Fluttershy was always my favorite.
I mean, there's nothing wrong with the other Element-Bearers, by any stretch. Twilight's all smart and stuff, Rarity is gorgeous and basically rolling in money, Rainbow Dash is on record as being the fastest thing alive, Pinkie's probably the funniest pony who's ever existed, and Applejack is totally ripped. And I like all of them well enough for who they are, but none of them can beat Fluttershy.
There's just... something genuine about her, you know? When she smiled, you felt like she really meant it. For the others, it always felt... not fake per se, but like it could be fake. I never got that feeling from Fluttershy. She felt like she really was that sweet, that caring. She felt like the kind of pony you could really fall in love with, and not worry about your heart being broken.
"I always wanted to tell her how I felt, you know. But there was never a right time."
"There seldom is, sir." Fiddle Diddle, my unicorn butler, always knows just what to say.
"And now that I finally can tell her..." I look out the window at the Shady Oaks Retirement Village. She's there even now, reclining on a bench and chatting to the lovely little songbirds. She's so old now. Though the years don't weigh on her as much as on some of her friends, they still gather on her shoulders like snowflakes. Her face is creased with wrinkles, her mane is faded and frayed, and she doesn't seem to ever stop molting. "There's no way she'd take me now."
"Oh, I don't think so, sir. I think a young lover would be just the thing she'd enjoy at her age." Fiddle offers me a choice of suits, but I turn them all away.
"How little you know of romance, Fiddle. I am far too young for her." I draw the curtains for emphasis, and turn away from the window for good measure.
"It seems to me, sir, that you think her too old for yourself." I hear the curtains flick open, and feel the sunlight on my back. I grit my teeth, and turn on Fiddle. He's staring out the window, almost daring me to strike out at him while he's defenseless. Well, I won't stoop to that level.
"You forget your place, butler." I draw the curtains again, right in his face.
"And you forget your very nature." He rips the curtains away from their moorings, and they burn to ash before they hit the floor. "You are an alicorn, sir. You will live forever. In ages to come, mortals will lust after you just as you lust after her, but they will have no concern for the centuries that lie between. They will seek you for your passion, your fire, those things that will always endure even when you inevitably start to age."
I flare my enormous crimson wings at Fiddle. "What does any of this have to do with Fluttershy?"
"Look at her." He points through the window at the aged mare, and I follow his hoof reluctantly. "Has she ceased to smile? Have the years taken her sweetness, her caring nature from her? Is the mare on that bench any less kind than the mare who tamed Discord?" He turns to me, and his eyes burn with a fire I have only before seen in the throats of dragons. "The mare you fell in love with is not trapped in the distant past, Your Majesty. She is sitting right there."
I look out there one more time. Yes, perhaps there is some shadow of the Fluttershy from my youth out there. But that's all it is. A shadow, faded by time and easy living. The Fluttershy I fell in love with was a warrior, a saint who could charge into battle against hordes of giant insects and come out the other side just as bright and kind as before.
To love any other form of her would devalue her legacy. It would diminish her. I refuse to do that. Not to her.
"Not my Fluttershy."
The fire in his eyes fades, so quickly it is more like a candle being snuffed out than a bonfire being doused. "You are without a doubt the most bull-headed alicorn there has ever been."
"Horse-headed, actually." I toss my dark, lustrous mane for emphasis. "If I were bull-headed, that would say some very distressing things about our relationship with Yakyakistan."
That gets him to laugh, at least. It's better than him giving me that look like I'm about to jump into the Abysmal Abyss with my wings tied down. I get enough of that from Dad.
"So, that's it, then. There's nothing I can say to turn you away from this?" There's a hopeful note in his voice, but it's mostly resignation.
"Not an Auntie-Twilight-blessed thing, no." I put on my best goofy smile, though at my heart I'm still totally serious about this. He retorts with his own smile, but it's more of a 'what am I going to do with this glorious lunatic' smile than an 'oh, you incorrigible rapscallion, you' smile. Trust me, there's a difference.
"Well, could you at least put on a decent color before heading out? You'll scare the poor dear half to death, looking like that."
I look down at my own body. I painted myself red about a year or two ago - well, not really painted, more cast a coloring spell on my coat after I realized that paint could wash off. If I'm wet, I tend to look like I just got born, and not in a pretty way. Since I don't wear my regalia to anything except state functions and surprise appearances at schools, the only clothing I've got on is a leather jacket that has dinosaur teeth instead of metal studs. And then from the head up, things get kind of mental. So mental, I actually have to pull over a mirror to make sure they're as mental as I remember.
