The sun was just on the horizon, bobbing like a a blazing cork over the mountains, halfway sunken and fiery, but no one had drawn the curtains, nor lit the lanterns. The last dregs of orange light made the trees and paving and brush outside look like it was burning, reflecting like liquid flame off of the glass of the window. A bit of that last sunset light leaked in and bathed the room in fire, glowing off of the dark, quiet wooden furniture and setting both the outside and in in sweet incendium.
Rainbow Dash quite liked the light at the eaves of night; she reveled in that soft glow, a cat in a puddle of sun. She liked the color it cast on everything in the house, and how it reminded her of life and jolly feelings and practically warmed her just looking at it. If the pegasus had to choose a favorite time of day, it might have been high noon when the sky was blue and crisp in her youth, but now it was certainly this time, right before sundown, swimming in that pond of orange fire-light.
Then again, as Rainbow recalled, there were several reasons apart from that as to why now may be her favorite time of the day.
"Are you coming soon, Rainbow Dash?" Rainbow heard a so very familiar voice call from the next room, ladylike but sweet, faded a bit with years, but still that voice she had always known and drifted to.
The cyan mare called back over her shoulder. "Just a minute, Twilight, be right there." She heard the paper ruffle of a book cracking open and a unicorn rifling through the pages and knew that she had bought herself maybe a minute or two or twenty; when Twilight Sparkle opened a book, time wouldn't matter if it passed in seconds or years.
Rainbow Dash turned back to the mirror. She appreciated how long this mirror has hung here, uncracked and well-kept as a whole, but such was living with the most kept unicorn Equestria had forged. Rainbow Dash smiled, her eyes aching a little with sadness and the faintest longing; everything here was the same as she had remembered it after all this time, down to the mirror. In truth, all that had changed was the reflection that looked back at her. If only just a little.
A quick flick of her hair, admittedly slower than it used to be, parted Rainbow's colors nicely, but quickly drifted back into her eyes. She chuckled and pushed them back with her own hoof as she had done more and more as of late, pinning her thinned hair behind her ears. As Rainbow replaced her hoof on the marbled countertop, she marveled for the first time in a long time at how different she looked, how the colors in her mane had grayed a bit, but, as she reminded herself, no more than a rainbow in a fog.
It took a moment for the water to creep up the pipes, but once it did, the pegasus wet her hooves in the trickle and lifted them to her face, patting them over her cheeks, matting her blue coat slightly. It was nice, cool, refreshing; Rainbow Dash had made it routine to splash her face with a bit of water before bed, enjoying the droplets that beaded up and left clear streaks as they rolled down from her lashes.
She crinkled her nose and flicked her ears, closing her eyes in the mist. Once dry, Rainbow Dash peeked around the doorway at the unicorn still buried snout-deep in her volume and returned to her reflected self. The mare winked and grinned, and her reflection winked back, looking a bit more tired than she felt. "Still looking good, Dash."
"Oh, are you done?" Twilight emerged from her words, blinking up at her partner like a hermit from under a rock. She scooted over, crumpling the sheets as Dash slid in, the wooden bed squeaking a bit at the added weight. Twilight reached to replace her book handy and grab-able on her bedside, and turned back to her mare.
"Yeah, sorry it took a little bit, Twi." Dash apologized, before huffing with quiet laughter. Twilight blinked again, befuddled.
"What?"
"You're still wearing your reading glasses."
The unicorn went comically cross-eyed, trying to catch sight of the spindly spectacles on her bridge. "Oh, pssh, silly me, let me get those..." She fidgeted her constantly trembling hooves, unable to get a grasp on the delicate lenses, knocking them off and onto the covers. "S-sorry, if I can just-"
The glasses slipped between her quavering grasp like they were made of ice. Twilight grew more frustrated and frantic as she bit her lip, fumbling with the frames until they snapped apart under her hooves, lying in two, still on the covers.
The unicorn drew her trembling hooves to her like a child, squeezing her eyes shut and looking as though she were about to cry. Rainbow Dash took the pieces in her steadier hooves, putting them gently on her own bedside.
"Don't worry, Twi," she spoke, gently and quietly, "You'll get it perfectly next time. I'll take 'em to town tomorrow, don't worry..." Her voice was soothing to Twilight like a salve.
Twilight lifted a hoof and shakily wiped her eye with the back, shaking her head. "N-no, you and I know it's not going to get better, Rainbow Dash." Her voice beat Dash's heart like a gong. "It's not."
"Shhh, don't talk like that." Rainbow grasped both of her mare's hooves and held them close. Twilight's sad purple eyes met sympathetic cerise ones.
"But you know that it's the truth. Without m-my magic, and now this trembling, I just-I just-" Her voice broke, shattering to pieces and dripping out of her worn eyes in a tear. "I'm no good anymore."
Rainbow Dash hated to see the mare she loved like this, so run down and purposeless; it broke her heart and she had to do something, anything. "No, no, come here Twi. Scootch in." She motioned warmly, allowing the unicorn to rest her quavering head against her chest.
Rainbow continued, resting her hooves over Twilight's. "Sometimes magic just fades in some ponies when they get older, it just happens. I just need you to remember something, Twilight, for me." She rested her cheek on top of the blue mane, snuggling in her scent. "You're always good, you're always worth something. You're worth the world to me."
Twilight tucked her chin to her chest. "Really?"
"Always."
The unicorn replaced her head against her mare and best friend, her mane sprawling over the cyan coat. Dash absently played with it, running her hoof over and through the silken yet faded strands, before an idea came to her with another stroke.
The pegasus adjusted, stretching to open and fumble through the bedstand drawer, pushing away heaps of forgotten quills and scraps of yellowing parchment scribbled with lost memories to find an object more lost and forgotten than any of the rest.
Twilight was still, her head rising and falling with Rainbow's breathing and erratic movements as she rummaged, before finally settling. The unicorn felt something touch her head, scrape gently and carefully over her scalp. She opened her eyes, suddenly alight with surprise and nostalgia.
"It's... It's been a long time..."
Rainbow nodded, knowing Twilight was unable to see her do so and kept combing, running the piece through the blue strands. "I... know."
Neither said anything further as Dash raked through Twilight's hair, gently separating the smooth strands until they cascaded over her hoof like a waterfall. The light from the rising moon -the sun had set long ago, they had only failed to notice- shone over the straight mane, reflecting the blue hue with the gray time had faded it into. Rainbow Dash held her breath, watching the long and lovely hair swing over her hoof and under the comb; aged, graying, yet timelessly beautiful.
It had truly been so long, so long since Dash had felt that soft mane, since she had let it drape over her, whether it be under her comb or shrouding a kiss. So long, in fact, that she had slowly begun to forget what it looked like in its full, youthful glory, remembering it only as a sheet of blue-gray and seeing the original rich navy color as a foggy, distant memory. Even as she tried, Rainbow Dash could not see it now.
And it broke her.
"I'm sorry, Twilight."
