A Prank Too Far
Written by TheCrimsonDM
They all faced Rainbow Dash. The entire town, zombified, looking for more of the tartarus condemned cookies. Rainbow stepped away from the townsfolk as they approached. Her ears folded flat against her head. Her heart racing a thousand miles a minute.
“This is all my fault,” Rainbow Dash said. Her heart was shattering inside. Knowing that she killed everyone and transformed them with her cookies. Everyone she knew, everyone she loved. Dead. And all because she was trying to pull off the best prank ever. No prank was worth this.
“Cooookiees,” Pinkie Pie moaned as she shuffled forward.
Rainbow Dash tried to hold in her emotions, but those walls around her heart had already crumbled. Tears ran down the sides of her face as she looked at all her friends. Rainbow goo covered their muzzles. Fur and manes gone gray with the first stages of rot.
Rainbow Dash leaned back and sobbed. “I’m sorry! I didn’t mean it. I’m so sorry.” Rainbow Dash knew full well that there was no redemption waiting for her. Pinkie shuffled ever closer. She was gone, the dead look in her eyes made her look like a complete stranger. Fluttershy was gone, Twilight was gone, Rarity, Applejack, all of them. Gone. Even Scootaloo, the little filly that always looked up to Rainbow Dash was a zombie now. The thought struck her like a hammer to an anvil, she was a filly murderer.
Rainbow Dash couldn’t live with herself after this, the greatest of betrayals and failure. Rainbow Dash’s hoof bumped into a box full of the toxic cookies that had turned her friends from living, bright, and wonderful ponies, into the undead nightmares she now faced. Rainbow Dash tried to convince herself that she could fly away and get help. It didn’t work. She’d seen the movies. Once you became a zombie…
There was only one way out of this. Only one way that Rainbow Dash could accept. Rainbow Dash picked up the box of cookies and opened it. The zombie ponies shuffled a step faster. Rainbow Dash closed her eyes as they all converged around her. “I’m so sorry.”
Rainbow Dash shoved her muzzle into the box and ate greedily. The cookies didn’t taste that good, and the poisonous rainbow paint splattered against her mouth, neck, and chest. Still she ate, until they were gone. Once they were Rainbow threw the box down and begged, “Please be quick. Please be quick. Please be quick.”
Seconds ticked by slowly. She thought back to how long it had taken for Pinkie Pie to turn. Maybe she’d have to suffer first before becoming one of them. Before she could join her friends in whatever afterlife awaited a murderer like her. Before that though she might be torn to shreds by the zombies surrounding her. The quiet, still zombies.
Rainbow Dash opened her eyes, it was hard to see through all the tears. Twilight stood in front of her, but the crazed look in her eyes were gone. Nopony moved, nopony asked for more cookies. Rainbow Dash wondered if this was how they saw each other, or perhaps she was already dead and being feasted upon and these were the souls of her friends come to take her into the afterlife.
“I’m so sorry,” Rainbow Dash whimpered.
“Rainbow Dash,” Twilight said, she sounded shocked, confused, and sad all at the same time. “You ate the cookies?”
“How could I live with knowing what I did too all of you? Of course I ate them. I… I killed you all, turned you into zombies, and, and I couldn’t even save Scootaloo or Rarity.” Rainbow Dash was shaking. The tears flowed freely down her face. “Something like me is better off dead and zombified.”
Rarity blinked. “You thought we were dead?”
“You’re zombies, of course you're all dead. Now I’m staring at your departed souls.” Rainbow Dash looked around, nopony looked happy. If they were really here for her they should look happy. Still she shook uncontrollably. How come her own spirit was shaking. Weren’t the dead supposed to be calm?
“Rainbow Dash, we’re not dead,” Pinkie Pie said. “This was a prank.”
Rainbow Dash looked at her. “I know it was a prank. I tried to prank you with these poisoned cookies.” Rainbow Dash thrust a hoof behind her. “I, I killed you all. I’m a monster.”
Pinkie shook her head. “No, what I mean is that we pranked you. We aren’t zombies.” Pinkie Pie rolled her eyes and wiped the rainbow colored paint from her lips. “Come on, get with the program.”
Rainbow Dash stared at the group long and hard, but stayed silent.
“We were trying to teach you a lesson,” Twilight said. “I hope you know what it feels like to be pranked with mean pranks now.”
