“Fluttershy, please. You have to eat.”

The open can scraped against the concrete floor, ash piling up along its forward rim. The sticky syrup inside quivered as the magic jostled it, before coming to rest. The faint image of sliced fruit hung under the surface, barely illuminated by the sole candle between them.

Fluttershy turned away, burying her snout in her forelegs.

Twilight sighed, inhaling through her nose. The scent of burnt gunpowder still hung in the air. It would wrap her for days, leaving her to wallow in it. “Fluttershy.”

Fluttershy didn’t answer.

“Fluttershy.”

Fluttershy answered. Even under the thick, dirty coat she wore, Twilight could see her shoulders start to shake, the motion rolling down her body as a soft sob escaped her snout.

For a brief moment, the thought of using the final two cartridges in the gun crossed her mind, before she wiped away the tear streaming down her cheek, carving a clean spot through the caked ash on her gaunt face. A small trail of purple shone through the chasm.

The fork, wrapped in purple, rose to her mouth and Twilight forced herself to take another bite of fruit. She swallowed, hard, to prevent the bile rising from her stomach. Not tonight. She needed her strength tomorrow.

) ( ) ( ) ( ) (

The carriage felt heavier. Twilight knew it weighed less; they hadn’t found any supplies in weeks. That didn’t stop it. It was illogical; less items meant less weight. That didn’t stop it, either. Even with the coat she wore, the strap around her chest chafed. The cart rattled as they walked, axles creaking, a constant reminder that it, along with the rest of the world, was falling apart.

Supplies were low. They could probably fit all of it in one of the bags, if they wanted to. Two cans of pears. Their map. The useless pieces of garbage they were lugging around for no r-

Twilight caught herself, eyes shutting as her hooves stopped in place. No. The Elements of Harmony. That’s what they were. Even if they’d failed them, they were still the Elements of Harmony. Five were in the cart, the sixth - Kindness - being worn by Fluttershy. At least, she hoped. She hadn't seen her take it off, but the heavy jacket she wore kept her from seeing it for weeks, now. For the first few weeks, Twilight wore hers, too, but that was a long time ago.

Twilight hadn't noticed herself lost in thought until she felt a hoof against her chest.

Twilight's eyes flicked towards Fluttershy. Her coat and mane had long since lost their luster, gray and ashy just like the rest of the landscape. Just like Ponyville, just like the forests, just like herself. Just like the Elements. Everything. Dull, lifeless, without color. If she squinted, she could still make out a tiny bit of yellow and pink. There were days where she wouldn't move. On those days, Twilight had to carry her in the carriage.

Twilight was thankful today wasn't one of those days. She didn't think she could go on if it was.

"S-sorry," Twilight stuttered out. She wasn't sure if she meant it. "A little longer, and we'll make camp."

Fluttershy nodded. Hooves aching, Twilight grunted and started to pull the carriage again.

Along the tracks, buildings were rare. There were the frontier towns that were built along them, at the ends of the line, but they were a long ways away from that end of Equestria; even when they found one, they were often pillaged for anything worth taking years ago. Still, today, they were lucky. Today, they found a small barn.

Pulling up alongside of it, Twilight shrugged the harness off, letting it clatter to the ground where a plume of ash kicked up. “Come on, Fluttershy, I have a good feeling about this,” she lied.

Twilight’s horn glowed, gripping the revolver in her vest with her magic. She didn’t pull it yet, but she was ready. She was always prepared. She’d never let them get Fluttershy. It didn’t matter what she had to do.

As she pressed a hoof against one of the massive barn doors and pushed, it swung with little resistance. That put her on edge. It meant that nobody had barricaded it before everything. It meant that she was walking into the total unknown.

Her fears were dispelled, then immediately replaced with others. The barn was ransacked. Furniture turned over across the floor, sprawling out chunks of discarded wood and mouldy hay. The building may have been abandoned, but not before it was turned over for everything that it had.

Twilight stepped inside. Her horn lit brighter, spraying the room with a bright purple light.

Her heart only sank farther and farther as she meandered around the musty room, snout filling with dust causing her to sneeze a few times. Each time, she clenched her magic around the revolver’s grip a little tighter, just in case that sneeze would be the one to draw attention to them; in this case, thankfully, it never did. Twilight brought her handkerchief up to her mouth, wiping away the blood from her lips.

Behind her, Fluttershy took a careful, tentative step into the building. Head low, mane dragging against the ground, she too picked through the corpse of the barn. A hoof here, and nuzzle there.

