More than This

More than This

by Damocles23

Chapter 12: Me and her, face to face at last...

“Are you sure about this, Tiara?” Spoon asks, finishing the sentence with a small kiss at the tip of her nose.

“I have to do this alone. She may feel threatened if anypony else is there. I don’t want that.”

“And leave you alone with her? I don’t think so,” the red maned mare intervenes. “Besides, you may just make things worse, coming out of nowhere like that.”

“Well, it was your cousin that wanted to see her.” Spoon steps in with an angry stomp of hoof. “Unless you two are so stupid to—”

“Please, girls!” Tiara yelps, quelling the fires of rage and humbly facing the cousin of the one she loved. “Please, Babs. I promise I won’t hurt her or anything else.”

“But why the act? The empty, dark room, you stalking her in silence like some kind of horror monster, which could be appropriate considering that you—”

“Trust me. She knows. She knows of this stupid act and I guess...I just miss it.”

“Do what you have to do.” The orange mare simply says, even putting a hoof on Tiara’s shoulder. A small gesture of thrust is enough at this point. Spoon’s gentle smile is just icing on the cake.

She is ready. For what, she isn’t sure about it...

“So, um, how are ya holding up?” Appebloom’s eyes search for an exit, as they don’t want to meet hers. Tiara knows this, but it makes it just worse. She had wanted Tiara to be there, she knew she would be there. Earning some closure just became more difficult than before.

“I lost my daddy and my fillyfriend in the very same day,” she states bluntly. “You?” Her sharp eyes tells her that for the yellow mare, that statement was like a punch in the gut, but she doesn’t feel guilty about it. In her mind, she finds herself entitled to a few cheap shots.

“Gee, you don’t lose any time.”

“I’ve wasted enough of it. I just wanted some answers, not chit chatting like we’re old friends.”

“Ah guess ah asked the wrong question.” She brushes the floor with a hoof.

“To put it mildly. You didn’t even answer mine. But you know what? Let’s do these things properly: how are you holding up? What are you doing in the Big Apple?”

“Mooching off mah favourite cousin that is too kind an’ working as a waitress in some washed up diner because ah couldn’t dare to face ya again.” Bloom speaks with all the dryness of a dried up lake.

“Really?” She almost laughs in Applebloom’s face, but that last bit moves her not to. The filly has grown older, and want answers to mend the wounds of her heart—not laugh at the expense of the pony she once loved. “You couldn’t find anything better?”

“Ya know, they say life in Manehattan is so fancy and ya can have everything ya want, but sometimes ya have to start from ta bottom.”

“It’s probably the accent. Somepony could think it’s cute and somepony, um, doesn’t.”

“Yeah, ah thought so too.”

The mares fidgets on their hooves, exchanging a look of mutual agreement that the cheap talk is finally over.

“But ah guess ah wasn’t aiming too high.”

“You didn’t answer my question,” Tiara says coldly, her words coming out like sharp icicles.

“Ah thought ah did. Because it was all my fault. B'sides, ah think ya could ask me why about so many things.” Bloom almost chokes a sob out, as if the solemnity of her dramatic reveal and her fault was exhausted on that first attempt.

“Then, I’m gonna be more specific: why did you said that thing at my daddy’s—” The word funeral slithers and strikes her heart like a snake, forcing its awful maw around it. She isn’t a little, dumb filly with no concept of death, she has grown accustomed to live without her father’s smile...but nopony says she should come to like it. “After he saw me that way... How could you?!” She slams the table aside, reprimanding herself to not do it again, lest she have to buy a new one for the Bad Seed, who is waiting just outside the door.

“Ah wanted-Ah wanted for you to hate me,” Bloom spits out, “ah don’t know why ah was so mean, but ah wanted for ya to never see me again. Ah knew that striking ya right there, using just those words, would do the trick. Ah knew that ya would jus’ hate me again and finish the story. Ah had to hurt ya one last time.”

Tiara listens in collected silence. You succeeded. You hurt me more than anypony else. You made me hate the pony I loved...and I’m not sure you’re that pony anymore.

“Ah knew it came out of nowhere, but seeing ya like that, ruining your life jus’ because ya wanted to be with me...” She takes another sip of water on which she almost chokes on, “It’s so messed up and ah thought that only by getting rid of me ya could get a second chance.”