Twilight moved slightly, looking at Dash behind her from the edges of her eyes. "For what?"
Dash's hoof kept moving the comb, but her mind was elsewhere, her downcast eyes hardly seeing. "I should have done this every day." She sighed. "There's so much more I should have done. I'm really sorry, Twilight"
A tear born from the lump in her throat fell onto Twilight's mane, but Rainbow Dash was quick to comb it away. She closed her eyes and continued to comb, even softer; every strand felt like a missed memory as it glided over her hoof.
Finally, Twilight's voice broke through the choking silence, and Rainbow Dash felt a potent mix of relief and dread at her first words.
"Rainbow Dash..." The words strung through the mare's ears as she held onto her breath with death's clutches.
"It doesn't matter, you're here now."
Relief flooded the pegasus, a trickle that was quickly chased away by a torrent of something even more powerful, that seared her insides like an acid. Shame spread through Dash, and she knew then, like it always been bothering her, how much she had denied Twilight, who had deserved her whole life and the next, of.
"It does matter. I should have been there always, especially after I hurt you." Just the memory was so caustic to the pegasus's mind that it sickened her.
Twilight shifted and Dash's hoof with the comb fell limp onto the cover; somewhere, she had stopped combing anyway. The unicorn turned to face her partner, leaning to down to try to catch the cerise eyes that were staring holes into her lap.
"Rainbow Dash, please listen," She had told this story so many times, more than she could or wanted to count, and she would tell it again. "You didn't hurt me, it wasn't your fault. What happened then was an..." A deep breath. "...accident. That's all it was."
The pegasus did not meet her gaze, her voice cracking as she spoke. "I-If I was there, I could have c-caught you and-"
"No, Rainbow. Please, I'm here now." Twilight spoke, her voice teetering to the edge of pleading.
Rainbow Dash's shoulders began to tremble, silent, closed sobs rising from the pit of her stomach. Guilt. Anger at herself. Leftover pain from the years she had never forgotten.
Shame.
"What about after? I got you back, I got you back..." Dash repeated, the words still like a miracle to fall from her lips. "And I should have given you everything, all the time, but I didn't, I didn't, and...and..."
She finally tore her eyes from her lap and met Twilight's wide purple orbs. The unicorn kept their gazes locked, watching the soul of the mare she loved run down her cheeks.
"I-I didn't...I forgot...It was like nothing changed, Twilight, I'm so sorry..."
Twilight rested her hoof under Dash's chine, pulling her head up once more. Her voice came in a whisper, aged but true. "Rainbow Dash, we might have drifted apart a little over the years, but you're with me now."
She leaned forward, touching their foreheads together, cradling Rainbow Dash's shuddering form with her own quaking hooves, whispering to her.
"I'm with you."
Rainbow Dash felt the most wracking mix of emotions flow through her and ebb away, wrapped up in the most wracking memories. How she almost lost Twilight, how it was a miracle she had her again, how she vowed everything would change after that.
How she lost herself along the way, drawn by the glitter of fame and fortune, torn away from the one she loved. How many years had to pass for Rainbow Dash to return home, and return to Twilight. How her wings had started to deteriorate and become brittle and how Twilight's magic had started to fade. How many wrinkles had appeared under her eyes and how her colors had started to melt away. How many years she had forgot to count.
How many times she had missed combing Twilight's hair.
How many seconds it took to realize, right now, that her best friend and the mare she loved more than life was in her hooves.
"I'm sorry." Rainbow Dash apologized again. She had so much to apologize for.
Twilight held the sides on the mare's face in her trembling hooves, her eyes searching. "Rainbow Dash, I love you, and I always have. I do not regret anything. I do not regret the time I spent with you, I do not regret falling in love with you. I do not care if my magic disappears completely and my horn crumbles and I can never pick up another thing in my life. I don't care if all my hair falls out and all my teeth fall out and all I have left is to sit on the porch with you, the both of us bald and helpless and laughing at each other. I will not regret any of that. The only thing I regret, Rainbow Dash-"
She paused, focusing on the pink eyes, staring farther into Rainbow Dash like only she ever could.
"The only thing I regret are all those seconds I didn't spend by your side."
Rainbow Dash sunk into her, burying her snout into her shoulder and crying all those tears she had left behind. Twilight stroked her hair from the back, laying out the fading colors and resting her cheek against her love.
Moments passed, or years. Neither would have known.
Rainbow Dash pulled away finally. "I love you so much."
She didn't have to say anything more.
Twilight crawled up and the two sank back under the covers, two pillows on the bed but only needing one. The unicorn lay her head against the pegasus, and the pegasus wrapped her hoof around the unicorn, and neither spoke.
The sun had long since vanished, the world was long since still, the clouds had long since drifted into the blue horizon. The light that had washed over everything had waned, orange replaced with silver. The moon begged the light of the sun the next day, and the moon again after that, and the sun again after that.
The two mares lay, together, finally, after sun and moon and sun and moon. They were still, but not exhausted. Quiet, but not distant. Time rolled on.
Twilight Sparkle closed her eyes.
Shortly after, as did Rainbow Dash.
A/N: Oh man, oh man, I'm going straight to hell. I'm serious though, if you have any expectations about this story, lose 'em. Go on and read now. Godspeed.
"Fluttershy, you home?"
Rainbow called into the crack of the door as her hoof collided in a knock with the firm pane of the dark wood. Upon hearing a muted rustle followed by a soft squeak and the dull thud of something heavy tipping over, Dash stepped back, assured that the yellow mare was in.
"Sorry, Rainbow Dash, I'm coming!" Fluttershy's soft and melodic voice drifted to the waiting pegasus, muffled by the door of the cottage that separated them.
"Take your time, Fluttershy, don't worry about it." Rainbow shifted her weight, absently eyeing the fine carvework that bordered the frame, before the heavy wood swung open and a harried-looking yellow figure sidestepped into the open.
"Oh hey, Fluttershy. Hope I didn't interrupt something." Rainbow greeted, her eyes sliding from the scuffed mare to the door which she had shut behind her. "Sounds like you broke some stuff."
Fluttershy glued her eyes to the ground. "Oh, no, no you didn't interrupt, I was just startled and I... knoctvernmbrullastnd." She vibrated out the last words, brows drooping over the expression of a shameful and deeply mortified pegasus.
"You what?"
Fluttershy, horrible, clumsy Fluttershy looked to the side, mouth crinkling into the tiniest frown. "I knocked over an umbrella stand." She breathed, her words practically catching and withering away with the breeze.
Fluttershy winced; she considered herself a good friend of Dash's, at least well enough to expect teasing when the situation called for it. A whoop of laughter or a jovial clap on the back harmonized by a snort of mirth was imminent.
For once, however, it didn't come; Rainbow Dash only offered a small smile, and the seed of realization began to sprout in Fluttershy's navel.
"Um, Rainbow Dash, what can I help you with?" The buttery mare inquired.
Dash sighed, the airy, emotion-laden sigh that Fluttershy had come to attribute to the cyan mare as of late. A smile grew on Rainbow's face. It was forced, displaying more chagrin than it did glee.
