Miles Away

Chapter 12

In the moment I felt the world stand completely still. Like the world had experienced a supernova in the atmosphere and left the whole world mesmerized. It almost felt like what I had read was a cruel joke pulled by the newspaper company, a very cruel one. There was no way that it could’ve been Angel, not after how happy and contempt he was just a day ago. I began shaking vigorously from the possibility that it was indeed true what I was reading. The shaking had gotten to a point where I couldn’t hold up the newspaper any longer with my magic.

“Velvet, are you okay?”, Peach asked me reacting to me dropping the newspaper to the ground.

I nearly lost touch with reality for a second as I began to softly hyperventilate reading what I had just read.

“Velvet?”, Peach asked again.

“I-I-I have to go. I-I-I’m sorry but I have to-”, I said slowly moving towards the door.

“Wait Velvet I don’t understand, what do you mean you have to go?”, Peach asked me.

“I-I can’t explain right now. I-I just need to go now.”, I said with a breaking down tone before taking off running out the door.

“Wait Velvet, VELVET!”, Peach exclaimed as she ran out after me before stopping as she left the door.

I needed to find a way and convince myself that it wasn’t true, that he was still there and not at the hospital from a suicide attempt.

I was dead set on getting home quickly to see if he was there. I didn’t care what was in my way, it had better move before it gets trampled. I didn’t really pay attention to anypony who was on the street going to work. I think I might have run into a couple of ponies, but like I said before, I didn’t care about them.

I was nearly out of breath by the time I made it back home with how fast I had ran to get home. I wish I had learned a spell used for teleporting to make traveling easier. I busted in through the door and darted straight for my PC. I knew that the only way to see if he was really at home was either by seeing if he was Online on his profile by messaging him. I frantically scrambled to try and turn on my PC.

“Come on, come on, come on.”, I said to myself in an almost panicked tone.

As my screen finally came on as the PC powered up, I quickly switched over to Smoke to see if he was online. Sad to say, I was tragically disappointed seeing his profile was offline.

“No no no no no no no. Please be on Kaos, please be on Kaos.”, I said in a completely worried tone starting to tear up.

His Kaos account said that Angel was “Away”, which was essentially an idle notification. I saw a small ray of hope by seeing this. I instantly sent a call to see if he would pick up. The call rang on and on, longer than I had wanted it to.

“God dammit Angel, please fucking pick up!”, I screamed out to myself breaking down into weeps and sobs.

He never did pick up. It caused me to slam my hoof into the desk before collapsing to the floor crying.

I knew that it was true, he tried to kill himself last night. I began to start to wonder all the reasons why he would try to kill himself. In all my thinking while I was crying, I began to blame it on me turning my back on him to play with Ruby. I felt that this was all because I was too selfish and only thought of myself and not for my best friend. I finally sat up and accepted it as it possibly was; I was the reason for my best friend to try and kill himself.

It took around 15 minutes for me to calm down enough to where I can fully think straight. I knew that I needed to know the real reason why he tried to do it. From what I could assume, it would take a week or two before he would even come out of the hospital. Even then, would he even be the same after all this? Would he still be his former self? I didn’t want to take the gamble to find out. I needed to find out from him as soon as I possibly could, even if it meant me going way out of my comfort zone with me never meeting or even seeing them before hoof.

As I stood up and began to pace outside my doorstep, I decided to grab a newspaper out of the box that has a full production of them. I decided to read more on the story to maybe try and piece more and more parts of this plan together. Thankfully the article had the name of the hospital he was staying at.

It was all set, I needed to get to Teche Medical Center in Mounting City as fast as I could. I quickly ran back inside to grab my hoodie that I kept in case it ever got cold and some money for me to pay for the carriage to get to Mounting City. I knew that since Mounting City was in northern Whoovesiana, it was gonna be colder up there than it is here in New Saddle. Grabbing all my things and locking up the house, I quickly trotted over to a nearby carriage station.

Carriage stations are a savior for anypony who happens to need to travel a far distance who isn’t a Pegasus. All you really need to do is find an open carriage, tell the pony pulling the carriage where to go and you would be on your way. Funny that they are slowly trotting with a carriage behind them, yet it always feels quicker when you are riding rather than trotting over to where you want to go.

