Fluttershy's New Role to the Dazzlings
Fluttershy stood at the edge of the water surrounding Rut’theran village dressed in a dark-green leather robe that had been made and enchanted specifically for her, and a decently sized rucksack resting next to her. She was very different in appearance than she normally was, though that was to be expected when one became a new species. She was 6 foot 5 inches, and her skin was light purple with a bit of a pink hue to it. One could see her pupils in broad daylight, but the mystical blue glow of her night elven eyes seemed to hide them. Her pink hair, which she was very glad she had kept, flowed down her back to almost reach her butt. Her bangs were parted by her long, pointed ears that reached at least a foot past her head.
She was beautiful in so many respects. That beauty, however, was marred by the sadness currently present on her face as she stared somberly out across the ocean as it awaited the rising of the sun.
Rut’theran village was only a village in name, really. If Fluttershy truly wanted to be honest, it was more of a small island that served as a waypoint for travelers coming and going to the majestic, giant tree trunk island it rested against the base of. At least, at any other time, it would be majestic. Not today, though.
There wasn’t anything different about the giant tree trunk, Teldrassil. It still towered over Rut’theran, its massive, earthquake-torn roots still creating a rocky inlet around the island that didn’t quite surround the harbor, but could still sink an inattentive vessel. The edges of its calm, yet mysterious, forests could still be dimly seen around the rim of the trunk’s top where its inhabitants lived. Even the waves surrounding the island and tree lapped at them just they always did.
The chatter of sailors arose from one of the three docks extending from the island, signaling the arrival of a ship, a large one at that if the sheer volume and number of different voices creating the sailors’ clamor were anything to go by. It was surely their boat, but Fluttershy barely registered it as she stared at the dark, empty horizon despite how loud its occupants and receivers were. Today was a day of sorrow for her and her present company.
“A full year.” She thought mournfully to herself.
It had actually been over a full year since she and others had entered this game to rescue Sunset Shimmer. More than a full year of being a new race of creatures, however humanoid they were. More than a full year of constantly facing peril after peril, danger after danger, quest after quest in this digital world to find their friend. More than a full year in which anything could happen.
Despite all of it just being part of a game, the danger of it all was real, especially death. The memories of this simple little village from a full year ago would always remind Fluttershy of that.
*sniff*
Fluttershy quickly turned her head to behold her fellow, in-game night elves.
Sonata Dusk sat on the ground, dressed in blackened leather clothes that fit snuggly, but still loosely, as she hugged her knees. Her bright blue hair was wrapped in a long braid that reached down to the middle of her back. Her face, usually so bright and happy for a night elf, just looked old as sorrow dominated her features.
Fluttershy idly noted how much the siren turned human turned night elf had matured since they entered the game. During the funeral last year, she had been balling her eyes out uncontrollably. Now, the tears merely trailed down her face, her sobbing appearing to just now start.
Aria Blaze stood on the other side of Sonata. She was on the taller end of the spectrum for female night elves, standing at 6 feet and 9 inches. She had dark purple hair that hung in two short pigtails that reached only a little ways past her shoulders, resting lightly on the simple, yet impressive, silver plated armor with the edges lined in blue. Her helmet, sitting on the ground next to her, was just as simple, having a T-shape visor in the front to allow her to see and breath while keeping her head protected. On her back rested a long-sword that, like her armor, was simple in appearance, but had long since proven its worth in the time she had come to possess it. She was a warrior in all appearances, even with her current demeanor accounted for.
She stood with her arms folded and her face empty of all emotion as she gazed out in the same direction Fluttershy had been. It seemed as though she had neither care nor joy as she stood. However, after spending a full year of looking after her and Sonata, Fluttershy knew better than to think that. No one knew how, but Fluttershy had learned how to read the normally hot-headed girl. Whether her attitude was anger, disrespect, or disregard, she knew when she was actually happy, sad, confused, or truly angry.
And Fluttershy could clearly see that Aria, despite the fact that she would never admit it, was just as sorrowful as Sonata was.
Fluttershy turned back to the ocean where they had sent off the casket exactly one year ago. It wasn’t traditional for night elves to send their dead out to sea, especially with how oriented to nature they were, but Sonata and Aria had both insisted that it was what the casket’s occupant would have wanted. And so it was done under the light of the high moon.
Fluttershy closed her eyes.
“If only I had been stronger.” She thought to herself.
“Stop it, Fluttershy.”
Fluttershy looked at Aria in surprise and confusion as the girl’s suddenly disapproving eyes lightly reprimanded her.
Aria’s brows furrowed more as she beheld Fluttershy’s confusion.
“Stop blaming yourself.” She said sternly. “There wasn’t anything you could have done.”
Fluttershy blinked before a wry smile briefly graced her face. It seemed she wasn’t the only one who had learned how to read their company.