Something towards the back of the room glinted. Something glass. A relic from before the world died. Something that took Twilight’s breath away, and caused her to nearly sob with glee as she presented it to Fluttershy.

Twilight had found candy.

) ( ) ( ) ( ) (

"Do you know where we are?"

Twilight held out the map of Equestria. It was tattered, torn, fixed, then torn again, but just like the two ponies it kept doing what it needed to do, until it couldn't anymore.

Fluttershy shook her head, looking at Twilight. As she gave a nod of approval, she raised a gray hoof, pressing it against the paper. To the east, right outside Baltimare.

"No, silly," Twilight said, giving a little chuckle before she cringed. Laughing hurt. Talking did too, but she forced the words out for Fluttershy's benefit. "We passed that over a month ago." Twilight raised her own hoof, pressing the edge against the map. Just south of the Canterlot mountain, along the tracks they had been following.

Just east of Ponyville.

Both of them grew quiet.

Fluttershy broke the silence. A hoof across the table, two tiny little morsels of crunchy-coated chocolate on the wood between them.

"No, they're yours," Twilight said. “That’s all there is. Maybe all that’s left in Equestria.”

Fluttershy didn't move to reclaim them. Her head shook, a small dusting of ash flittering down to the table from her head. She reached out further, pushing them closer to Twilight.

Twilight smiled. The muscles she used to do that were atrophied, and at first it was lopsided, but she smiled. Her eyes closed, looking off to the side. "I'd be lost without you, Fluttershy." The pieces of candy were wrapped in purple before floating to Twilight's mouth, jumping in before crunching between her teeth.

Memories slammed into her like a truck. It had been months since she’d tasted sugar, and years since she’d seen Pinkie Pie. She didn’t swallow - she didn’t want it to end. The chocolate melted against her tongue, coating her mouth in a foreign flavor. The world crumbled around her. Her thoughts were everything.

"It reminded me of her, too," Fluttershy said.

Twilight's head shot up. She hadn’t recognized that voice. Weeks, maybe months, since she’d heard it last.

"Twilight?"

"Y… yeah?" She stammered out, still in total disbelief. Fluttershy was talking to her again.

Fluttershy's head ducked before she let out a brief squeak, droplets of moisture dribbling against the wooden floor, splattering against its hard surface with rolling sob Fluttershy made. "I miss them so much."

Twilight pounced. In an instant, her forelegs were wrapped around Fluttershy's withers and she squeezed. She squeezed harder than she had ever before, feeling the warm tears soak through the thick coating of ash along her neck. Before long, she felt forelegs along her back, too, a light hug that fit the pegasus in her grasp so well.

“I want them back, Twilight.”

Twilight grasped for words, mouth turning all sorts of shapes as she tried to form a coherent sentence. In the end, all she’d ended up coming up with was “me, too.”

Fluttershy’s grip squeezed tighter. “I thought you’d forgotten them.”

“No, Fluttershy. No. Oh, Celestia,” she sobbed, burying her face against Fluttershy’s filthy overcoat, nestling herself right between her chin and shoulder. “I could never. I could never. All of them -- I couldn’t.” Between sobs, the pair let out small chuckles. Glimmers of laughter in a wasteland of emotions, saplings of happiness in a forest of dread. “Do you remember the party? When I first came t- to -- to Ponyville.”

“The hot sauce,” Fluttershy said, before her body was wracked with a different pulse - laughter. The sound was like music to Twilight’s ears. She’d never heard something so amazing in her life. She’d forgotten how great it was to laugh.

Fluttershy didn’t need to say anything else. Twilight knew exactly what she meant. “Yes. Yes, that…”

For the first time in months, they slept in each other’s grip, bathed by the warm glow of friendship. Outside, a little blue balloon on a gold necklace pulsed with magic.

Author's Note

This was my foray into serious fics. I mentioned wanting to do this several times, but never had the courage. Based heavily on the book The Road, which is both my all-time favorite book and all-time favorite film. This is very sad and not at all fetishy (in fact, an overarching theme is lack of food, so it's literally the opposite of most of my stories), so if you are just here for jerk material, skip it.

The story would have followed Twilight and Fluttershy as they realize that the Elements of Harmony still function; they just need to be "recharged" by honoring them.

In the end, they would learn that the Elements empower whichever element was needed most at the time. During Nightmare Moon's attack, that was magic, and so that's why it empowered Twilight. However, now, it's Kindness, and Fluttershy would ascend to Alicorn once they reached the sunlight on the west coast.