Making my way to the nearest open carriage, I threw on my hoodie. I felt cold, most likely from me feeling on edge from earlier. Whenever I feel uncomfortable or on edge I always get chills and feel cold. Never really understood why, so I just accepted it for what it was. As I approached the open coach, the stallion pulling the coach quickly noticed me walking up.

“Ah, hello there. I take it you need to travel somewhere far?”, The stallion asked me.

“Yeah. Can you take me to Teche Medical Center in Mounting City as quick as possible?”, I asked him.

“Absolutely I can make it there, as long as you can pay for it.”, He told me.

“I have money for the ride. I just need to get there fast.”, I said showing him the money for the coach.

“Alright, just hop in the back and we’ll get moving in a little bit.”, the stallion told me.

I nodded and headed in the coach.

The inside of the carriage was a bit small for fitting a whole bunch of ponies all at once, but thankfully I was riding alone so it was rather roomy. It also had a set of two seats that faced each other, one in the back and one in the front. I decided to sit near the front of the carriage because it was near a window that was on the other side of the side with the door. Hearing the last little click towards the front let me know that it was the beginning; the beginning of the longest journey I’ve ever taken.

About halfway in my ride to get to my friend in time, I began to have a real insightful thought about what I was doing. How absolutely fucking crazy I was for going to meet Angel in person for the first time unannounced, I still don’t know. All I knew was that I needed to be there to find out why he did what he did. But more importantly I needed to be there for my friend, especially after me skipping out on him yesterday.

Fuck me.”, I quietly said to myself thinking more and more about how insane my plan was.

“So who are you going to visit?”, The stallion pulling the carriage outside asked me.

I was almost startled hearing somepony talk to me due to me being so deep into a thought.

“I’m sorry?”, I asked him wondering what he said.

“Who are you going to visit? I assume you are visiting somepony at the hospital since you weren’t running up to me begging for me to take you to the hospital because of some serious injury.”, The stallion inquired about my situation.

“Oh. Yeah, I’m uh, visiting a friend who was acquitted there.”,I explained to him. “Oh I see. Oh, how rude of me! My name’s Caramel Crunch.”, he told me. “Red Velvet.”, I said introducing myself to Caramel.

“So, do you mind telling me what your friend is there for?”, Caramel asked me. “Well I uh-”, I said stammering.

It was one thing to think about what I was doing, but it was a completely different ballgame actually explain what I was doing without sounding crazy.

“You’re not going about trying to stalk some nurse there, are you?”, Caramel asked sternly.

“No no, not at all that. I don’t even know any nurses who work there.”, I said nervously reacting to his stern tone.

“Good. I have had some ponies in the past try to do that to the good mares who work there. I can’t stand anypony who would do that to somepony.”, Caramel said backing down from his more assertive tone.

“You sound like you have a deep appreciation to the nurses that work there.”, I assumed about Caramel.

“Deep? That’s not enough to describe the appreciation to those mares who managed to fix my amputated hoof.”, Caramel said to me.

“Wait, amputated hoof?”, I ask in surprise hearing this.

“Yeah, did you not see it when you first saw me?”, Caramel asked me.

It didn’t catch my attention at the time because I was more focused on getting to Mounting City, but I saw a little glimpse of Caramel’s right front hoof. It had looked like a bandana covering a hoof, maybe some ponies use it for comfort when traveling. Now looking back it did look shiny for a bandana, it also looked more solid than a soft bandana.

“No way. How did you lose it if you don’t mind me asking”, I asked wanting to know.

“Well back when I used to work at a candy shop, I was in charge of making some of the caramel. More specifically the hard ones. Now they require a lot of heat to make them get hard and stay hard. I was heating up a soft batch of caramel when all of a sudden the bowl tipped over. If I hadn’t moved quick enough it would’ve been the end of me. Unfortunately my hoof wasn't as lucky as the rest of my body.”, Caramel explained to me.

“Holy shit. That must’ve hurt.”, I said to Caramel.