“I know,” she said in her notably soft and gentle voice, which had somehow survived the harshness of their journeys in this world. “But it doesn’t keep me from wishing that there was something more I could have done.”
Aria’s disapproval melted from her face, weariness replacing it as the sun began to peek out from behind its horizon covers.
“The past is past. All we can do is remember it, and use it to give us strength.” She recited.
Fluttershy nodded in both agreement and approval. That saying, spoken to them by Tyrande Whisperwind, the leader of the night elves, had been their motto for the past year. It had given them the strength they needed to move on since the funeral, and then some. It, along with the promise she had made, had given Fluttershy the strength to take the rage Aria would unleash upon her for her “failure”. It gave her the strength to put up with Sonata’s foolishness. It had given her the strength she needed to push onwards when guilt and injury demanded hers or the other two girls’ lives.
It gave her the strength to be strong for the two girls entrusted into her care.
“Fluttershy?”
Fluttershy looked to Sonata, who had just stood up, revealing her 6 foot 7-inch height.
“Do you think Adagio would be happy with us?” she asked.
Fluttershy looked at her quizzically.
“What do you mean, Sonata?” She asked.
Sonata gave a sad, shuddering sigh, evidence of how hard she was trying to speak clearly despite her impending sobs, before giving a simple elaboration.
“Do… do you think she’d be happy about all we’ve done?”
Fluttershy thought about that for a bit. While all four of them had been in the game together for about three months before… well with it having been over a full year now, Sonata and Aria would still surprise her with something.
However, in the time they had been in the game, The Alliance, one of the primary factions of the world, currently regarded all of her friends and her as heroes for all they had done in that time. They had stopped potential invasions, attacks, and saved countless lives (each one of which seemed too genuine for Fluttershy to believe were simply virtual had she not known otherwise), and they had done even more. They had done so much for so many people, it was not uncommon for them to occasionally encounter groups of people who would point at them while whispering excitedly whenever they stopped by one of the Alliance’s capital cities, especially the Night Elven capital.
Fluttershy answered Sonata’s question with complete sincerity.
“While I doubt she’d say it,” She said, “I think so.”
Sonata stared at her for a moment, looked out to the ocean for a few more, and then threw herself onto her, hugging her as the waterworks finally began in full volume and force.
“I miss her-er!” She wailed.
Fluttershy hugged her, comforting her.
“I know, Sonata.” She whispered. “I know.”
Fluttershy let her cry and cry, letting her get all of her sorrow out. Usually, whenever this happened, Aria would get mad at her for wasting their time, or for being dead weight. This time, however, no harsh ridicule came. Right now, they had the time. They had no current obligations, no requests, and nothing to distract them for this day. This was a time meant for mourning. This was a time meant for the two sisters to cry. This was a time they could truly express their grief for Adagio, their… their fallen sister.
They had not realized that they could truly die when they entered the game. They were warned that it was a possibility and that if anyone who could resurrect them took too long to do so, the death would become permanent. But it just didn’t seem like something that would actually happen. To actually die in a video game? It seemed like something meant for a movie or TV show. Such a thing couldn’t actually occur.
But it could, and they had discovered the truth of that the hard way with the cost of Adagio life.
With the only way out of the game being the defeat of all of the final raid bosses of each expansion of the game, the fantasy of which was
now very real to them, they only had the options of continuing on or just giving up on everything to let the cruelty of this world end it all for them.
“But I wouldn’t let them give up.” Fluttershy reflected as Sonata slowly began to run out of tears. “I promised Adagio I would look after them.”
And so she did. Sonata had proven to be relatively easy to look after as long as she was given something to do, and whenever she needed someone to cry to, she would provide herself to her. Whenever she needed encouragement, Fluttershy was there for her.
That wasn’t to say she was without challenges. Oftentimes, her foolishness would get them all into trouble; half of it being the kind that involved bloodshed that could have been avoided. She usually never intended it to be so, but the sheer frequency it occurred had made Fluttershy become used to the mild headaches that the girl’s ditziness would compel the world to bring about.
Sonata had worked hard to be better, and it thankfully showed. Her ditziness would still occasionally do something that would hurl them into a crowd of enemies seeking their lives in one form or another, but it didn’t occur so frequently now, and Fluttershy had learned how to deal with the few times it would still occur.
Oh, Sonata would always be a handful, but Fluttershy had learned to love her nonetheless.
Aria, on the other hand, had proven to be much harder for Fluttershy to love and look after. For a long while following the funeral, Aria had blamed her, their appointed healer for their group, for letting Adagio die, and she had made no effort to hide. Her rage would show itself in the form of simple glowering to outright violence, the latter only really occurring when she was really drunk. It had been very hard for Fluttershy to care for her. It had even gotten to point where she nearly abandoned her quite a few times, each time nearly doing so before remembering her promise to Adagio.