“There are no second chances when you love somepony the way I loved you. There can’t be. You have to live with what you get and I couldn’t have asked for more.” She reaches for Bloom’s cheek again, daring not to caress it. Why does she want this so much? “I never blamed you for that.”

“But ah blamed me. How can ya be with somepony else, if you don’t love you’self ta begin with?”

“I could give you some lessons about that.” Tiara lets out a bitter chuckle. “I’ve hated myself on so many occasions—maybe I did so all my life.” Her eyes wander elsewhere, lost in the labyrinth of memories. “Maybe, the ponies that love me mean so much to me... because I just can’t do the same: love Diamond Tiara.”

One memory, a treasured memory, surfaces again when she finds herself in the farmpony’s warm embrace that seemed so long gone.

“Why, then?” Her facade of collected disdain cracks, allowing for Tiara to reach for her former lover and stroke her cheek. Normally, she would ask herself why she can’t let go, why that mare that wanted to help buck trees with her fillyfriend is still there, somewhere, and just wants a place beside Applebloom. She doesn’t care at the moment. “Why this change of pace? Do you still want me to hate you?”

Touched by the gesture, Bloom almost touches Tiara’s hoof with her own, but doesn’t dare to do so, forcing her gaze on the floor as a desperate measure to add some more distance between them.

“No. No, ah don’t want it anymor’. Ah know ya can’t jus’ say you’re sorry and everything will be a’right, but ah want ya to know that...” she stops, biting her lip and keeps staring at the floor, like she’s begging for an answer to be magically written there. Tiara nods for her to continue. “Ah want ya to know that ah still care about ya and that ah’m so sorry. Ah couldn’t look in your eyes anymore after that day.”

Just care about me? That’s it?

“And you still can’t look at me, can you?” Her hoof slides under Bloom’s chin and she forces the other mare to face her, locking their gazes. Applebloom’s eyes try to roll out of the way of Tiara’s piercing blue orbs, but to no avail.

“Yeah.” Bloom lets out a sad and forced chuckle. “Ah know it was horrible and monstrous and...and...”

“Unforgivable?” A dark shadow envelopes that word, as if it was suggested by some dark force that is watching their turmoil with glee.

“Ah missed your fancy words so much. After what happened ah didn’t deserve ya anymore and—”

“Deserve me?!” Tiara snaps out, ending the gentle contact and the possibly prepared speech, “You thought you had to deserve me?”

“Ah meant still staying with ya, loving ya...Ah couldn’t do that anymore. Ah wasn’t worthy of your love anymor’. Not after your dad—”

“You think I’m some kind of prize, a possession for the most worthy? What’s next? You and SIlver Spoon are going to compete over me now?” Indignation and rage are quelled by ferocious embarrassment, as at the first sign of change of Bloom’s expression, she covers her mouth with her hooves, but it’s too late. The other mare has already come into the discussion.

“S-Silver Spoon?” Bloom recoils back in surprise. “What is she-Why are you bringing her up?”

“Because we’re a couple!” she shouts, giving no time for her brain to object the truth escaping from her heart and stabbing with a shiv her rationality along the way.

The silence is the worst part. That awful silence that follows everytime she says something that turns everything upside down. It allows the sound of many thoughts, awful thoughts to make their way into her skull with no hope but for words, any kind of words, to silence them for a minute.

“Uh.” Bloom huffs and holds the bridge of her hoof. The yellow mare, very calmly, reaches for a glass of water and gulps it down in a blink, her gesture automatic and impossible to decipher.
“So, you’ve already replaced me.”

“No, I haven’t! I-I couldn’t do that. I—”

“Don’t lie to me. Ah’m not dumb and you’re not either. Ya did jus’ that.”

“Yes. Yes, I did. I replaced you with my best friend.” Tiara rubs her temple and sighs, her nerves cracking like glass. She has avoided so many truths until now, and this is just the latest and probably most painful. “I don’t know if it’s cute or just horrible.”

“Are you happy with her?” Her inquisitive look goes under Tiara’s skin. She wonders with fear and guilt why is she asking this? Jealousy, perhaps? No...The mare she loved was never this petty...

“Yes, I am. We had a somewhat rocky start, but we’re working things out.” Bloom flashes that look, a look of foalish amazement and goofy confusion that Tiara always finds funny. Contrived and inappropriate, but still something that reminds her of a happier time.

“Don’t give me that look.”

“Sorry. Ah always thought that if there was somepony ya alwalys got along with, she was the one. Ah never thought ya’ll could have a rocky start.”

