballs, shimmering and spilling out rivers of tears. He trembled like a puppy stuck out in the rain.
Twilight gasped. “Spike?” She lifted him off her back in her magic and hugged him. “Spike, what’s the matter?”
He sobbed against her. Ponies around them began to stare, so Twilight teleported the two of them away from the crowd and into the east apple orchard, behind a tree.
Twilight rubbed Spike’s back as he wept. She licked her lips, thinking of ways to cheer him up. “If this is about the castle, don’t worry. It’s made of crystal, not wood and hay. Once the fire’s put out, the only home that won’t be completely reduced to a pile of smoldering ashes will be ours!”
Spike only wailed louder.
Twilight frowned, mentally kicking herself. “Look, Spike, I’m sorry,” she said, taking a deep breath. “Something bad happened, but these things happen once in a while, you know? We’ll just have to push through it together. Life will be the way it was before you know it.”
Spike’s wailing calmed down after a bit. Twilight held him close, wrapping a wing around him to protect him from the cool evening air. His crying reduced to the odd sniffle and gasp.
“I’m so sorry,” Spike said, wiping his eyes. “It’s all my fault.”
Twilight looked him in the eyes, grabbing him by the shoulders. “Look at me, Spike, it wasn’t your fault,” she said. “It was the methane tank company’s fault. It was just really unfortunate that the valve they use for the tanks was cheap and prone to leaking. And that all twelve tanks had faulty valves. And that it took three hours for anypony to notice that the gas had leaked across all of Ponyville. That is far and away their fault.” Twilight furrowed her eyebrows. “Funny how no one got hurt. Not that I’m complaining, but it seems so odd. Are ponies methane-fueled-dragon-fire resistant or something? I need to research that…”
Twilight looked down at Spike, who was on the verge of tears again. “…Later,” Twilight said as she pulled Spike in for another hug.
Spike buried his face in Twilight’s chest. “I still started the fire,” he mumbled.
“Honestly, Spike, anypony could’ve started that fire. That you started it is a testament to how little we actually use fire.”
Spike nodded, backing away from the hug. “It was just a fun thing, you know?” he said, turning to look at the roaring blaze that used to be Ponyville. “Was a fun thing.”
“What do you mean? I thought you liked practicing using your fire.”
“I did, until you, well,” Spike wiped his nose. “Never mind.”
“Until what? You can tell me.”
Spike looked up at Twilight, twiddling his thumbs. “It was fun, until you made me feel like a freak.”
Twilight cocked her head. She hadn’t meant to make him feel that way. She had just been taking precautionary measures. The fire-resistant glass and the welding helmet and the fireproof closet (initially without windows) were only meant to…
Oh. Maybe she’d overdone it a little.
Spike traced circles in the grass with his foot. “It was my magical thing, you know? Like, you and Rarity have magic and Rainbow has wings and Applejack has apples and Pinkie has… you know. I just thought my fire was a neat ability to have. But then it wasn’t neat anymore.”
“It is a neat ability, you know,” Twilight said. “There aren’t many ponies who can shoot fire from their face without either being outrageously angry or eating something extremely spicy.”
Spike stared down at his feet.
Right. Freakiness and all that. “Look, I’m sorry about this, Spike. I never meant to make you feel like a monster. I just wanted to protect you.”
“But you tried so hard to protect yourself,” Spike said, rubbing his claws, “I was afraid of me, too.”
Twilight wanted to refute that, but she couldn’t help that her actions had said otherwise. Whatever her intentions were, Spike didn’t fear his own power: just himself.
But she couldn’t just not try to be safe. Supervision was necessary, after all. Twilight rubbed her chin. Perhaps a more relaxed form of supervision was in order.
Twilight set her hoof on Spike’s shoulder. “I’m sorry I worked you up about this. I’ll cut back on the safety stuff, okay? I mean, I’ll still have to supervise you for now, but I won’t be so extreme about it.” She stroked her chin. “I think the law of diminishing returns applies here. We’ll find the break-even point, all right? Together.” She started to walk towards Applejack’s barn, her hoof around Spike’s shoulder.
Spike nodded and walked with her. “Okay. So you’re still going to supervise me.”
“Yes, but I want to watch. I want to see what you can do.” Twilight raised an eyebrow. “Can you make three fireballs and juggle them?”
A smile spread across Spike’s face. He put his claws on his hips and grinned. “Easy.”
“Bet you can’t juggle five.”
“Psh, no one can juggle five.”
“I can.”
“Duh, you’re part unicorn.” Spike stopped walking. “But, uh, can we leave the fire extinguishers at home next time?”
“Yes.”
“And the bathtub?”
“Yes. Well, no. I agree, the bathtub was overkill, but I will need to bring water. Maybe in a bucket next time.”
Spike mumbled, folding his arms.
Twilight sighed, smiling. “I’ll bring a towel, too.”
They walked off together towards the barn. Over the blaze that used to be Ponyville, the sun shone as it drifted behind the horizon, the biggest fireball there ever was.
