Lost Words

Spike woke up to Twilight's hoof prodding him. He sat up in bed, unable to keep his eyes open for long. "Come on, Spike!" Twilight insisted. "We need to clean up the castle."

"Clean up? What for?" he asked.

"The big party yesterday," she informed him, rolling her eyes.

Spike moaned, "Can we at least get breakfast first?"

Twilight and Spike took down the decorations from the big Hearth's Warming Eve party they had held yesterday. Just as Spike was about to take a wreath off the door, the door opened. Luckily, he managed to fly out of the way in time. He looked at the entrance and saw Sunburst at the door.

Sunburst and Starlight had gone on a trip to Sire's Hollow for Hearth's Warming Eve, since Starlight didn't feel too well, so they weren't able to attend the party yesterday. Twilight had expected their trip to be longer, but she wouldn't complain if their trip was a bit short. It was their vacation, after all. "Hi, Sunburst!" Twilight greeted. "So, how did it go?"

"Twilight," he panted, getting straight to the point. "Starlight... missing!" Twilight and Spike's eyes widened in shock.

"Where?" she demanded. Sunburst only shook his head. "What happened?"

"I woke up on the train earlier this morning, and the train was only about one stop away from Ponyville," he started. "I looked up at the seat across from mine, where Starlight should've been, only she wasn't there. Which means she left at night!"

"She jumped off the train?" Spike exclaimed.

Sunburst hung his head. "I don't know. She just... vanished. For all I know, she could've gotten off at a different stop. Though, jumping off the train was an option for her, too." Twilight and Spike looked at each other, concerned.

Twilight pointed to the door. "Let's go get our friends," she directed. The boys nodded and split up to get the rest of the girls.

"So we need your help finding her," Twilight concluded.

Rainbow Dash flew up and out of her throne, kicking at the air as if it were a villain. "I'll make sure to kick whatever monster's butt that took Starlight."

"No, Rainbow," Sunburst intervened. "She wasn't taken by anyone. She left on her own."

"And how do you know that?" she challenged, right before Applejack grabbed her tail, bringing her down. "Hey!"

Sunburst levitated a seemingly old book and placed it in the center of the table, opening it. "This is Starlight's old diary," he told everyone. "She discovered it again yesterday, and she's made two new entries. I think one of them was on the train, right before she disappeared to Celestia knows where."

The group gathered around to see the journal, looking at the last entry. "I'm sorry, everypony," Twilight read aloud. "I'm sorry, but I have to go right now. I'm sorry, but I can't make it anymore. I'm sorry, but I feel misplaced. I'm sorry, I'm so, so, so, incredibly sorry. Please, just keep in mind this: I'm sorry."

This was confusing to everyone, as they had no clue what Starlight was talking about. Nopony had a clue what "feel[ing] misplaced" meant. No one knew what Starlight meant when she wrote that she couldn't make it anymore. No one knew why she was sorry in the first place, or why she even had to go, for that matter. All they knew was that their friend was gone, and they had to find her.

"Where could she be?" Fluttershy asked, mustering up enough courage to find out a possibly dangerous answer.

Sunburst hung his head. "Anywhere," he sighed. The others gained an expression of concern and fear.

"Well," Pinkie started, a smile on her face, catching everypony's attention, "this sounds like a big mystery for me to solve." They all exchanged confused glances, except Twilight, who seemed unimpressed.

"Are you going to solve this mystery using reasoning and evidence?" she questioned, an eyebrow raised.

"Don't worry, Twilight," she assured her, patting her head. "I'll solve this the right way."

Twilight bit her lip, looking at everyone else in the room. Then, she turned back to Pinkie Pie and shook her head solemnly. "To be honest, it doesn't matter if you get carried away or not," she murmured, loud enough to receive a gasp from everyone. "Because we're all going to solve this case. We're all in this. Together."

Most everyone else smiled, and nodded in agreement. They put their hooves, and claws, in Spike's case, together in the center of their circle, waiting on, and looking at, one more pony. Fluttershy was a bit hesitant, in fear that the expidition might be dangerous, but was still willing to do it. It was all in the name of friendship. She was kind and friendly, and never wanted to back down from helping, especially if it was a friend. And right now, her friend needed her. A lot. She sighed and put her hoof in with the rest of her friends, and they all lifted their hooves in celebration.

Not that there was much to celebrate, of course, not with the recent news of the disappearance of Starlight Glimmer. But at least now, they had, well, sort of a plan. Yay...

Twilight took a quill and a scroll, for taking notes, and suprisingly, she kept them instead of handing them over to Spike. "Where were you when you woke up earlier? And what time was it?"

"I think it was around... near... the Everfree Forest? At about 6 A.M?" he stammered, his voice inflecting with doubt.

Twilight raised an eyebrow but took notes on it anyways. "And what about when you fell asleep?"

"That was about two hours after we left Sire's Hollow, so around midnight. And I think we were in Arimaspi's Territory back then."

Biting his lip, his ears bent down, Sunburst watched as Twilight proceeded to jot down annotations. Soon, she brought in Starlight's journal and flipped through the pages. "Interesting..." she remarked out loud, taking even more notes.

"Well, what is it, darling?" Rarity dared to ask.

Twilight pointed to the hornwriting. "Starlight's hornwriting is incredibly messy, but right now, it looks far worse than it usually does." Sunburst closely observed it, then nodded in agreement, confirming Twilight's statement. "Which means she probably wasn't able to see clearly when she was writing this."

Sunburst gaped in realization. "So it must've been really early and dark when she wrote this!" Twilight nodded, frowning even deeper.

"She must've been further south," she concluded. Then, Twilight teleported a map into the room scribbled on it. Well, at least, it looked like scribbling in everyone else's perspective. She was probably planning a detailed route or something of the sort. "Alright, everypony," she finally announced. "Looks like our first stop is Pinkie's rock farm."

Hearing this, Pinkie beamed. Well, it was a mix of a smile and a frown; she was mostly happy she would get to visit her family again, but was also dissapointed that Starlight was missing while she visited. She wouldn't get to spend much quality time with her family.

They all trotted out the front door, except Spike, who had volunteered to stay in Ponyville in case Starlight ever came back. Spike waved goodbye to Sunburst and the girls, wishing them good luck on their expedition.

Starlight's mane harshly flew around in the cold, heavy wind. She heard a bear growling and cautiously looked around in fear, only to find nothing. That was when she realized that her stomach was hurting, as well. She was starving! And she hadn't packed any food. In fact, she hadn't packed anything at all! Well, that was too bad. She would just have to be a bit resourceful for a little while.