The other four nodded in agreement.
Rainbow Dash stood up. “You made me think you were dead, that I killed you and turned you into zombies. All of you. As a prank?”
Pinkie Pie smiled. “Yeppers! Awesome prank right?”
Rainbow Dash didn’t smile. “Yeah, awesome. So awesome in fact that I’m going home.” She walked past Pinkie, bumping into her along the way.
Rarity stepped behind her. “We were only trying to make you understand how we felt.”
“Message received,” Rainbow Dash said. She couldn’t decide whether to be angry, hurt, or confused, so she settled on the most familiar of the three; anger. “Tell ya what, no more pranks. Ever. I’m done with them.”
“You don’t have to quit pranking ponies, just be nicer about it,” Twilight said.
Rainbow Dash got to the door. “I’m done. Good night.” She made sure to slam the door behind her on her way out. She listened in just for a moment and heard the ponies inside talking in hushed tones. Since she couldn’t make out what was being said she went home. Rainbow Dash couldn’t believe what they had driven her to do, even if the attempt was in vain. She had just tried to kill herself because of what she’d done to her friends. It didn’t work because it wasn’t meant too. Rainbow Dash went home, she felt numb all over. Her heart was empty.
No matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t get it out of her head. She couldn’t forget seeing her friends like that, as reanimated corpses of her own design. If this hadn’t been a prank, if those cookies were really poisonous, Rainbow Dash would have killed everyone. That thought was going to stain her soul for the rest of her life.
Even if Rainbow Dash could admit that she’d been a bit mean, if not outright cruel with a few of her pranks lately. There was no way she could forget what her friends did to her that night. Rainbow Dash was wounded by that prank of theirs in ways she never thought possible. That prank had gone too far.
Rainbows and Suicide
Rainbows and Suicide
Written by TheCrimsonDM
Staring out over the balcony of Ponyville’s crystal tree-castle Rainbow Dash could feel the urge to jump, perhaps stronger now than ever before. Once upon a time that urge would lead right into her doing some acrobatic stunts and showing off for her friends. Now it was different. She wanted to jump, but she didn’t want to open her wings and fly. Smashing into the ground at maximum velocity almost sounded pleasant.
After all, what would her friends care? They had broken her trust with that zombie prank of theirs. All of her closest friends betrayed her, hurt her, and then acted like it was all okay because it was done in the name of revenge. Even Fluttershy, the last pony Rainbow had ever expected to hurt her, had joined in on the prank. It was true that Rainbow Dash might have gone too far with her pranks and she was willing to admit that now. Still that didn’t change one simple fact that she had already tried to kill herself in redemption of what she’d done and that darkness inside of her didn’t go away after the fact. It was still there, cold and hungry.
The ground below was looking very tempting. It would only take a hop, a skip, or a jump and all of Rainbow’s problems would no longer be there. One of her hooves stroked the smooth railing.
Twilight’s voice called from just inside, “Rainbow Dash! Are you okay out there?”
Pinkie’s voice followed it. “Yeah, we’ve been waiting for your turn forever! Can I roll for you?”
Rainbow put her hoof back down. It was time to go back inside and continue pretending that she was okay, and that they hadn’t broken her. Every one of her muscles ached as she moved back inside. It almost killed her to put on a false grin. The game board on the table was filled with various little characters, five of them were bright and colorful while the rest were all red.
Rainbow Dash took a seat in between Fluttershy and Rarity. “What did I miss?”
“Not much,” Rarity said. “Pinkie Pie just opened a trapped door and somehow rolled a natural twenty to escape it.”
Pinkie Pie flashed a child like grin. “I told ya I’d be fine.”
Rarity’s eyes lowered. “No you didn’t. You said, and I quote, ‘Ohh, a secret door, I wonder what’s behind here?’ and then you opened it, and the explosion did five damage to me and my wonderful mane.”
Twilight groaned. “Come on, is somepony going to do anything? You’ve been arguing about this for five minutes. This isn’t even a proper role-playing game.”
Rainbow Dash shrugged. “I guess I’ll go into the secret door and see what’s there.”
A pink aura surrounded Rainbow Dash’s character, a little figurine of a mare with a mane of purple and silver wearing chainmail and holding a broad sword in her teeth. The figurine moved through the door on the map and into the next room. Three of the red monsters appeared on the map, each one was some kind of giant lizard with big robes and even bigger pointed hats.