She spoke, her voice steady, though only as steady as a thick tree in a tempest, strong, but threatening to crumble at any moment. "I just need a batch of your finest, as usual."
Fluttershy nodded in understanding, before looking up at nothing in particular as she mentally reviewed her inventory.
Rainbow swayed in place like a willow as her companion thought, quietly chipping at a pebble below her hooves. The sun felt warm over her head as it illuminated her seawater blue coat, but it was a warmth without comfort to the mare, who watched the pebble she had dislodged roll away.
"Well," A sweet voice began again. Dash looked up. "I have some daisies, if you, um, want."
Rainbow nodded, lighting her friend back up. "Sounds great, I'll take 'em." She affirmed, craning back her head to clumsily tug at the flap of the saddlebag flung over her back. "What do I owe you?"
A tickle at her ear caught the cyan mare's attention, who rose her head curiously, facing halfway back to Fluttershy. The yellow mare held a lovely white bouquet of blossoms between her teeth, her head extended to Dash, silently beckoning her to take them. Rainbow accepted, grasping the cluster of stems held to her. She reared her head back, tucking the delicate blooms into the pocket of her bag before turning back, bewilderment written in her features.
Fluttershy might as well have read her like a book. "No charge, anything for you, Rainbow Dash." She said, smiling gently in wordless comfort. Rainbow felt a pulse of affection toward the soft-spoken yellow mare, though it was quickly dulled, a flower bud trying to grow in the cracked plains of a desert.
"Thanks."
*~*~*
"Hi, Twilight." Rainbow addressed her friend as she entered, before wheezing in the musty air, thick with swirling dust. "Man, it's rank in here, mind if I open the window?"
The unicorn didn't respond, but Rainbow Dash rationalized that everypony liked fresh air anyway, and a reply isn't completely necessary. Dropping her saddlebag, while sparing a glance to ensure the flowers weren't being crushed, Rainbow made a beeline for the window, heavily draped with outdated curtains.
"You could use some sunlight in here too." Rainbow sputtered after she said it, waving a hoof in front of her watering eyes, trying to hopelessly dissipate the cloud of dust that had risen when she nudged back the moth-nibbled curtains. "Sun's good for you, you know."
The mare swallowed her words with a bitter grimace, appreciating the grim irony, before letting out a sorrow-soaked, humorless huff of laughter through her nose. "Of course you know that." She spoke quietly, addressing no one in particular, especially not the unicorn, who, liked every other day, had yet to respond to even the slightest remark.
In spite of herself, Rainbow felt the wall of ice she had willed herself to build to distract her from the clutches of helpless hope crack as she waited for only a moment in stiff silence. No sound came from Twilight, nothing but the silence, hardened like obsidian. The silence had grown to a sickening cacophony pounding through Rainbow Dash's ears, but had she expected any different?
No.
Had she hoped any different? Reality shredded through Rainbow's chest; hope would not elicit a sound from Twilight, as it had failed to so many times.
Now, just as the day before, as the day before that, it was silent.
Rainbow said nothing as she unhitched the window with a dull click, sliding it up and open to the sound of the wind ruffling tree leaves and the scattered chirps of a bird or two. She inhaled deeply, taking a welcome lungful of the sweet outside air rather than another of the haze inside. "Mmm, that's way better, can ya feel the breeze from there, Twi?"
Rainbow Dash planted her hooves back to the floor from the window's ledge, making amplified clops against the endlessly smooth, sterile floor and she approached her friend, still quiet as ever. She drew up a chair from it's quaint position against a wall somewhere, scraping the cheap wooden legs over that glassy floor, surely scuffing it with ugly gray streaks.
Rainbow released the chair, letting silence overwhelm her once more before cracking it with another breathy snort of laughter. Had this been Twilight's chair, dragged and scraping across the polished floorboards of her library, she wouldn't have it, not in the least. This time, Twilight did not berate Dash, she offered no reproach, no words at all.
"I brought you something." She plucked Fluttershy's bouquet from the corner of her saddlebag, where it had been hanging limply. The blossoms shone a glowing, almost ethereal white in the streaming sunlight, innocence and frailty in the sickening atmosphere of the room, the room that Rainbow Dash, somehow, was drawn to more often than she cared to realize. "Got 'em from Fluttershy, they're pretty, right?"
She dropped the stems into an abandoned glass of water on the rickety side table, the flowers fanning out as they leaned over the side of the makeshift vase. They lay as quietly as Twilight did. "Yeah, they're nice. I thought you might like some."
Leaning back into the tackily-upholstered synthetic material of her chair, Rainbow Dash sat for a moment in pensive quiet before remembering just what else she had buried in her bag. She scraped her prismatic mane to the side with a hoof as she bent over her pouch, voice coming muffled as she spoke with her snout shoved halfway into its depths. "Just remembered, I brought you something else too, something pretty awesome. You're gonna like this one, Twi."
She withdrew, drawing with her an angular shape which she shrouded from Twilight, covering it with both hooves as it sat in the colorful mare's lap. "So, I figured if you've gotta spend so much time in this, erm-" Moss-green nylon chairs, barren, fading white walls, heavy threadbare curtains. "nice room, something to do would be cool." She laughed darkly, looking shortly down and to the side, away from her friend. "Trust me, I know the feeling."
"So," she continued, "I brought you a surprise." Rainbow Dash held up the object in her lap, thick, square, packed cover to cover with the violet mare's favorite prose. "Tada! A book!" The cyan mare clarified, holding it so the unicorn before her could see. She peered over the top of the cover with a hopeful smile, eyes flicking from the top of the novel to Twilight's face, searching, waiting for that telltale glimmer a certain pleased purple unicorn would get in her eye when faced with a solid literary gem.
Dash waited, holding the book with a hinting smile, presenting it like a reward in a cheesy game show.
Nothing.
Sigh, like a deflating balloon. "That's cool, you don't have to tell me, I know you like books." Dash replaced the tome on her lap, running her hoof quickly over the cover before tapping it and looking back up, with a wink. "And I know this is your favorite one!"
In truth, Dash didn't know what Twilight's most highly-regarded work was; the mare would be seen perusing a new cover almost daily. It didn't matter, surely, as a unicorn with such a plethora of taste, she would likely enjoy anything.
"Unicornia: A Critical Analysis of the Rise and Fall of an Empire", the finely engraved cover read, surrounded by a swirl of colors that made up the rather abstract motif that decorated the cover. Rainbow Dash herself had never read it, her own realm of literary experience hardly extending outside the Daring Do series, but the pegasus was quite certain this particular novel would be a surefire hit with Twilight.
As she scanned over the cover once more, the proud pegasus could not help but feel a twinge of displeasure at the somewhat elitist title.
This was not the time. "Want me to read this t' you, Twi?" Silence. "'Kay, you twisted my leg."
