Something Halloween

This was a problem. Twilight stared at the page with mounting horror. How could she have missed this?!

"The last part is missing!"

Now that she looked really closely, there was a page gone from the book. It looked like it had been torn out! The missing page contained the last third of the counter for her no-sleep spell. She couldn't undo it without this critical piece!

"I thought you said you looked it over!" Anon said, voice thick with worry. He was standing in the doorway between the living room and the kitchen, coffee pot in hand.

"I did! Well, I skimmed through it. Just enough to make sure I understood it."

He just gaped. "And you didn't spot that some of it was missing?"

Twilight felt like crying with frustration. "No! I just read the first half, saw that I could cast it and that was it." She closed her eyes and pushed her muzzle into the couch armrest. "I should have read it all the way through. How could I have been that stupid?!"

In two steps Anon was sitting beside her on the couch. He hurriedly put the tea pot on the coffee table so his hands were free to lay gently on her back. He sighed and when he spoke his voice was calm and measured. "Don't beat yourself up. There's bound to be another copy, right?"

Twilight didn't remove her face from the cushion. Her horn was poking into the fabric and it was putting uncomfortable pressure on her forehead, but she didn't want to look at Anonymous right then. "I don't know. This is a very rare spellbook."

A few moments of thought later Anon had another idea: "Well, can't you finish the spell yourself? You did it with that Starswirl one. It's what got you these."

He ran a finger down one of her wings, making the mare's breath catch. It was still very sensitive. She didn't complain, though.

"This is different," she muttered into the pillow.

"How so?"

It was like explaining calculus to an infant, but Twilight tried anyway. "That was a short spell and it was only missing the last line and it tied into the Elements which I was already studying. This is a really complicated one and it's tied into the first spell. It'd take me weeks to figure out how it should go, and even then it's risky."

Anon was silent for a few seconds. Then his hands moved to her cheeks. "C'mere," Anon said and gently lifted her head from the couch.

Twilight fought for a moment, but then went limp and let the man transfer her partially into his lap. Instead of the pillow, she was now pressing her face into his shirt. Her horn was no longer uncomfortable because it rested on Anon's shoulder. He knew exactly how to handle her for maximum comfort. On a distant level, Twilight was grateful for that, but the emotion was buried under self-pity. Her sleep spell was probably doing strange things to her mind. She was having hallucinations, or seeing ghosts, or the past, or something, and now her last lifeline was gone.

"Hey, hey," Anon murmured right in her ear, mindful to keep the volume down. "It's okay. If anyone can figure it out, it's you."

She almost shook her head and gave up, but Anon's arms around her were so warm and he used his free hand to brush away a tear.

"We've been through worse, remember? This is just a minor problem."

That much was true. If it were just hallucinations, all Twilight needed was to trust in Anon. Whenever she saw something uncertain, she would ask him and if he didn't see it, she could safely ignore it. It wasn't like hallucinations could touch her. She had time to figure it out. The mare was about to ask, but somehow Anon sensed her question and patted her mane.

"I'll call the office tomorrow and we'll take a few days off, both of us. It's not like we don't deserve it. When was the last time we took a vacation?"

"Sea this summer?" Twilight guessed.

Anon chuckled. "Yeah, okay, that was nice. But it was just an extended weekend. We took Monday off and came back to work around noon on Tuesday. That's not a vacation."

She was forced to reluctantly agree.

"Clarissa has things handled for a week or so, right? You've taught her plenty and besides, the best way to learn is to jump in the deep end."

Again, the mare nodded against his shoulder.

There was more, however. Anon patted her back, then placed his free hand on her muzzle and carefully pushed her away, so he could look in her face. "Tell you what you'll do," he went on, all businesslike and self-assured. Maybe he was doing it on purpose, or from some gut feeling, but it was exactly what Twilight needed. Someone in charge.

She listened intently. "You're going to write to Celestia and ask her to find you another copy of this spell, or this book. If anyone can do that, it'll be her. Then you're going to send a copy to that wizard friend of yours, what's his name - Sunburst something?"

"Yeah, that's him."

"Yeah, him. Maybe he can help you finish it. He knows all about ancient spells, after all."

Twilight was cheering up. There were many options left to try, all she had to do was think of some. Anon was doing that for her.

"Thirdly," the man went on, making her blink in surprise. "Thirdly, can you use your spell software you wrote when we first met to look for solutions to this? The way I understand, it's just like solving a really big linear equation system and you should be able to crunch through that in a few days on the company server farm."

Twilight rolled her eyes. "Every word in that sentence was wrong, Anon. Don't pretend you know anything about magic, okay?"

She was smiling when she said it and the man grinned back. "Okay, okay, I admit it. But can you?"

It got her thinking. If she made a few changes, maybe her program could at least point the way to the solution. Her smile widened. "I can try," she said with finality.

"Good! We'll find a way to fix this, okay? Just don't get depressed on me and give up, or I'll-"

He didn't say what he would do, so Twilight supplied the first thing that came to her mind: "Spank me?"

It was funny the way Anon's eyes bulged. "Holy shit, Twiley, where did that come from?"

She blushed a nice pink and looked away. "I dunno. Sorry."

"I mean, if you want to. In play, yeah. But that's neither here nor there."

The mare nodded and filed the thought away for later. Maybe it could be fun to try it, once, in the bedroom. She couldn't work up any enthusiasm right now, but maybe someday.

Where had the thought come from?

"Good. So that's all settled?"

Twilight gave Anon a nod and a smile. A moment later she licked his face. "Thanks. You wouldn't believe how much that helped," she said.

"Good. Now, let's do something normal and fun, okay?" Anon suggested. "Show me your Jobs costume."

"You show me your Holmes costume."

"Deal."

It really did sound fun, but there was one lingering doubt. "What if I can't fix this by Halloween?"

Anon gave this some thought, then burst out laughing at the joke he thought up. Twilight recognized his expression and waited patiently until he was able to tell her. "Don't worry, on Halloween you'll be seeing ghosts everywhere anyway!"

She didn't know why, but the observation was funny. The mare started laughing as well and had to lean her head against Anon's shoulder for support. It went on and on as the tension released.

At the end of it, they both had tears in their eyes and were wheezing from the exertion. "Holy crap, Anon, I needed that," Twilight admitted. She was already in the perfect position to lay her muzzle on his shoulder and gave his ear a good lick. "Thanks..."