Twilight beamed as she spoke in her narrator voice, “You walk through the creepy tunnel filled with dust and loose soil into a small chamber with an altar and a magical book with a pony’s face stitched onto the cover. Three of the Lizard Wizards are there performing some kind of ritual, they look like they are completely lost in their ritual. What do you do?”
Rainbow Dash couldn’t bring herself to really care. This game had lost all interest on her about ten minutes after coming to Twilight’s house. So Rainbow Dash thought she’d just end the game as quickly as she could, she’d seen Twilight use this exact scenario before and almost died last time. “I go to the book, pick it up, and start reading it out loud.”
Everypony froze, for a brief moment it looked as if Rainbow had managed the most amazing feat in Equestria, shutting the elements of Harmony up. Of course Twilight ruined the moment by asking, “A-are you sure?”
Fluttershy grabbed Rainbow by the leg. “Please don’t. Last time we had to fight a big, scary, star thingy.”
Rainbow eyed the table hard and tried to ignore the traitorous hooves touching her. It felt like her skin was trying to crawl away from Fluttershy. “Too bad you didn’t follow me or else you could have told me that. I open the book. And I read from it aloud.”
Fluttershy pulled back, she looked wounded.
Twilight raised an eyebrow. “Okay, it uh… it’s another one of the Fellstar books. I’m going to need to roll a die and compare it to the table of random effects,” Twilight rolled a D20. It landed on a natural 1. “Oh… oh… uh, look if you want to buy out of this I will allow you to sacrifice a rare item to-“
“What happened?” Rainbow asked in a tone that brokered no argument.
“The book uh… rips your face off and replaces the cover of the book with your old face. You… died,” Twilight said in an apologetic tone. “I can help you make a new character in a moment, um did you want try being a pegasus this time, or perhaps a uni-“
Rainbow Dash pushed away from the table. “Whatever, cool, I’m dead. See you later.”
Before anypony could argue Rainbow Dash jumped into the air and flew back out the balcony door. Her movements were much slower than normal, but still faster than Fluttershy. There wasn’t really anywhere for Rainbow to go now that she’d effectively pulled off ruining everypony’s fun. She could always go home but the only thing waiting for her there was the sinking hole in her heart, but by this point it had almost become a comfort to know that she didn’t have to care about anything anymore.
It was going to be a long night.
***
The next couple of days went by with Rainbow Dash doing her best to ignore her so called friends. Nopony came to check up on her. Nopony was worried about her killing off her own character in Twilight’s game. Nopony cared.
If she had had any doubts about being abandoned before they were gone now. She knew for a fact that she was now all alone. There was no way anypony could understand what it was like for her. To think she had hurt her friends so badly that she could only make up for it in death, then to find out that it was all just a lie.
Rainbow Dash was the most awesome pegasus in Equestria, or at least she used to think she was. The poison her friends had planted in her heart was eating away even at her own memories. She questioned whether she had just been fooling herself this entire time in thinking that maybe she could be more than the worthless winged pony that she was. Even the fact that she was a fully fledged member of the Wonderbolts was something she now believed she’d earned only by riding on the backs of her friends. If it wasn’t for them, and their fame, Rainbow wouldn’t have been anything.
The afternoon sun didn’t help her feel any better as she sat in a tree staring out over the seemingly endless plains of Equestria. Ponyville was behind her, having fun and sharing love and kindness without her. It was almost peaceful here. Almost peaceful enough to close her eyes and never wake up.
Just as she was on the verge of falling asleep she heard two voices talking. They were growing steadily louder as they approached her. One of them was easily recognizable.
Starlight Glimmer’s voice sounded almost musical it was full of so much joy. “Come on, it’s a great place to just watch the sunset. I discovered it right after I moved here, best of all nopony ever comes here.”
The other voice was familiar though Rainbow couldn’t figure out which mare it belonged too. “That sounds wonderful.”
“I’m glad that I took you up on that offer to go on tour with you for a few weeks.” Starlight sounded more than just a little happy about that. “Turns out that while I was gone there was a zombie infection in Ponyville. Glad I could steer clear of that one.”
The other mare exclaimed. “That can’t be true! Did anypony you know die?”