Dash opened the front cover, the book making the most satisfying crinkle as she cracked it opening, habitually skipping over the table of contents and author's forward, sure Twilight wouldn't mind if she did, anyway.
"Unicornia, Chapter 1: A History." Dash cleared her throat as she briefly glanced over the text awaiting her. Long, dense, thick writing; certainly not something Dash herself would pull from a shelf. "Man, this is long, Twi."
Not a sound.
As Dash was met with heavy silence again, she felt her heart stiffened and pound with poisonous sorrow, and, for once, she did not mind reading every bit of dense historical prose before her. "That's okay, I'll read it for you anyways."
"Unicornia, Chapter 1: A History." Rainbow began to read, abandoning the dramatic tone she reserved for the adventurous tales of Daring, replacing her voice instead with a lower register, more serious, informative. Her voice felt unfamiliar to Dash as the words rolled off her tongue.
"Throughout the ages of evolution and genetic fine-tuning of ponykind, one race had broken away from the tedious metronome of the others, choosing instead to build civilization in accordance to the values of sophistication and finery."
The book read more elitist than even the title suggested, though Rainbow Dash did not bat an eye. She continued to read, hoping her silent friend was listening.
"...and it was through these advancements that classical unicorn society flourished, leading to..."
The cyan mare read and read, letting the words bore into her brain, imagining Twilight sitting before her, eyes wide with rapt attention, hanging on her every word. She imagined the violet unicorn curled up next to her as they used to be, each reading a different book, and occasionally peeking over Dash's shoulder to see in what sort of trouble Daring had gotten herself in this time.
Rainbow Dash imagined Twilight was enjoying the text she was reading, maybe even marveling at the flow with which the pegasus read, a little smile on her face.
Maybe the silence in the room was only Twilight caught in Dash's diction, and she had nothing to say, just to listen.
Maybe, but as Rainbow finished the chapter, and the suffocating silence spread over her once more, she felt she may as well have read to the cold, harshly white walls of the empty, square room.
"...the eventual development of what would become ponykind's greatest civilization." Dash finished, sniffing slightly as she closed the cover, burying the icy words. "Well, that was chapter 1, we'll do chapter 2 tomorrow. That okay, Twilight?"
Rainbow replaced the book clumsily in her bag, noticing how much the light from the window had diminished to a pale blue since she'd arrived. "Yeah, it's getting kinda late, I should probably hit the road." Rainbow remarked, before flinging her back over her back, tightening the strap.
She closely approached Twilight's bed, upon which the once-lively unicorn lay, flat on her back and motionless, eyes closed. Rainbow felt sick for the umpteenth time that day, but she was used to the feeling.
The cyan pegasus said nothing, only gently drawing up the pristine white sheet that was crumpled at the foot of the bed, tucking it tenderly over the unicorn's still form, feeling her worn, thinned body under the material. Rainbow was careful to avoid the needle hanging from her quiet friend's right arm, loosely connecting her to a bag of fluid on a pole and a softly-beeping machine Rainbow had taken no notice of before then.
"You look good, Twi, better than last time." Rainbow gently stroked the unicorn's forehead, pushing navy blue hair out of the way. Twilight's colors looked ghostly and washed out in the evening light, her bed and her machine and pole casting long shadows across the dimmed, quiet, sterile room.
"I better go." Rainbow said, walking around toward the door around Twilight's bed, before pausing and looking back at the still form of her dear friend. "I'll be back tomorrow, okay?"
Silence.
*~*~*
"I'm home!" Rainbow Dash called as she flitted into her cloud home, hooves finding purchase on the fluffy floor. She half-expected a purple unicorn with an expertly-casted cloudwalking spell to swing her head around the corner, beaming as she greeted her companion back.
Then, Dash would hug her, and she would smell the fresh, clean scent of deep blue hair, the feeling of Twilight's breathing pressed to her own chest. After she unwillingly let go only because she had to, Dash and Twilight would sit together under one big blanket, Dash telling of her awesome feats of the day, Twilight rolling her eyes playfully and teaching her about humility.
Then, maybe, they'd fall asleep right there in the living room, Twilight cradled against Rainbow, head resting like a tired foal's on her shoulder as the pegasus stroked her hair.
Instead, Rainbow's voice reverberated through the room, replied to by no one, a cold echo, reminding her painfully and deeply just how alone she was in a drafty, unforgiving house.
She never expected a reply, of course, but that didn't stop Rainbow Dash from calling into the confines of her house every day as she returned. She hung onto the hope-a fool's hope- that maybe, miraculously, she'd meet those rich purple eyes, sparkling with life over a huge smile again.
But those sparkling eyes were shut, dulled and tired in a washed out, exhausted body, somewhere else. Somewhere not too far, though to Rainbow Dash, each time she returned to speak with a lifeless form, it may as well have been an eternity away.
"I'm home." She repeated, quietly, as she propped her bag by the door. The house moaned in response with the wind, empty, save for the quiet breathing of one.
Exhaustion rippled through Rainbow's muscles as she walked, to tired to fly, through the ghostly house, up to her bedroom. The bed that faced her was unmade, sheets and covers strewn wherever; the pegasus hadn't bothered to make it since-
She snatched the thought from her head as it passed. No. Every waking moment was piercing as a nightmare to Rainbow Dash, and she willed herself not to spend another torturing herself over something that couldn't be rectified.
"I'm beat." Rainbow made conversation with the bare walls, imagining them to listen. "I'm gonna turn in early."
This was when Twilight would smile proudly and playfully, making some comment about Rainbow falling into a healthy routine, and Rainbow Dash would snort and shake her head with a smile.
Quit it, Rainbow Dash, think of something else.
Dash settled in the cushion of her messy bed, drawing the cover over her huddled form, all the way up to her chin.
Twilight would now be maybe running a comb through her silky hair, Dash herself would make some witty quip about never having to brush her mane 'cause she was too good-looking anyway, and Twilight would laughingly agree.
Stop it, Dash, don't think of-
Twilight would toss back her mane, freshly-combed, and slither in next to Rainbow under the covers, nestling up to her chest as demurely as a kitten, looking up at her with wide, starry eyes. Rainbow Dash would melt, affection and love pounding through her like sticky syrup, but she was tough, she couldn't show it. No way, never, it would surely be the end of her reputation, not even when Twilight would say:
"I love you, Rainbow Dash."
Rainbow loved her, truly, deeply, more certainly than she had ever loved anyone in her life; it burned through every fiber in her being. She would want to give the violet unicorn everything, wrap Twilight close, never let her go, tell her everything would always be alright, all it took was the two of them. Even then, somehow, inexplicably, Rainbow would rest her cheek atop Twilight's head and say nothing, not even as the unicorn waited for a reply.
Twilight's heart would break, and Rainbow would never know it.
Twilight would then tuck her head down, a little quieter than before, while Rainbow promised to herself that next evening, she'd tell her for sure just how much she loved her.
Then, the next evening would come, and Rainbow made another promise. And another.
Then, Rainbow would make her last promise.