“Oh it did. Thankfully I was able to get to the hospital in time to get it amputated by the wonderful nurses over there.”, Caramel said to me.

“Well, glad to see that you are doing better.”, I said expressing my gratitude to Caramel opening up to me.

“Yeah. So now will you tell me what your friend is doing in the hospital for?”, Caramel asked once again.

After him opening up to me like that, I couldn’t just leave him with curiosity.

“Well, you hear about the pegasus that attempted suicide in Mounting City?”, I asked Caramel.

“Yeah, I had read about it earlier in this morning’s paper.”, Caramel told me.

“Well, that’s my friend who I am visiting.”, I explain to Caramel. “Well you’re a mighty long way from Mounting City, were you on vacation or something?”, Caramel asked me.

“N-no. Um, it’s gonna sound weird but uh, I am friends with him online.”, I elaborated with Caramel.

“Ah I see. I’m not one to use online services like you, but I guess it’s understandable. One thing I do want to know though: Why would you come all this way for a stallion you never met?”, Caramel asked me.

“It’s a lot of things really. I guess the one thing that is motivating me to go through with all of this is the fact that he’s been my only true best friend since I was a colt. I felt that it’s the least I could do for him with all he’s gone through. Even if it’s a lot to take in at once meeting for the first time without letting him know before hoof.”, I said losing myself in my rambling.

“Wow. I never realized how deep a friendship could go like that. You two must’ve been the best of friends. Especially if one of you is willing to go all this way to meet them.”, Caramel told me hearing all of this.

“Yeah, you could say that.”, I told him before looking back out the window again during the ride.

Thanks to me being able to conversate with a rather nice pony, the ride to Mounting City felt short. I knew I was in the city feeling how awfully cold it felt.

“Here I am Angel. I hope that you are doing ok.”, I told myself in my head.

Looking at the view from the window automatically gave me the feeling that I truly far from home. The streets were not as crowded as it was back in New Saddle. It felt more like the stereotypical city streets of a city like Manehattan. A bunch of ponies in suits and dresses with some holding a briefcase or bag.

After about five minutes of cruising along in Mounting City, I felt the carriage come to a stop.

“Hey Velvet. We’re here.”, Caramel told me.

I slowly scooted towards the door of the carriage before opening it to take in the unfamiliar Mounting City air. I felt my hooves go numb stepping on the ground after the long ride. Once I felt my hooves get a full feeling of the ground below them, I got to take a glance at the Teche Medical Center. It was a rather large building for a hospital. Almost the size of a huge mall. It almost was a spectacle to see. Once I was finished being mesmerized by the hospital’s size, I turned back to face Caramel.

“So, how much do I owe you for the ride and for you to hang around for a bit?”, I asked Caramel.

“Don’t worry about it. You go in there and be there for your friend. I’ll hang around here and wait for you.”, Caramel said nodding with approval.

“Thanks. I really appreciate it Caramel.”, I said thanking Caramel for letting me ride for free.

With that, I approached the door to the hospital that held my friend.

“No turning back now Velvet.”, I told myself before stepping inside.

As I stepped inside the hospital, I quickly realized how glad I was in bringing my hoodie along with me. I had never been in a hospital before nor planned to go to one, but I could tell it was not a place I would like to be with how cold it felt inside. It almost felt like it cold store packaged meat inside of it. The coldness of the lobby had distracted me from my goal: finding out where Angel was.

I made my way towards the front desk where there was a nurse working with another nurse by filing some paper or something. As I approached the desk, the nurse with a purple mane and grey fur coat noticed me walking up.

“Can I help you sir?”, the nurse asked me.

“Yeah. I’m here visiting a stallion who is in for an injury. Angel Dust is who I am looking for.”, I said to the nurse.

“Give me one moment to look up which room he is in. If you would like, you can take a seat in those benches.”, The Nurse said pointing at the benches.

“Thank you.”, I said before turning around to sit down at the benches.

Who would’ve thought after all this sitting around in a carriage for a long journey I would feel slightly tired. It felt good that I can finally sit down and relax for a little bit knowing that I was right there where I needed to be. It was literally in a matter of minutes I would be able to finally be there and know why my best friend did what he did. I knew that it was gonna be a little bit awkward with us meeting under these circumstances, but sometimes certain circumstances will cause you to do things that are completely out of your comfort zone.

