Day 6, Hearthswarming Day:

With a gentle stir, her senses soon began to return to little Flurry Heart, the bright sunlight flickering with the shimmer of snow falling from above, the warm and comfortable feeling of the silky sheets she slept curled up beneath, the sounds of laughter from the kitchen, the scent of delicious Biscuits and Hayvy cooking on the stovetop... All of the indicators of her favorite day of the year! Hearthswarming was finally here!

Throwing off her blankets and hopping out of bed so fast she almost fell to the ground, she giggled and screamed as she bolted out of her room to give her greeting to her parents, friends, family and all else whom she would encounter that day during the festivities!

The entire day was such a wonderful blur of joyful playing, laughter, gift giving, spreading cheer and visiting with loved ones, it was truly a day for Flurry Heart to remember for the rest of her life!

Back in the eerie, hollow and desolate cage that she resided within; Cozy Glow brooded away. There were no decorations, no gifts, no tree to tuck them under. She was fine with no caroling, no sparkling lights, no fancy feasts. She plotted and planned and schemed her revenge! She didn't need cookies or candy canes or sappy stories! All she needed was time to plot the perfect escape so she may exact her revenge upon those that humiliated her!

Pacing circles within her prison, she continued to ruminate aloud, "I don't need other ponies or presents or potlucks or pictu...", pausing as her gaze fell upon the previously discarded ball of crumpled up paper that was just outside of her cage.

After a few moments' pause, she slowly moved to stand at the edge of her cage and reached out to the poor letter she had previously wrecked and rejected. Her hoof getting closer and closer to the letter, she pressed her body against the bars of the cage to get every last bit of reach she could manage, yet it felt like it was juuuuust too far away!

"Why did I have to throw you so far, you stupid thing?!", she grumbled to herself as she strained as hard as she could. After exhaling her breath, she felt as though she might soon squeeze through the very bars holding her back, her hoof made purchase, and she laughed in celebration before quickly withdrawing it back into the cage with her, "Hah! Got you!"

She hastily unfurled it once more and placed the crease-covered paper upon the floor of her prison, smoothing it out as best as she could, she gazed upon the colored pencil-covered side and just stared at it.

She stared at it, looking over every stroke, every little erase spot from a mistake, every color used. She just... Stared.

After what felt like an eternity, the echoing of one of Cerberus' long howls shattered the silence, causing Cozy Glow to jump in surprise and grab the photo, possessively squeezing it to her chest.

It was hers, and none shall ever take it from her!

The End

Author's Note

Although I've written thousands of hours of stories for my players at gaming tables, I've only written two small pieces of fanfiction before, and both were very private, personal pieces specifically for certain parts of my games. Never have I posted/published anything like this before, and so the pressure to do my very best was intense (especially with the notion that it's as a gift to fulfill someone -else's- Yuletide wish!) I truly hope that I did you proud, Hazel Skye! This wound up being a little closer to my usual "Epic Writing" style than was intended, but I am very happy with how it wound up, and I hope you are, as well!

I didn't originally set out to make the tone of this story as dark (and traumatic) as it wound up being in a few places, but I do take pride in making my writing stay as true to what I feel the cannon of each character can be. As such, I felt like taking a more dramatic "Charles Dickens"/Yule-esque approach to delving into Cozy Glow's mind and emotions, and how this theme would feel more true to the darkness within Cozy Glow's heart, which should be quite immense, seeing as it takes a lot to make one become as rotten and irredeemable as Cozy wound up being at the end of the show!

This story wound up having a lot more depth than originally intended, like the growth and maturation of Flurry Heart, her getting over a bit of her naivete, as well as the subconscious suffering she experiences after her initial trauma. Lastly, it was a fun challenge, building up and hinting at possible reasons why Cozy wound up as rotten as she did. Bouncing back between moments where Flurry Heart was hurt, and when she was just living life like any other child at school felt quite odd at first, but I know that even kids suffer from nightmares, and they bounce back on a daily basis (as I and I'm sure many of you sure did when you were kids), and I didn't want to deny Flurry such child-like resilience.

It was also quite enjoyable working in some of Luna's Dreamwalking magic, even if only subtly! Long before the show used that idea, in the Inspireland games I run at pony cons, the players can play as many characters whom were written as the previous Elements of Harmony wielders, back when Celestia and Luna were teens (along with a few OCs to fill out a usual medieval fantasy-esque party feel!) I gave Luna the ability to Dreamwalk waaay back when I built the system and guessed at a bunch of old Equestrian lore back when Season 1 just wrapped up. I enjoy offering my players (and now you wonderful readers) a small taste of how my rendition of how Dreamwalking looks!

I'll stop rambling now! This was an incredibly fun but also intense first experience for me! I absolutely LOVED the challenge, and I now wait with baited breath to learn how it will be received!

Merry Yule to all!