Twilight would grow exhausted, she would mention aching in her bones, Rainbow Dash would presume she was joking, she would laugh. Twilight would climb into bed, more fragile than before, and Rainbow Dash would hardly notice
Twilight would speak once more. Rainbow Dash would make another promise. The last.
Twilight would grow paler, her colors would fade from fatigue. She only lay now, her hoof would be heavy, difficult to lift, and her eyes would grow just a little dimmer. Rainbow Dash would comb her hair for her.
Twilight would lean into Rainbow Dash as she ran the comb through her mane, and speak again, this time in a whisper, sad, somber. Rainbow Dash would make another promise.
Then, Rainbow Dash would enter and call out one day, and Twilight would not answer.
Rainbow Dash would fly outside, she would call for Twilight, and she would not answer.
Then, Rainbow Dash would find her crumpled on the ground, shaded by their drifting home. The ground underneath her would be rust-colored.
So many ponies would talk to her all at once, too many to follow. They would say things, all of them, nonsensical things: 'exhaustion', 'failed magic', 'multiple breaks', 'slim chance'. Rainbow Dash would not listen. She would sit in a hideous moss-green chair and twirl a comb between her hooves.
Twilight would not move very much anymore. Rainbow Dash would come every day and sit by her. She would comb her hair.
Twilight would not speak since, and Rainbow Dash made one last promise.
Rainbow Dash now sank into her covers, feeling weighted and heavy, thousand-pound sadness spreading from her very core like a black fog. She played the series of events over in her mind like a horrible reel, agonizing herself.
Rainbow Dash did not cry. She never did. When numbness engulfed her and voices swirled around her, and when she was swallowed up by the complete surrealism of it all, even then did she not cry. Her tears felt cheap; no one could ever know the pain she felt, and Dash owed Twilight more than just sobbing over her.
She was always the strong one, the solid, confident rock, but now she could never break. For Twilight, Rainbow had taken her pain and swallowed it, burying far from the light. She would grit her teeth and stay immovable, always. No one would ever see her cry.
Rainbow Dash grasped the cover just a little tighter, and drew her wings just a little closer to her curled body, lit a dim, softly-glowing white by the light of the moon. The cloudy walls, glowing grey in the night's luminescence, seemed to close in on the pegasus in an unfriendly hug that forced her to squeeze her eyes even more tightly shut.
Thoughts of the unicorn scrolled through Rainbow's mind as she paused for every one, a foreign medley of pain and joy shooting through her veins as the images formed in her mind.
The day they first met. She had plummeted into Twilight, thrown her into the muck, soaked her in icy rainwater, and unleashed a tornado onto her mane, all in the course of five minutes. Rainbow Dash chuckled to herself into her pillow.
Defeating Discord. Rainbow Dash had left, betraying her friends, her element, and herself like a coward, an escaping rat scrambling back to the gutter. Twilight saved her.
The day they came together. She had never seen it coming, that maybe this adorable, bookish unicorn may reveal the feelings Rainbow had harbored for her to be mutual.
Rainbow Dash shuddered under the covers, a fresh wave of pain searing her body. Twilight had made a mistake in choosing her and Dash, selfish, awful, boorish, had let it happen. Twilight, now still, lying in a heap on some hospital bed, never deserved this.
The memories continued to flow, their tune beginning to change.
Their first kiss. Twilight was nervous in her usual manner, stumbling over words as she referenced book after book that may have helped her in the situation. Dash had taken the lead, sparing the bumbling unicorn, pressing her lips to Twi's in a fluid, heated motion that softened the violet mare as she gave in.
Heat began to spread in Dash's stomach, far beyond her control, accompanied by another harsh pinch of sadness.
She could still feel it, she could feel it; Twilight's lips pressed to hers, trembling slightly with nervousness and emotion, impossibly soft. The violet mare bent into the Dash, tilting slightly backwards as Rainbow leaned forward. It was never a matter of dominance, rather a moment fueled by passion that the cyan mare could never forget.
Twilight had had her hooves up, held protectively to her chest at first, and as the seconds ticked by, she loosened, placing them against Rainbow's chest instead. Rainbow had acted on impulse in that moment, lifting a hoof to run through the shimmering midnight-blue mane that swung behind Twilight's head. The unicorn shuddered and squeaked; a pure, timid sound like a kitten mewling.
The sound rang in Rainbow Dash's ears as she kicked off her bed cover, heat pooling in her abdomen, only stoked by the memories burning through her. She flared her wings, catching a draft as it blew through her extended feathers.
Memory after memory streaked through her. Dash laid on back, hardened wings clipped under her, as the air around her began to swelter, a dull flame burning in her chest and stomach.
Rainbow felt Twilight against her that first time. The violet unicorn had been shaking, anxious beyond comprehension.
"Twi, we don't have to do this." Rainbow spoke quietly as she took her place next to Twilight on the fluffy bed-cover, pushing the unicorn's hair aside, cerise eyes meeting purple.
Twilight breathed deeply, filtering the air through her lungs as if it were a breath of gaseous relaxation. "No, I want to. Really, I really do." She looked up at her best friend and soon-to-be lover from under her lashes, eyes carelessly smoky.
Rainbow bent in, almost touching the tip of Twilight's snout with her own. She could feel the unicorn's minty breath tickle her nose, grinning.
"I'll go easy on ya, 'kay Twi?" Rainbow Dash teased with a snicker. Twilight pushed her jokingly; Dash always knew how to ruin the moment.
"Wipe that smirk off your face." Twilight said, mock-pouting, crossing her hooves like a fussy foal.
Rainbow took hold of her head with both hooves, gently pulling her to face her. She smiled, a genuine, open smile; a rare sight from the arrogant, confident pegasus. A sight only for Twilight.
"Just for you, Twi."
Rainbow Dash's breathing grew shallow as she lay, coming to her in quick gasps. She slowly slid her eyes closed, her body shuddering as she became a battleground between potent emotions as they permeated her gut, and the physical heat that blossomed from her very core.
Rainbow felt dirty, awful; what was she doing, lying in bed getting aroused by the thought of her other, who was also in a bed somewhere, comatose and hardly clinging to life? Rainbow felt guilty nausea blossoming oozing in her stomach.
She pushed back whatever was growing inside her as another memory seared her brain.
"Mmmnn..."
Twilight sighed into Rainbow's ear as she kissed down her neck, nipping at the soft violet coat. Rainbow shivered between kisses as Twilight scraped her hair, separating the mess of colors that draped over her shoulder.
Rainbow trailed down the unicorn's chest, who snaked her forelegs over the pegasus's back, linking in her cyan fur as Twilight drew her closer to her own body.
Rainbow buried her snout into the purple fur, inhaling deep lungfuls of the essence of water lilies and sweet-smelling shampoo. She dragged her front teeth lightly down the unicorn's chest, eyes closed, as Twilight shivered under the new sensation that spiked up her spine like lightning, standing her fur on end.