“Twilight didn’t say what happened exactly, just that everypony got better.” Starlight laughed. “I bet she fixed everything with some great and powerful magic.”
“That is not funny.”
Finally Starlight was at the base of the tree. “Oh come on it is too. I bet that if I- wait, Rainbow Dash? What are you doing up there?”
Rainbow Dash reluctantly looked over and saw both Starlight and Trixie standing on the ground below her. “Sup?”
“Uh, hi,” Starlight said, she sounded unsure of something. “Are you okay?”
“No,” Rainbow Dash answered bluntly as she turned to look back at the sunset.
“Do you mind if we sit here with you?”
Rainbow tried to shrug. “Whatever.”
Starlight sat down and Trixie took a seat next to her. For a moment there was silence and Rainbow was almost glad for that. Of course Trixie had to ruin it.
“Rainbow Dash, Trixie demands that you tell us what happened with the zombie infection.”
Starlight facehoofed. “Trixie, you can’t just demand things of other ponies. Especially if they’re not feeling well.”
Rainbow Dash rolled off her perch and landed on the ground. “You really want to know?”
Trixie smiled. “Yes, and from the one and only Rainbow Dash no less, how could Trixie refuse a story like that?”
Rainbow Dash knew that Trixie was trying to use flattery to manipulate her, but she didn’t care. It gave her an excuse to finally tell somepony how she felt, and two ponies that were not involved in the event none the less. This was going to be good. So Rainbow Dash told them everything. About how she was originally going on a pranking spree, to how she tried to pull off the ultimate prank in all of Ponyville with the cookies and how it turned them all into zombies.
“So than I was trapped in the barn surrounded by everypony I know and love, all of them killed and turned into undead walking corpses because of my selfishness,” Rainbow Dash said. “There was no way I could fix them, I’ve read the books, seen the comics, and the movies. There’s only one way to cure a zombie, and that’s with a blow to the head. I would never hurt my friends, undead or not. So I’d killed them, I was responsible. It was all my fault. There was only one thing I could do to make up for it, I ate the cookies.”
Trixie and Starlight both gasped. Starlight was first to respond. “But they were infected cookies! How did you not get infected?”
“Yes! Tell Trixie!”
Rainbow Dash tried to smile but it came out as more of grimace. “The cookies did nothing to me. In fact when I ate them, everypony just stopped and stared at me wide eyed. I thought maybe I had joined them at first and that was what it was like to be a zombie, but then I find out from Twilight’s own lips that none of them were actually zombies. It was all just a giant prank. They were just trying to teach me a lesson. I… I tried to kill myself for them… they made me think I had killed them… I would never…”
Starlight reached out with a hoof and gently wiped some tears away from Rainbow Dash’s face. “Shh, it’s okay. I’m sure they didn’t mean to hurt you. Did they apologize?”
Rainbow Dash didn’t even realize she had started crying, but she didn’t care. This was the one friend she had left who didn’t betray her. Even Fluttershy had joined in on that evil prank. But not Starlight. “Even if they did, how could I honestly forgive them?”
Trixie sighed, and her eyes looked down at the ground. “Trixie… kinda understands.”
Rainbow Dash shot a mean look at Trixie. “How could you? It’s not like you ever hurt your friends, or tried to kill yourself.”
Trixie’s lower lip trembled. “A-actually, I did.” That had Rainbow Dash stunned. Luckily she didn’t have to prod Trixie to continue. “Back when T- no, when I hurt Starlight’s feelings and made her cry. She was the first pony to ever care about me, the only one to really take an interest in me. I hurt her so badly though that I thought I lost my only chance at friendship and at redemption. I knew that I couldn’t survive being eaten by a manticore. Sure I really hoped that Starlight would come to my rescue, but I didn’t believe she would. I mean, what would make anypony want to save something as despicable as me?”
Rainbow Dash frowned. The story although different did sound awfully familiar. “How did you move on from it?”
Trixie shook her head. “I haven’t. It’s still a battle to get by each day, but I vowed to myself and to Starlight that I would never try to hurt myself again. Instead I would be there for her, for whatever she needed, whenever she needed it. Starlight could ask me to go to the ends of Equestria and I would do so for her. To make up for what I did.”
“But… what do I do?” Rainbow Dash asked. “My friends hurt me in a way that nopony has ever hurt me before.”