Fluttershy suffered glares, disobedience, rants, and even a sober beating one time from the hateful Aria, but she never gave up trying to care for and love the girl. It wasn’t until the third time she nearly gave her life to save her and Sonata when Aria finally began to let go of her hate for her.
From then on, she had proven to be extremely willing and reliable. She would still question some of her requests and commands from time to time, but she would still fulfill them nonetheless.
At last, Sonata finished crying. She looked up at Fluttershy, her completely tear-stained face bearing a weary smile.
“Thank you, falore.” She said.
Fluttershy jerked back a bit in surprise. When they had entered the game, they gained a complete knowledge and understanding of the Darnassian language, the language of the night elves, and while they usually spoke in Common, the universal language of the Alliance, they would occasionally utter a few words or phrases in the night elven tongue.
That word, however…
“Oh, I don’t think I would call myself that.” She protested.
“Pah!” Aria spat, causing Fluttershy to turn around to face her. “After all you’ve done for us since Adagio died?”
Fluttershy barely processed the single tear stain on Aria’s cheek as she tried to protest further.
“But that was because I promised-”
“You cared for us.” Aria interrupted firmly. “You put up with Sonata when she was being annoying, useless, and getting us all into more trouble than we should have been in, and you put up with me despite how much I attacked you. You showed us care and love when we gave you plenty of reason to just leave us to die and rot – and don’t even deny that I at least did.”
Fluttershy was shocked! She had never heard Aria speak like this. Anger, hate, and belittling, yes, but not this honest sincerity. She was not done either.
“ You pushed yourself to near exhaustion to care for us, nearly died three times trying to make sure we survived, and you’ve done even more without even a second thought for yourself. You’ve done more for us than anyone has ever done. If anything, calling you falore doesn’t do what you’ve done for us justice. In fact, it doesn’t.”
Fluttershy’s mouth gaped open like a fish, her mind completely failing to grasp any words to refute what Aria had just said.
“But,” Sonata asked, “what should we call her then?”
Aria paused at this, holding her chin between the knuckle of her forefinger and thumb as she thought about that. After thinking for a bit, and she smiled sincerely, something Fluttershy had rarely seen of her, as the sun finally emerged from underneath the dark horizon.
Aria looked Fluttershy dead in the eyes.
“Shan-An’da,” Aria replied as the trio were bathed in the sunrise’s warm, new rays that announced a brand new day.
Sonata smiled very brightly at this before eagerly hugging Fluttershy again.
“Shan-An’da!” She cheered.
If Fluttershy was shocked before, she was absolutely floored now. Before, Sonata had called her falore, which translated into sister. Fluttershy didn’t want to risk possibly taking the place of Adagio. While she did indeed love them, (how could she not after caring for them for so long,) she didn’t want to risk causing any sort of schism between them and their fallen sister. This, however...
Aria simply nodded before gazing back across the now sunbathed sea, that sincere smile never leaving her face. Fluttershy simply stood there, still trying to processing what Aria and Sonata had just declared her to be to them. Before long, Sonata too gazed across the sea.
Then she glanced at the docks.
“We should probably get on the boat.” She said.
Both Fluttershy and Aria blinked. They had forgotten about the ship that had come into port.
“Why?” Aria asked as she looked at her.
“Because it looks like it’s almost full of sentinels headed for Stormwind already.”
Both Aria and Fluttershy’s eyes widened at that before they turned to look for themselves. The ship they had heard come in earlier, a large, human passenger ship, should have taken much longer to unload and restock before they could even board the large number of Night Elven troops that currently stood on the dock. it could not have been in port for more than… Well, Fluttershy wasn’t really sure, but it couldn’t have been that long.
Yet it did indeed appear to have almost reached the limit of passengers that it could take, indicating that it would surely have an incredibly early departure.
“Move it or lose it, idiots!” Aria shouted as she scooped up her helmet and bag while running for the ship.
“Aria, wait for me!” Sonata shouted as she ran after her, grabbing her own bag as well.
Fluttershy grabbed her bag and began to run as well, but stopped to face the ocean again which was now bathed in the beautiful light of the sunrise.
“I’ll keep my promise, Adagio.” She pledged once again.
“Min’da!” Sonata called out to her. “Hurry up! We’ve got to get on the ship before it fills up!”
“I’m Coming!” Fluttershy called back as she resumed her run towards the dock, the sun slowly continuing to provide even more of its light for her.
As Fluttershy chased after Sonata and Aria, she couldn’t help but look at them differently. Before, they were simply two sisters who were lost without their oldest sibling to watch over and guide them, and she had done her best to fulfill that responsibility. However, now that they had declared her Shan-An’da, she doubted that she could ever look at them in that way again.
For when Aria and Sonata had declared to her Shan-An’da, they had declared her, in the Darnassian language, as Honored Mother.