Rainbow sank even further, planting butterfly kisses in lines over Twilight's pelvis, halfway down one thigh, then retracing up and traveling down the other. As she circled around Twilight's heat like a hawk, eyeing her prize, the cyan mare felt her lover stiffen.
"Did I hurt you?" Rainbow halted her ministrations and peered over Twilight's stomach, searching her face with the exclusive concern just for her that the unicorn so cherished.
"N-no, it's just..." Twilight stammered, her eyes looking pleadingly into Rainbows, unable to find the words.
She didn't have to say anything more. Rainbow understood; the silent connection between their eyes said more than a thousand words or a bookish explanation ever could.
"It's okay, we don't have to do that part." Rainbow offered, lifting her head and she slid back up the unicorn's body, hovering above her face and she looked down into those wide purple eyes. "We can skip it."
Dash supported herself on her forelegs, propped over Twilight in push-up position, her hair falling over her eyes and grazing the unicorn's forehead.
Twilight gingerly lifted a hoof, caressing the side of Dash's face as lightly as a flower petal, pulling her close. She smiled a small smile, lifting her head to the pegasus's, their lips grazing, but never quite meeting.
"I love you, Rainbow Dash."
Rainbow Dash's stomach gripped up, she clenched her eyes shut in a horrible twisted expression of deep sorrow as the words played over and over in her head like a broke record.
I love you, Rainbow Dash.
And what? What had she said? What had she said when the mare who her universe revolved around confessed her love for the umpteenth time, under her in a moment of unbridled passion?
Nothing. Just another broken promise.
Agony shredded through Rainbow Dash like a white-hot poker, piercing through her heart, choking her in her throat. It mixed with the arousal radiating from her core, swirling together in a concentration of guilt, pain, heat, and love that throbbed through Rainbow Dash's veins.
In a moment of weakness, like a helpless, blind foal looking for even the smallest comfort anywhere she could find it, Rainbow ran her hoof through her fur, touching herself gently.
She bit her lip, feeling lower than she ever had in her entire ridiculous, superficial life, and grunted through her nose as her hoof found her physical solace.
The room was alight with the orange glow of the lantern Twilight had insisted on hanging in the corner, mingling with the moonlight and reflecting off of two writhing bodies like molten gold. The smell of sweat and passion was heavy in the air.
"Ughhh..." Twilight moaned aloud again, adding to the chorus of heavy breathing and groans that livened the bedroom.
She threw her head back, flat on her back, her eyes clenched shut, blue bangs pasted against her forehead. Rainbow Dash, still propped up on her forehooves and gyrating her hips, arched her head down, burying her snout and groaning a cracked groan into Twilight's neck.
Sweat pooled between them wherever they met, matting their fur. Rainbow Dash kept her rhythm, each grind of her hips displaying rippling muscle under a lithe cyan body.
Twilight gasped each time they connected, her chest rising and falling deeply each time. Her mane was disheveled, her coat rumpled as she let herself go, lost herself...
Rainbow Dash moaned into the cold and silent room, arching herself into the hoof that provided her relief, physical and emotional. Her wings, trapped below her, pulsed with electricity.
Dash's heart pounded from sexual exertion and emotion with every stroke. She gritted her teeth, pleasure and rage at herself coursing through her in equal parts.
Rainbow Dash hated herself. She hated for doing what she did with Twilight, and even more for what she was doing now.
"Oh...Rainbow Dash..."
Her name dripped from Twilight's lips, music to the blue mare's ears. She felt unbearable heat and pressure pooling in her abdomen, and she knew it would be over soon, no matter how little she wanted it to be.
Twilight gripped her around the back, holding Rainbow tighter and tighter to her chest. She groaned and grunted and sighed, sinking her face into the fur of Dash's shoulder, scrunched up in pleasure the likes of which the unicorn had never known before.
Rainbow moaned out loud in sync with her lover, her voice cracking with nearly every one. She pushed down on Twilight, wrapping her arms around the small violet mare in a tight embrace.
With a few more gyrations against each other, Rainbow clenched her teeth hard, moaning loudly through her tight grip, muffled in Twilight's fur. Twilight lightly bit the cyan mare's shoulder, squealing, and both mares saw stars.
Rainbow Dash burned with the fury of an inferno, head thrust deeply against the pillow, furiously touching herself. Deep, intense pleasure ravaged her body, numbing her mind as emotion tore through her like a hurricane.
Anger.
Lust.
Passion.
Sorrow. It ate Rainbow inside like an acid, consuming her mind like a poison thundering through her being.
She cried out into the darkness, pain and pleasure tearing her to pieces.
Finally, it ended. With one scream shredding through the blackness, a scream coming from another place than the heat in her abdomen, cracked with despair and pleasure, Rainbow Dash came and broke.
Sobs ravaged her trembling body in time with the contractions of release, the bed beneath her dampening with lust and pain. Rainbow Dash cried out loudly, the salty tears she had kept from flowing all this time bursting from her chest as each sob shook her to the core.
She felt weak, broken, exhausted as she cried and cried. Emotion broke through her- pain, anger, sadness, loss, love, passion, all of it- crashing over Dash like a tidal wave.
Eventually, it slowed, the tears dripping one by one and soaking into the bed. Rainbow was out of her mind, overwhelmed; she hardly saw straight as she flailed for a pillow to grasp.
She propped the pillow against the board of the empty bed, built for two, and drew the covers up over the both of them, sinking into the warmth.
Rainbow Dash flung herself to her side, back turned away from the window, looking out onto her nightstand. A comb lay there, discarded, abandoned, unused. One single strand of blue hair was still weaved through the teeth.
The pegasus turned, kissing the pillow once on the top before curling back up against the lifeless object.
"Goodnight, Twilight."
*~*~*
Rainbow Dash backed into the door, pushing it open as she turned to face her friend in the familiar setting. "Morning, Twilight, I'm ba-"
She dropped her sentence at the sight of an empty bed, propped up with white sheets folded at the foot, ready for the next patient. The IV pole was there, where it always was, but there was no liquid-filled bag draped over it, and certainly no limp purple unicorn connected to it or the beeping machine, which now had a blank screen.
"Twilight?" Rainbow called into the obviously empty room, unsure of what else to do. A wave of tremendous nausea rolled over her as a harsh jolt of fear rocked her.
No.
Please, no. Nonononono-
Rainbow left the door, rushing into the hall, skidding over the waxed floors. She whipped her head around as ponies passed her, nurses, doctors, patients, all staring at her, doing nothing. The cyan pegasus gathered her head and pulled aside a nurse as she passed.
"Nurse! Where's the patient that was in this room-uh-129!" She asked desperately of the surprised pony.
"I-I can find out, let me-let me check the room chart." The nurse stammered, looking down to the front of her coat, where Rainbow had seized her by the collar.
Dash looked down at her hooves, slowly releasing the nurse, who straightened up and pushed back her frazzled mane. "Sorry."
The fear never left Dash's eyes as the nurse plucked a file from a rack on the wall next to the door, squinting her eyes under a tacky pair of glasses as she perused it. The cyan pegasus rocked back and forth on her hooves, wings flared in terror.