Starlight shook her head. “I’d say ask Twilight but obviously she can’t help you with this one. Maybe you could start by telling everypony how you feel and talk about what they did to you. I doubt they’d go so far as to vow a life debt to you, but they would like to help you with what you’re going through. I’m sure that nopony knows how badly they hurt you.”
Rainbow Dash’s entire body shook. “They should know. Why would they think I’d be okay after a stunt like that?”
Starlight shot back, “Why did you think that Fluttershy would be okay after being nearly attacked by a dragon?”
Rainbow opened her mouth to retort but came up with nothing. Starlight had her there. Yes everypony had hurt Rainbow Dash, and badly. Yet at least one of her friends had been hurt by her own actions too. Rainbow Dash knew that Fluttershy was terrified of dragons, more than anything else. If there was any one pony that she could trust to talk to about this, to forgive first, it would be the one pony who actually deserved to get revenge. Nopony was in the right here, but maybe Rainbow Dash could make two wrongs become a right.
***
Fluttershy’s cottage was as small as it ever was. It also smelled like animals and pine cleaner, but that came with the territory of being an animal sanctuary. Rainbow Dash was nervously sitting on the couch, a soft breeze flew through the window brushing against her mane. Fluttershy set a cup of tea down on the coffee table before taking a seat next to Rainbow Dash.
Fluttershy offered a kind smile. “I’m having company over soon, but I can always make time for us to talk, Rainbow Dash.”
Rainbow tried to return the smile but simply couldn’t find the energy to lift her lips. “Thank you.”
There was an awkward pause shared between them. The only sound being whenever Rainbow would take a sip of her tea. It was honey lemon tea, sweet but a little sour. Not at all too her liking, but she wouldn’t be a bad house guest and tell Fluttershy that.
“What did you need to talk about?” Fluttershy asked.
“That… you remember that prank I pulled on you, the dragon one?”
Fluttershy took a sip of her tea. “Yes… Why?”
“How bad did that affect you?”
“I-it was… I-I mean, I-I’m okay now… mostly.”
Rainbow tried to keep the hurt out of her own voice as she pressed for more information. “Fluttershy, please. I need to know.”
“I had nightmares for a few days. I also couldn’t sleep alone. Rarity was kind enough to let me stay with her, but I was still…” Fluttershy shook her head and opened her mouth but stopped short.
“What else?”
“I was mad at you,” Fluttershy admitted. “Really mad. You… I still can’t go near that part of the forest, even in daylight because I’m scared that a real dragon will show up. I’m just glad that it’s out of my way or else there’d be… I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have brought this up.”
Rainbow Dash was mad at herself now. Fluttershy was still hurt by that dumb prank. It was just supposed to be a joke, but it had been too much for Fluttershy. Rainbow lowered her head. “I’m sorry.”
“N-no I’m sorry.”
“Fluttershy, I’m the jerk who pranked you. I am the one whose sorry about that.”
Fluttershy blinked, than nodded. The smile that grew on her lips was genuine. “I… I forgive you. And thank you for talking to me about this in private. I… it means the world to me.”
The first part was done, apologizing for her own actions. Now for the hard part, getting an apology back from Fluttershy who admitted to harboring feelings of anger towards her. The next few words were like swallowing a bitter pill for Rainbow Dash, she needed it, she just didn’t want it. “You, hurt, me.”
Fluttershy’s ears folded back and her eyes widened. “I’m sorry, when, how? Oh I didn’t mean too. Is it bad? D-do we need a doctor? Was it during the game when I grabbed your leg?”
A bitter laugh escaped Rainbow Dash’s lips. “What? You think that pansy attempt to stop me from ruining your game was enough to hurt me? Pfft no. I’m talking about how you and the entire town literally broke my spirit and made me want to die.”
Fluttershy leaned back. “W-w-what?”
“You know with that stupid prank where you all became undead zombies. I thought that I had killed you all myself, and yet there you were just messing with my mind. I actually tried to kill myself to join you, you all watched.”
“B-b-but-“
“NO! I want you to know what you did to me. Remember that game, how I went outside to go get some fresh air or whatever? I was actually just looking at far the ground was and wondering if I could jump off the balcony and hit terminal velocity before you or Twilight could stop me.”
Fluttershy’s eyes were glistening wet. “I’m sorry.”