“It’s mostly my fault. All my fault.” Echoes of the past live again and she remembers the soft whispers and sweet comforts. Ya can tell me anything. She has no need to lie, no fear to lose her...because it already happened. “I guess it was almost too convenient that my best friend held those feelings when I needed somepony with me.”

“But it turned out well, right?”

“For your definition of ‘well,’ it’s certainly something. She said that—” the shadow of that tree and two fillies exchanging their first kiss is still there, taunting her. “She said that she loved me since we were little fillies together. As much a young and stupid filly could have known about love, anyway. And I’m talking about myself, too.”

“Ah already knew that.”

“Oh, please! Don’t start with the dumb jokes. I know we were really close and all, but when you have just one friend, one very good friend, that doesn’t mean two ponies are—” Tiara paces up and down the room, waving a hoof and ranting non-stop.

“Spoon told me about it.” Bloom sighs with a defeated look.

“What are you talking about?” She almost trips due to her hooves suddenly stopping, while cocking an eyebrow.

“The day we invited her, to say the ‘big news’ to her. She told me everything, how she feels for ya.”

“Oh, Spoony...” Everything comes together now. If the love Spoon has for this spoiled and careless mare, grown under that tree and finally blossomed when the two were grown, it must have felt like torture for Silver Spoon, hearing from the mare of her dreams that her heart belongs to another. Part of her says she shouldn’t be blaming herself. Nopony knew...

She’ll do it anyway, because even if it is just the past, the thought of her wonderful fillyfriend suffering breaks her heart in two. “She didn’t take it well, I suppose?”

“She said that she would have killed me if ah made ya suffer.”

A cold, hail-storm of silence falls the room.

“Well, you should be grateful that she is outside then.” Tiara chuckles nervously to break the tension, but realizes it’s futile. The other mare mare just scowls and shakes her head, the joke dying a silent death. “You know, I’m here just to see you again, but about you? Why did you want to see me after all this time? Why are you still asking for me? Why...?” A dawning realizations is seen in Applebloom’s timid smile and mortified look. “You still hoped that you and I—”

“Yes!” Then it comes: a smile so sincere, gingerly crossed by a streaming of tender tears, that it physically hurts. She holds a hoof to her chest, fearing her heart to stop and burst from some unknown emotion. Joy? Anger? Confusion?

Confusion comes out as the winner.

“I-I don’t know what to say...”

“Of course ya can’t. Jus’ forget about it.” Bloom hides her face with a hoof, rustling her mane frantically, dripping with uneasy feelings. “Ah can’t believe ah even asked ya.”

“You know, Bloom...” The yellow mare’s embarrassment turns into a gleam o f hope. “I don’t know if we could have had a chance. I don’t know if I could have had a chance, even after what happened with Dad. Not after y-you can’t drop a bomb like that on me!”

That face...disgust. I could only see disgust in his eyes and it’s her fault. All her fault. Why? Why do I still feel something for you if you...No, I can’t blame her. I really can’t. I still can’t. Never could.

But it’s her fault I lost him!

Why am I still reaching for her, then?

She continues, spurred by the same, old faked indignation and anger, dancing around the issue like a cheap carillon. “I thought it was over. I said this to myself over and over and over again. There was no hope...No reason to ever be together, and giving me hope like that—”

“Ah’m sorry,” the farmpony blurts out in tears, throwing herself at Tiara’s hooves, “Ah’m sorry if ah ruined your life. Ah’m sorry If ah left you all alone in the cold when ya still needed me. Ah’m sorry for being so selfish and...and dumb!”

This time it’s Diamond Tiara who initiates the hug, grabbing in her forelegs a pony that is begging for her forgiveness. She sees herself reflected in those tears, alone in the cold and abandoned by the pony she loved. The old Tiara would have repaid the favor with an evil smirk and a mean joke, but the old Tiara never knew how to love.

“I forgive you,” she whispers still grasping the mare. It isn’t difficult, really, forgiving her. She feels peaceful, instead, as if a great weight has finally been lifted.

“I forgive you, Bloom.”

Tears cross her smile, taking away the hate and malaise, never to return, “I really mean it. I loved you and for this I forgive you. Me of all ponies should know what means being mean when you have no other choice.”

“Y-ya mean it?”