No, no, no way. This can't be happening.
The nurse looked up, dropping her glasses and letting them dangle on their beaded necklace. "Says here she's-" She paused, squinting at the page.
Rainbow Dash went numb.
"-been moved. Hospice wing, room 4a." The pony finished, looking back up at Rainbow Dash, whose face was unreadable.
Relief flooded through Dash like warm water, anger at the nurse for stringing her on like that like hot water, and reality of what she had just said like ice water.
Hospice wing?
"Thanks, nurse, can you, uh, tell me where that is, too?"
The nurse nodded, slipping the file back into its rack. "Down the hall, keep going, turn left, you're there."
"Thanks a lot." Rainbow Dash took off, brushing past doctors in white and patients in that ugly green the entire establishment shared.
2a, 3a, here we are.
Rainbow came to a halt in front of the heavy door. There was significantly less traffic in this wing of the hospital, and those who did come by looked in a hurry to move on. An ominous cloud hung over Dash as she nudged open the door.
"Twilight, it's me, they said they moved yo-" Dash stopped again, the sight before her sinking into her like bullets, crippling her mind and breaking her heart.
Twilight lay on a bed just like the last, covered up with a thin white sheet up to her neck. Her forelegs lay limp at her sides, eyes closed. Paler than Dash had ever seen her, she looked like hardly more than a ghost, a ghost of the pony she was in love with.
Dash approached her slowly, as though she were walking into a dream, or rather, a waking nightmare. There was a contraption covering her mouth, connecting her to a machine on the side that made loud, airy noises; an oxygen machine, Dash figured. The same IV as ever hung at Twilight's side, only adding to the medley of machines attached to her in one way or another, the only things holding her to earth.
Rainbow sunk into a chair, pushing herself to Twilight's bedside. This unicorn, who was once so energetic, always full of a youthful thirst for knowledge, had a zest to learn, to love, and to breathe, was now a mere body, lying forgotten in a bed as she clung to life.
"Twilight, it's me, Dash." Rainbow spoke in a low voice, hoping that maybe, somehow, Twilight could still register her presence.
She didn't say more. Dash didn't know what else to say. She couldn't speak anyway.
She sat in silence, huddled over Twilight, in the bright sunlight that came through the open windows. Outside, the sky was crystal blue, and Rainbow Dash could have sailed through it as she did, but sitting there with Twilight, she wanted nothing more than to be sleeping under the earth with her love, her best friend.
The door opened. Dash turned, not releasing Twilight's lifeless hoof. A stallion entered, draped in a white coat with a clipboard tucked in the side pocket.
Rainbow did not recognize him. "Where's Dr. Heart?" She asked, the accusatory tone that would usually be present faltering in her weak voice.
"Sorry, I'm Dr. Ray, presiding over the hospice wing. Dr. Heart is the resident in the trauma wing." The stallion introduced himself, extending a hoof in greeting. Rainbow did not shake his hoof, her own still clasped over Twilight's.
"Rainbow Dash." She offered curtly.
The doctor looked momentarily perplexed before crinkling his brows and referring to the clipboard from his coat. "The Rainbow Dash?"
"What do you mean, doctor?"
"The patient, Miss, uh, Twilight Sparkle, referenced you in her file." He stopped, removing his glasses, and surveyed Rainbow Dash in slightly intimidating seriousness. "Could we step outside for a word?"
Rainbow, so unwillingly, released Twilight's hoof, which fell back onto the bed, lifeless. As she followed Dr. Ray from the room, the mare couldn't help but feel the least bit relieved; perhaps she would finally receive some solid answers.
Once they were out, Doctor Ray shut the door as if he were somehow trying to prevent the unconscious unicorn from hearing what he had to say, and turned to face Dash, expression somber. Before he was able to spit a single word, Rainbow beat him to the draw.
"What happened? Why is she here? What is that...tube?" She shot questions at him like stones. "I really need some answers this time, doc."
Her mind swam, everything around her fading to colors in desperation, but somehow, Dash could still hear the doctor as he spoke.
"Yesterday, at around 2 am, Miss Sparkle went into cardiac arrest. She was resuscitated, though not without repercussions." Rainbow wondered how he could be icy, like he was teaching a class rather than telling of the near-death of a patient.
"Repercussions?" Dash's own voice sounded, but she hadn't felt her lips move.
"I'm afraid," The doctor continued, his voice softening. Just a little bit. "Miss Sparkle's state has reached critical."
"Critical." Dash echoed again, throat hollow.
The next words came as a blur, Dash could not follow all, or perhaps she did not want to. Out of the wreckage, she fished the word 'coma'.
Rainbow stared at the doctor, watching his jaw open and close, shaping words, so cold and heartless. "Thanks." The word stung her lips as the image of the motionless, sunken unicorn pierced her inner eye once more. She had nothing to be thankful for.
Rainbow turned, making to push the door open once more, to spend every minute with Twilight as the life leaked from her. A hoof connected with her shoulder, holding her back.
"Just a moment, Miss Dash."
Rainbow stopped and pivoted in place, unsure of whether she wanted to hear whatever the doctor had left to say. Regardless, her ears were perked at attention as he began to speak.
"It appears that," Dr. Ray magically lifted the clipboard, upon which was scrawled a coppice of medical jargon Dash couldn't make heads of tails of. "Miss Sparkle has made specifications of how she would prefer this situation to be...handled."
Dash shook her head slowly from side to side, following the doctor with her searching eyes. "I don't understand."
He placed a hoof on her shoulder, and she flinched; the touch was unwelcome. "You may want to sit."
A chair waited for her next to the door, ugly and green. To Dash, in this moment, it may as well have been the electric chair.
"No!" Her voice came out harsher than she thought, cracking mid-word. "I-I mean, no, thanks." Rainbow sucked in one deep breath of metallic hospital air to steel herself. "Just please tell me."
The stallion cleared his throat, tucking the chart back into his coat, out of sight. "Very well. Miss Sparkle has specified that she would want to cease a artificial life-assistance in the event of coma and/or severe debilitating injury." He sounded like a textbook to Rainbow Dash, though she had no trouble decoding his icy words.
Numbness sifted through her body again, branching out from her stomach like the painful whips of a thorn bush. "You want to unplug her." Her voice came muffled to her ears, distant, as though the words were being spoken from another dimension.
It was not a question. It was a rationalization to herself what was expected to become of her best friend.
"In effect."
Rainbow swallowed her tongue. There was nothing left to say.
"However," Dr. Heart added, bringing the pegasus back to the face of the planet. "Her condition is unlike what we have seen. Unlike, uncommon, yes, but not unheard of."
Silence from the cyan mare.
The icy, distant doctor continued. "According to her charts, she has already far outlived her projection, basing off of the injuries sustained from her fall. Off a cloud by way of weakened magic, if I am correct?"
"Yes." Rainbow croaked out. He made it sound so technical, as if it were not the love of her life lying behind the door.