Oh, yeah. Mom said I couldn't paint my horn black and red, mostly because the last thing we want to do is normalize Sombra (say what you will, that stallion had mad fashion) so that had to stay the same pearly white. I compromised at first by slapping a fake inhibitor on it, but that just made my magic really slippery, so I needed something else to make me cool. Originally, I was going to leave my mane alone, have it juxtapose my coat with its family-friendly purpleness, but I decided to color it solid black so my horn could provide the contrast instead.
Yes, I did kind of end up looking like a female version of Death's Chord but with more convincing wings. It's kind of funny it turned out that way, really. Not many rockers of his hardness can say they've done an album with a Princess of Equestria.
"I think I look good."
Fiddle's face looks like he thinks I'm joking. I decide to cast the time travel spell before he realizes I'm not.
Nopony makes a mockery of Flurry Heart's style.
I think the main problem with travelling back in time to just after you were born is that pretty much all the landmarks you've memorized over the years haven't been built yet. Like, seriously. Ponyville changed way more than it had any right to over the course of thirty years.
It really doesn't help that Shady Oaks Retirement Village wasn't actually built until lil' old Flurry Heart was having her first lager. Back in the past, it was still just Whitetail Woods. And not the footpath part, either. No, that's still there in my time. They built Shady Oaks right in the middle of one of the densest bits of wood you can find around Ponyville without heading into the Everfree. It's amazing, how much deforestation you can get away with when you can just tell the trees to get up and relocate.
From my perspective, nothing much happens. One second I'm in a guest room of a dusty old house for old ponies, the next I'm sitting in a small crater of scorched earth surrounded by some very angry trees. From where they're standing, I'm pretty sure they just saw a huge bubble of fire that turned into a pony.
There's about one second where I think everything is going to be totally fine, because the trees will recognize one of their five princesses. Then I realize that A) they probably haven't met Flurry Heart yet, and B) I currently look nothing like the baby. I'm going to need to get out of here. Fast. And not flying fast, I need teleportation fast.
So I teleport. The destination doesn't matter, so long as I'm definitely moving away from the angry trees. Space blurs into nothing, and the unfamiliar magic of a bygone decade wraps eagerly around me.
When I open my eyes a second later, I am safe. Better than safe, actually. I've teleported to the safest place in all of Equestria. I'm standing on top of the map in Castle Harmonia.
Say what you will about the Tree of Harmony and how it never lets anypony in on what the plan is, but it looks after its own. Since Auntie Twilight was so torn up about her library getting totalled, the Tree gave back with interest. It made her new castle indestructible, impervious to every kind of assault from magic to apocalypse to a good old-fashioned earth pony heave-kick to the doors. Castle Harmonia has served as Equestria's final holdout against the end of days more than once, and we're confident that nothing currently exists that can breach it.
"Ahem."
Of course, all of that is relative when you're inside the thing and Princess Twilight Disintegration Sparkle is staring right at you with a look that reminds you who it was that broke all the world's worst nightmares over her knee.
"Oh. Uh." This is about the point where the reality of my situation really starts to sink in. I'm a completely unknown alicorn basically decked out in sin's favorite color scheme, standing on top of one of the greatest tactical advantages Equestria will ever command, and judging by the fullness of the mug hovering in her aura, Auntie Twilight hasn't had her coffee yet. Scientifically speaking, I should be so many different flavors of dead right now. "Hi."
"Hi." She takes a sip, but her face doesn't soften in the slightest.
"Uh..." I'll be honest, I could not be further out of my depth here. Most of my diplomatic talent in my own era comes from street reputation, not anything that I can show off in about two seconds. All my rapport with Auntie Twilight, built up as I shared in over a dozen awesome adventures, is basically useless against this version of her. If I try to bring up any childhood stories, she'll just assume I'm a mind-reader, or worse, a spy. In fact, judging from the furniture layout...
Oh, no. The Day of Sharing hasn't happened. The changelings aren't on our side yet. If I take off my color and show her who I really am, she'll have no reason to believe me.
"Well, I'm not seeing any laser blasts, so that's something." She takes a longer sip of her coffee, and her eyes narrow. "Why are you here?"
"Teleporting accident," I say immediately, my brain apparently deciding that honesty is the best policy. "I was actually hoping to find Fluttershy's house."
I suppose it was too much to hope for that that would dissuade her. "And what does somepony of your..." her nose scrunches up in thought. Oh Celestia, she's actually trying not to be prejudiced about the color of my skin. "Sorry, let me start again. What do you want with Fluttershy?"