“Yes. Yes, I do. You still hurt me and it will still hurt, but I forgive you.” She touches Bloom’s forehead with her own, “But I can’t. This time we can’t. Because if something happens again, nopony can be sure if you’ll stay by my side this time.”

“And SIlver Spoon will?”

“Yes,” she lashes out before doubt, any kind of doubt, sets in to ruin everything; her conviction is built upon solid ground. “Yes, she would. She would do anything for me. I hurt her, Bloom. I hurt her even though she loved me and wanted me to love her in return. “

“And you’re hurting me, right now.”

“You started it, beautiful. But Spoon...she waited for me, in the shadow. But just like you, she always saw something more in me. Something worthy of being loved. Something that was worth waiting for and I guess I knew it was there too. Even before you saw it, an-and it happened.”

“And what about me?” Bloom’s voice goes up a few octaves, turning into a shriek that is short of knocking off the magenta mare from her hooves. “You said that ya loved me. Ya made all those plans about our future together. Ya made me feel so proud of being with ya—”

“It’s true. I was, and if nothing had happened I still would be, even now. Forgiveness is one thing and I mean it, truly, but this... It’s not-It’s not fair! It’s not fair to me. I can’t act like nothing happened and trot back at your side!”

“It’s still all about ya, isn’t it? You shout I need you and expect that everypony will comply. Ya’re the one that can feel miserable an’ make everypony else miserable as well, jus’ because ya feel lonely. Ya’re the only one that can cling to somepony else because ya know that will be the only pony that will love her. Have ya ever thought that I could feel the same without ya?”

In that moment, Diamond Tiara knows that she isn’t the only one who wears a mask of composure and foalish indignation. Sadly, Bloom’s own isn’t strong as hers, cracking that facade and revealing a face of tears and regret— all the tears she has stored until now, other tears that are on her conscience. “Ya’re the only one that can make mistakes...” Applebloom whispers, before slumping down on the floor, her forehead touching the cold ground. Pure terror clutches her very soul as the past once thought dead returns to haunt her again and again and again.

“No, please. Don’t give me that. Don’t do that. I beg you—”

“Ah’m the one begging you, now: Please, take me back with ya. Please, ah love you.”

“You stupid-”, with feline grace she picks up the broken mare from the floor and cups her cheek with brutal tenderness, staring violently in her orange orbs. A pair of terrified, blood shot eyes stare back at her. “Where were you when I asked the same?”

Their lips meet with burning need, leaving Applebloom to whimper in their kiss. A whimper that lasts just a mere second before her forelegs fall down to Tiara’s waist. Their lips part again, just to let out a pained whisper from the spoiled mare: “I wish I could give you up.”

She kisses Bloom again before burying her muzzle in that yellow neck, nibbling at it with tender care.

“Please hold me,” she sobs. She’s never felt so defeated like in this moment, at the mercy of the mysterious force that guides her heart.

Applebloom complains, making those gentle, silent nights that saw two mares cuddling together be real again. “Ah’m sorry for your dad. Ah truly am.”

“You should. He trusted you. He liked you.”

“Ah jus’ wanted to tell the truth. Ah jus’ wanted to look in his eyes and say the truth.”

“Now you can’t do that anymore.” Even if she’s indoors, a trickle of raindrops splatter down her cheeks. They’re warm, though. ”But he would have appreciated the truth.”

“Ah know it’s too late. Ah know I don’t deserve this chance, but-—”

Another kiss follows, desperate, wanting and yet tender for the effort Tiara puts in it. Nothing exists apart from the kiss, nothing except those happier days. Nothing except for forgiveness that blesses them both.

“Come back with me. Come back home. Stop hating yourself.”

“Are ya sure?”

“Running away is useless. Take back your life and try to be happy. If you won’t do it for me, at least do it for your family. Be happy that you have one.” She doesn’t know why this slipped out of her mouth, but it doesn’t matter. Never did.

“Tiara, I’m sor—” but she does not finish, her words are once again stopped by Tiara lips, swallowing doubt and regret with a simple gesture of kindness and affection.

“Stop being sorry.” She roughly pushes Bloom on the floor and locks lips with her once again, the world around her fading, melting away in her strong grip and the familiar taste of those lips she lost and found again.

A smile and a pair of purple eyes flares behind her eyelids. A smile that trusts her and owes the world for it.