“I don’t know how to live with myself anymore. All of my friends betrayed me, all of them, and not a one of you has tried to actually apologize to me yet. None of you. How dare you make me think I killed you all. Now I know just how much of a worthless sack of crap I am, and I can’t believe that anypony ever really liked me to begin with. You were all probably taking pity on me. Well now you can be mean all you want, because I don’t care anymore, I can’t care anymore. I am literally incapable of caring, about anything.”
Fluttershy’s ears perked up a little but her eyes grew only sadder. “Rainbow.”
“I’m hurt.” Rainbow’s vision was too blurry to see anymore. She rubbed a hoof at her eyes and it came back wet. “I’ve never been hurt like this. What am I supposed to do? I could have killed you all, I tried to commit suicide to make up for it, and everything turned out to be a freaking lie. I, I don’t know how to live anymore.”
Fluttershy leapt across the couch and wrapped her legs around Rainbow Dash pulling her into a tight embrace. “I am so sorry. I never thought that Twilight’s idea would hurt you that much. I was just so angry, I couldn’t see how badly I was about to hurt you. If… if I had been in your shoes… if any of us had been in your shoes. Thinking we killed everypony we knew and loved… I don’t know how Twilight or Applejack would have taken it, but I wouldn’t have been able to even speak. I… I think I would have given up, on everything. Retreated to some safe part of my mind and never come back out. But you’re stronger than me. You can get past this, and I’ll help.”
Rainbow Dash looked up and met Fluttershy’s eyes. “You’re my best friend.”
“You’re mine as well, Dashie.”
Rainbow Dash laid her head down over Fluttershy’s shoulder. “Heh, don’t call me that.”
For a moment silence passed between them, and for the first time since that horrible night Rainbow Dash actually felt almost okay. It hurt, everything hurt. From her eyes to her tail she was aching all over, but at least she had her best friend back.
“Please don’t tell anypony about any of this. Especially not about the part about what if they were in my shoes.”
Fluttershy nodded. “I won’t.”
Rainbow Dash let out a sigh. “Good, because the last thing I need is Rarity or Applejack thinking about what it would be like to kill their own flesh and blood… it hurt enough when I did it… I never thought about what it would be like to kill foals before, but there I was, murderer of an entire town of ponies…”
“I wish we never listened to Twilight,” Fluttershy said.
The front door opened and Rainbow Dash’s heart froze. Her five other friends all stood at the doorway, each one of them in varying states of disrepair. It had looked like all of them had been crying, even Applejack whose face was hidden behind her hat. For a moment Rainbow Dash simply stared at them, and then she tried to wipe her face clean and looked away at the wall.
Twilight’s voice echoed across the small living room, it sounded weak, defenseless. “Rainbow Dash?”
Rainbow Dash put all her effort into trying to sound like she was perfectly fine. “Yeah?”
Twilight sniffled. “Could you ever forgive us for what we did to you?”
That was it, Rainbow’s heart was officially breaking. They had all heard her conversation with Fluttershy, or at least enough of it. When Rainbow Dash looked at the window she cursed herself for not closing it earlier. The worst part was seeing how much her own words had affected her friends.
It took every ounce of strength that Rainbow had left just to speak, and she could no longer disguise the pain in her voice. “How?”
Twilight shook her head, a few glistening tear drops hit the floor. “I don’t know. We’re monsters for what we did to you. You could set my entire library on fire and it wouldn’t even compare to how badly we hurt you.”
The others all looked at Rainbow Dash with pleading, hurt eyes. For a moment Rainbow Dash put herself into their places and wondered what it would have been like to hurt one of her friends that badly and to know she could never make up for it. That the damage and the scars would be there for the rest of her life. Rainbow Dash closed her eyes. The closest she’d come to that was with Fluttershy, and even then it was too painful to think about. It might be impossible, but Rainbow Dash had made up her mind.
Rainbow Dash cleared her throat and made sure that she had everypony’s undivided attention. “Everypony, I... I love you guys. I don’t know if I can ever forgive you all, but… I can promise to try.”
That night was spent having a lovely little dinner at Fluttershy’s cottage. Even with everypony trying to make amends, and promises to help Rainbow heal from the trauma they all put her through, Rainbow had to admit it was the first time she’d been honestly happy in a long time.