Okay. Take stock of things. I told her the truth, and as a result I am not currently lying on the floor and bleeding out. Maybe lightning will strike twice. "I'm a time-travelling suitor from the future. I found myself falling in love with the legends of Fluttershy's legendary exploits, and wanted to come back and seduce her while she's still in her prime."
You could probably hear a pin drop in Castle Harmonia right now. Of course, alicorns can hear pin drops anyway, but you get my point. It's getting real quiet. Twilight stares at me. She looks down at her cup. She stares up at me again. Then she stares at the ceiling. Then finally back at me.
Finally, she smiles. "Well, she's had worse. Do you need directions, or..."
"I know the way," I tell her gratefully, jumping off of the map. "I just got a little turned around in the leylines. You know how it is."
"A little, yeah. Good luck."
As if I'll need it.
I'm finally here. Standing in front of Fluttershy's cottage, a bouquet of premium roses grasped in my magic and a suave, sophisticated smile on my face. My lovely red coat is glistening with the slightest patina of sweat, my black mane rolls down to my shoulders and frames my lovely clean horn in what I hope is a very lewd light, and my leather jacket hangs open in a way that perfectly draws attention to my ample chest fluff. And of course there's my wings, so huge that I was able to keep an entire family warm with them during one cold winter. Even folded in at my sides, they hang so heavy that I may as well be dual-wielding maces.
Well, I'm not getting any sexier. I reach out a hoof, and knock on the simple wood door.
I have everything planned out. I've got a thousand one-liners, a whole list of practiced swaggers and cool moves, and years and years of want and desire building up to this one glorious moment. I am Princess Flurry Heart, and I have had the perfect plan to seduce Fluttershy since I was eighteen.
But when the door opens, all of my plans become so much dust in the wind.
I saw her old, you know. I've spent so many years watching her grow older and older, withering away while I blossomed into a fountain of eternal youth. I watched the wrinkles pile on, I watched her mane fade hair by perfect pink hair. And while I kept on longing for the mare she used to be, I must confess I had forgotten just how beautiful she was.
She doesn't look like the pony I know she is. None of the adventures weigh on her, none of the peril has left a mark on her. The only indication that she's anything more than a downright virginal waif of a mare is a trace of boldness in the way she moves. There's a certain hardness to every twitch of her demure little wings that says she knows how to fight, even if she doesn't necessarily want to. And though she tries to hide it with that precious smile, there's a fire in her eyes.
"Um, hello? Can I help you?"
Oh sweet beauty, her voice. All these years, I forgot how jaw-droppingly beautiful her voice was. If I had any chance of remembering what I was going to say before, I have no clue now. But I have to say something.
"You're my favorite pony."
She smiles. Thank everything that's ever been, she's actually smiling. And I can tell from the way she does it, she really does mean it.
"How far have you come, just to tell me that?" Do I dare to dream that there is a hopeful note in her words? That she longs for something, just as I do? There's only one way to know.
"I came back in time to say this to you. Pierced the veil of time and space and went hurtling back through my entire lifetime to reach this moment, all for the sake of a hope of holding you close." The words are rehearsed, the sentiments long ago sketched out in journals and diaries. I'm getting my confidence back, getting my lines back.
"You traveled back in time?" Oh, no. Her face, that lovely sweet face is creasing with worry and anxiety. "Did something... happen to me?"
This won't do. I have to reassure her. "No, no, nothing happened. I just... I had to see you like this again."
She only seems to be getting more confused. "What do you mean, like this?"
"Well, you know..." In all of my plans, she had never cared where I had come from, or who I was. She had fallen into my embrace purely out of the kindness of her heart, like Fluttershy should. "Time, it has a way of changing a pony, and you changed so very much."
"In what way? How did I change?" Her eyes are narrowed at me, her wings flared and her mouth turned into a frown.
I have to tell her. Even if she never loves me back, I could not refuse her an answer. "You got old."
"And?"
I look up at her, tears beading in my eyes as that single word strikes me. "What more do you want? You got old, okay? Your beauty faded, your fierce flower plucked unjustly before I could breathe deeply of its scent." It seems like my attempts at improvised poetry aren't working.
She growls at me. I'm serious, she growls at me, like a wild animal.
And then I realize she isn't growling. Something else is. Something else, standing right behind me.
"I'm an alicorn," I remind her, trying to keep the tremble from my voice. "You can't kill me with a bear attack."
"Oh, I know." She's right back to being that sweet little thing that I fell in love with. "But alicorn or not, you can still feel pain." She takes the bouquet from me, encountering no resistance. "Thank you for the roses. I'm sure they'll taste lovely."