Spoony...Celestia, what the hay am I doing?! A voice in her head screams, terrified, as their kiss breaks. Everything she feared and loathed about herself comes true in the simple act of a kiss. Was it that easy to forget about Silver Spoon? Or was it just because she hoped for this? Waiting and waiting, loathing and complaining, burying her worries in her best friend’s embrace, in her SIlver Princess’ love, only until the glorious day Applebloom would return-—

No.

No, it can’t be.

She isn’t just a replacement...A toy to discard once I’m done with it. It cannot be...Why am I doing this? Why am I doing this to her? Again?! Her gaze goes blank as Bloom’s caress goes unnoticed.

“Tiara, what’s wrong?” she says softly.

“Everything is wrong!” She tightens her forelegs around Bloom’s waist, “I am wrong. I-I have Silver Spoon, now. Why am I doing this to her?” she sobs and groans. “I really wish we could get together, erase that day, erase all the pain and loneliness, start again just with me and you, but I found somepony else!”

Again the awful silence, interrupted by the oh-so-close sound of Bloom’s heartbeat. She can’t help but feels that it’s just as soothing as Spoony’s. Every beat is a reminder than the mares she loves are real and are there.

“Ah know.”

“I can’t choose. I don’t want to choose.”

“Nopony is asking ya to choose. Not even mahself.” Bloom strokes her mane, the kindness of it making it all the more difficult.

“I can’t choose. Not between you two. But I’ll have to.” She stares wide eyed at nothing, still pressed against Bloom’s warm coat. “I’ll have to.”

“Ah’m sorry. Ah’m so sor—”

She shoves a hoof in front of Bloom’s mouth. “Stop saying you’re sorry. It won’t help.”

“Just hold me, please. Hold me like you used to do. I need to rest. To rest...” The embrace grows stronger and Tiara drifts for just a second, a minute of peace in her embrace. It won’t last, of course. It’ll never be enough: not even with all the time in the world could she make such a decision.

Could it ever be possible...?

Maybe there is no need of a choice. Maybe even those two, for Tiara’s sake...could they get along? Why should love be reduced, limited to just few set choices, not unlike the flip of a coin? Nopony would know and should know, just the three of them...sappy as they can be. The possibility was never considered until she saw Bloom again, until she heard the other side of the story. Why does she have to let a simple mistake ruin the happiness of three ponies?

A mistake made only to let this happen: to make Diamond Tiara happy.

You can have anything you want.

Those words turn in a litany of torment: in her heart she knows she deserves to be happy, she has the right to fight with hooves and teeth to gain it, but at what cost? Her father...?

That she keeps disappointing, even long after he’s gone, is because of the whims of her heart.

To be three again, to let pain the and heartbreaks out of their lives, to settle their differences in the name of the purest desire can’t be so bad...Maybe if it hadn’t been so sudden he could have understood, maybe he could have left the past behind...

Maybe.

The possibilities are endless. Endless fates and endless Tiaras, sharing the same ocean but landing on different beaches. What matters is the road ahead of her. What matters now is to rest, even for a minute.

Sweet, brief slumber envelopes her, like a blanket full of stars. She can almost see it and hears a soothing voice in her ear, telling her not to be afraid, blessing her with a second of dreamless sleep. She can swear she sees the flash of a perfect crescent moon, like the one she saw that incredible, but still imperfect, first night with Spoony. The same stars she saw the first night with Bloom.

After so long, Diamond Tiara prays again to the Moon Goddess, hoping for an answer. Any answer.

The drape of stars and quiet is shred once Spoon barges in. The grey mare kicks the door almost out of its hinges and looks at the couple with enraged eyes full of tears.

“You!” Tiara jumps out of the embrace, startled.

“Spoony! I can explain: I wasn’t—”

But before she can finish the sentence, before she can notice the cruel irony of the same situation returning to torment her, she’s the grey mare rudely shoves her out of the way.

Once the center of her world, now SIlver Spoon's eyes are fixated with a sickened gleam against Applebloom: “You’re doing this again,” she whispers, not unlike a vengeful demon.

“What? Ah wasn’t—” before her words hit the air, the grey mare lunges towards Bloom, gripping her neck with her hooves.

“YOU TOOK HER AWAY FROM ME!” Spoon screams, her composure, her sweet, collected demeanour disappearing under a mask of tears and fury worthy of a berserker, her hooves pressing against the farmpony’s throat, drowning the sound of her gurgle with Silver’s enraged sobs.