"There have been speculations, Miss Dash. Speculations that were Miss Sparkle removed from artificial life-suspension, her body may naturally recover. Reboot, if you will."
Rainbow Dash rocked very gently in place, her wings extending ever so slightly. "She'll wake up?" Her voice was still low, and it shook on each syllable.
"Essentially, yes. Although, she will require extensive bed rest, around-the-clock supervision..." He continued to speak, his mouth continued to pump out the words, but Rainbow Dash had checked out. One realization, the one around which the galaxy revovled, rang in her mind.
She could wake up.
"...It's peculiar, the results are typically affiliated with amplified magical ability, beyond the typical unicorn, at best."
He had no idea.
"Can we do it now? Can you wake her?" Rainbow demanded, her voice sharp. This time, however, she did not lunge for the door.
The doctor did not move from his spot, as if he rooted into the shiny, artificial floor. "Miss Dash, understand that the chances of survival in a situation as dire as this are..."
He looked to his hooves, shaking his head slowly.
"Virtually nonexistent."
Rainbow Dash let the truth of his words sink in as she stood in silence. Twilight had requested to be taken off of artificial life support, and Dash should have seen it coming from the mare, who always believed that nature should be allowed to run its course. There was that tiny fiber of hope-stupid, foolish hope- that Twilight would once more open her eyes, but that was no longer what drove the pegasus.
She owed this to Twilight, the one last great favor. Even if it meant never again losing herself in those wide purple eyes.
The last unbroken promise.
"Do it." Rainbow Dash said, her voice surprisingly steady over thicket of emotion that clouded her senses. Dr. Ray looked to her, brows furrowed.
"Are you certain, Miss Dash?"
The last unbroken promise. "Yes." She breathed.
"Very well."
He nudged open the door, beckoning Dash to enter before him. She took a single step, before turning back. "Wait. Can I-Can I just have a moment with her, please?" She implored.
The doctor gave a nod and turned, the door closing quietly in his wake.
The sun continued to shine, illuminating the white walls and whiter floor with a yellow shine, pristine and quite lovely. Twilight's ashen coat glowed.
The very faint chirp of a bird outside floated to Dash's ears, a sweet symphony to accompany the silence of the room. Outside, life went on.
Here, within these four, angular walls, life came to end.
Rainbow stepped shakily up to Twilight's bedside, every step a heartbeat, counting off how many more the unicorn had left. She reached the rail, closed enough to see every rib detailed in Twilight's exhausted form.
For the final time, Rainbow took her place in that ugly green chair.
"Hi, Twilight, it's me." She began to speak, her words quiet but not whispered, just for the unicorn.
"I hope they're treating you okay. At least you're getting more sunlight. It's good for you, you know." Rainbow looked to her own hooves folded in her lap, laughing quietly, sadly. "Of course you know that."
"To tell you the truth, I never thought I would end up in a place like this." She continued, sighing as she looked around the dry, tasteless room. "But I guess that's life, you know? Things just happen."
A knot formed in the very pit of her stomach as Dash lifted a hoof, cupping it over Twilight's own. "This shouldn't have happened, Twilight." Her voice sank even lower, almost whispering, punctuated with an emotional voice crack.
"I'm sorry. I'm sorry that this happened to you." Dash's voice broke again. She could feel herself beginning to crumble, the ground falling from her hooves. "I'm so sorry."
Twilight's hoof felt cold as Rainbow now grasped it with both of hers, holding it tightly as she bent over the unicorn. "When we spoke, I heard you, but I didn't listen. And now, when there's nothing left to say, I can't hear you anymore, but I'm still listening. I'm so sorry I didn't listen all those times, Twilight."
Rainbow Dash broke. She clenched her eyes shut, a single tear escaping her eye, dripping over Twilight's hoof, carrying her soul with it.
"I miss you, Twi."
Her voice broke for the third time as a deep sob wracked Rainbow's small, trembling form.
She bent far over her still friend, pressing her forehead to the violet hoof as one tear chased another, streaming down her face and dripping into the mattress.
"I'm sorry for all those broken promises, I'm so sorry."
She stood from the chair, slowly, deliberately. "Let me make one more to you."
Rainbow touched Twilight's pale, tired forehead with her hoof, tracing along her bangs before caressing down the unicorn's sunken cheek. She leaned all the way in, pressing her lips to Twilight's forehead below her horn, lingering just a moment. The final kiss.
"I promise," she whispered into the blue mane whose scent and feel Rainbow loved so much. "that one day, I'll see you again."
She whispered the last words into Twilight's ear, the last words she would ever say to her love, partner, and best friend.
"Even if it's just in my dreams."
*~*~*
"Are you ready, Miss Dash?" The doctor's voice vaguely registered with the pegasus. She tightened her grip on Twilight's hoof.
"Yes."
Rainbow held her breath as the noise of the machines dimmed, their chorus of beeps and whirs coming less and less often as they shut down.
The sunlight, now setting, cast orange-yellow light over everything in the white room, deep shadows showing in Twilight's face as the room was suffocated by absolute silence.
Finally, the last machine came to a rest.
Twilight did not move.
Black stemmed from Rainbow Dash's brain as she squeezed the unicorn's hoof for all it was worth, her breath coming short and desperate.
Twilight did not move.
Something moved around Rainbow Dash. The doctor stood, placing one hoof over Twilight's foreleg, looking at the watch strapped to his other.
"Time of death, 5:52 pm."
He unhinged the bag from the pole, gently removing the needle for Twilight's arm.
Rainbow did not notice.
The sound of the door shutting jarred her back to reality as the truth of what had happened pulled Dash to the ground.
It was over.
She did not cry, she did not make a sound. Rainbow merely wrapped her forelegs under Twilight's, linking them behind her back as she pulled the unicorn up to her form, resting her head on her shoulder.
So they sat.
The sun set.
Rainbow breathed into Twilight's shoulder, filling herself with that sweet scent she would never again smell, imagining those purple eyes she would never again see, or that voice she would never again see.
Rainbow twitched.
No, she hadn't.
Twilight stirred, groggily moving her head against Dash's shoulder. Rainbow's mind wired, and she pulled Twilight from her, clasping her head in her hooves as the unicorn opened her eyes, like waking from a long sleep.
Purple irises glittered in the setting sunlight.
Rainbow Dash let out a sob, a smile breaking across here face for the first time in a very long time. Twilight opened her mouth.
"Rain-Rainbow Dash..." Her voice was raspy, whispered. Rainbow sobbed once more, pressing Twilight tight to her form.
"It's me, Twi, it's really me." She cried into the unicorn's shoulder, before pulling away once more to look again into those purple eyes.
Twilight opened her mouth again, her body weakened beyond control. Somehow, their eyes met, cerise and purple.
"I love you, Rainbow Dash."
Rainbow felt herself stiffen. Her blood flowed like lava as she made the decision she should have long, long ago.
"I love you too, Twi."
The last unbroken promise.