Sitting down, I noticed some of the ponies that were there in the waiting room like I was. I saw a couple that were holding a small unicorn in their hooves. From the looks of it, it must’ve been the newest edition to their family. The family looked so happy holding their new foal for the first time. It was a feeling I was long unfamiliar with because of both my parents dying when I was around 12. I did have memories of them when I was around that age, but never to the extent of me when I was a foal. Thinking about them has always been a tough thing for me to do without getting emotional about it. I loved them both so much as a colt, but then seeing them taken away in such a tragic way was almost shell shocking. It really fucked me up for the longest time. Thankfully I had Peach and Angel to help me get into a state of happiness that had prevented me from ending up well…...like where Angel had ended up.

“Excuse me sir?”, The nurse from the desk said to get my attention.

I stood back up and trotted over to the desk.

“Did you manage to find which room he is in?”, I asked the nurse.

“Yes sir. He is in room 317 on the third floor. Do make sure to knock first if you go in. He has been through a lot of trauma.”, The nurse warned me.

“Ok, thank you.”, I said to the nurse before heading towards the elevator.

I pushed the button to the elevator and waited for a little bit until I heard the elevator bell ding. Once it had dinged the door had opened up. Once I stepped inside I pressed the button with the number 3 on it and saw the door close. However, there was a doctor that was running towards it in a hurry.

“Nein! Holds ze elevator door!”, The doctor yelled from the distance. Right before the door had closed, I managed to stop it in time for me to slip a hoof in to hold it for this doctor.

“Vielen Dank! I thought you might’ve not have been able to open ze door in time.”, The doctor said once he got into the elevator and pressed the button with the number 5.

As the door closed I felt the elevator move up. This doctor who was next to me was a unicorn who was grey and had a black mane. For some reason he made me uneasy, like he was more than just a doctor. Am I going too far as to assume he is also a creepy unicorn who also kills other ponies? Probably.

Once I reached my floor, I quickly rushed out of the elevator to avoid being anymore uncomfortable with this doctor. As I walked around, I managed to find the room I was looking for. Outside of the door, I found these two older looking pegasuses on a bench. The stallion pegasus with a brown mane and snow white coat was cradling the mare pegasus with a navy mane and blue coat in his hooves. The mare had looked like she had been crying for hours and hours. I could safely assume that they were Angel’s parents.

I walked over to them before Angel’s dad noticed me walking up. His face looked truly devastated, like everything he loved had just disappeared from him.

“C-can I help you son?”, Angel’s dad asked me in a low, saddened voice.

By this point, Angel’s mother had looked up with tears rolling down her face looking at me.

“I uh, came to v-visit your foal. I’m his friend. I uh- don’t believe we had met before.”, I said Angel’s father.

“Friend? A-a-angel had never mentioned anything about a friend. Well, apart from his old group of friends who went off to do, other things.”, Angel’s father said to me.

“Well, s-s-sir. I would like to see him. After the whole situation of him-”, I said before Angel’s mother begins to sob more against Angel’s father.

I felt bad bringing up this fact again to the almost traumatized parents of Angel.

“-doing what he did. I’m so sorry for all that you’ve been through.”, I finished thinking carefully about what words to use.

After he managed to calm down his wife, Angel’s father gave me an approving nod.

“Just be careful with my son, I pray to Celestia he will be alright. My precious son.”, He said before starting to cry as well. I knew that feeling all to well.

The feeling of losing everything even though it wasn’t really gone.

As I looked back at them one last time, I knew how dire the situation must’ve been on them, especially with how nice they seem. I gripped the door with my magic and turned the knob. I nervously opened the door and stepped in. I shut the door behind me, right before seeing him. I saw a pegasus with a navy mane and turquoise coat with a hospital gown in a hospital bed. He was laying on his side facing a window that was opposite of the door I had just entered. The pegasus must’ve felt my presence in the room, as he slowly sat up and faced me. That’s when I knew it was him, it was really him. It was Angel Dust, in the flesh.