“Stop! For the love of Celestia, stop!” Tiara jumps into the fray, struggling with all of her scarce strength to separate the two, trying to avoid something terrible to happen to either of them. She circles Spoon’s chest with her forelegs, trying to drag her away or at least slow her down. “I don’t want to lose either of you! Please!” she screams, crying out her very soul.

SIlver Spoon stops, loosening her grip around Bloom’s neck, her forelegs slowly descending to the sides while the yellow mare breathes freely again. Before she can draw a sigh of relief, before she can see the faintest glimmer of hope, it happens. A grey flash hits her right across the muzzle, making Tiara tumble and fall on the floor, her face hurting like a thousand needles.

Spoon’s still lifted hoof and horrified look completes the awful picture. Bloom holds her neck, gasping for air. Diamond Tiara tries to not cry, not for the physical pain, but for the full weight of what just happened falling on her shoulders. She doesn’t blame Spoon, or Applebloom or everything or anypony else for that matter. She doesn’t know if she should blame herself. But when she sees SIlver Spoon cry, she would want to see everything that sprang those tears burn. Including herself if necessary.

“Tiara, I’m-I’m sorry!” Silver Spoon runs away, leaving a stream of tears in her wake. Tiara lifts herself, ignoring the pain, any kind of pain and exchanges one last, tearful look with Bloom, who just nods, seeing in her heart for one last time. There is no anger, no hate in those eyes, because the time for those is passed.

Tiara runs away, in the hope of following her best friend. In the hope of saving her from this madness.

She runs faster than she can perceive, ignoring an orange blur that yells at her and already seems far away. The stair leading out the apartment does not exist, turning in just a descending spiral that swirls and turns toward the ground.

She runs outside in the street, amidst a sea of faces and voices that turn into a surreal painting, her mind not working to put everything into place, to make the world coherent, but only to find one mare, the only one she wants to see.

She starts to run again, not caring for the aching in her flank, not caring for every pony she bumps into or the things she runs over, nor the sound of broken glasses or angry words, searching only for the grey of her coat. A cold wind blows, but it doesn’t matter because she doesn’t feel it. A thunder booms in the distance, but it doesn’t matter because she can’t hear it. The dreadful storm from her past looms over her world, but this spoiled, little filly...

No.

This young mare is not afraid of it anymore. That’s how she finally sees herself.

All the world stops and her eyes paint the first clear picture, the only one that matters: Silver Spoon...frozen in a crying fit in the middle of a road. She reaches for her with a smile that simply says hope and SIlver Spoon smiles back at her beneath the tears, happy of having been found, her relief so powerful that she can taste it...until a creaking, bumping noise emerges from the darkness of the Manehattan night. Silver Spoon turns and cowers in fear before it, causing Tiara to look as well with worried eyes.

A speeding carriage spirals around the corner streetlamp, uncaring for everything but its driver’s need for speed, his eyes reflecting drunken stupor, caring even less for a solitary and confused mare with only precious seconds left to live.

Tiara grinds her teeth of impotent rage while her hindqurters still ache and burn. Spoon is reduced to just shaking in fear and closes just one eye, sending a silent plea to Tiara while a single tear just rolls down her cheek. A tear that feels like the last she’ll ever shed.

A plea immediately answered because Diamond Tiara won’t let this happen to anypony she loves. Not anymore.

Her legs move of their own will to push her Spoony out the way with the few seconds remaining her, sending Silver Spoon to fall on a roll, thankfully on a safe sidewalk. Time freezes as she sees the mare she loves to safety and still tries to reach her with a hoof, separated by an ocean only a few inches long. She doesn’t hear what she’s screaming, but it’s probably her name. Still the center of her world, after all... She closes her eyes, reasoning that if this is the last thing she’ll ever see, if SIlver Spoon is safe, it cannot be so bad...A sharp pain hits one leg and ripples across all of her body. It last only a microsecond, though, before all of her senses shut down one by one until the world finally goes silent and drowns in immaculate darkness. She regrets only the fact that the mare she just saved will have to shed a few more tears because of her.

But if she lives...I’m happy. Forgive me...I love you...I love you...

With only this thought, she faces whatever is coming with peace and without fear. It’s almost...beautiful. She feels her once useless life has found its purpose.

Finally.

The silence of the endless void she starts to drift in is broken by a flutter of wing and a voice. A familiar voice...A too familiar, soothing voice that she never thought to hear again.

Daddy?