Hanged

Author's note: Woo, I'm gettin more cynical every day! :D But cynicosity killed the cat.

"How was school today, Muffin?" Ditzy tried to sound happy. It didn't work. But she didn't notice.

"Oh, it was great!" Dinky responded in the way all children do, carefree and in perpetual bliss.

Ditzy only wondered when that would all change. She remembered when it changed for her. Her eyes cleared, and the world seemed less... happy. She saw the suffering. Not just saw it like foals do, but actually understood it all... enlightenment comes with a price, always.

Sometimes she wondered if it was worth it. Waking up happy, laughing at everything... being able to smile with your mother... it all disappears in a second.

Ditzy's 'derp eye' twitched. Her left hoof followed. She tried to hide it.

"So, what are we doing today?" Dinky asked.

"That's... a surprise..." She said.

Dinky looked at her mother, straight in the eyes. She knew something was wrong. She stared down for a few seconds. Ditzy was beginning to sweat. Eventually she gave up, and shifted gears right back on track.

"What kind of surprise!"

Ditzy took the hint. "Oh, you'll have to see! It's... surprising!" she smiled for effect, a wide grin that didn't go very deep.

"Is it Sugarcube Corner?!"

"No..."

"Hmm... I don't know. Can we fly? I want to see everything from above! That might help me guess!"

'Can we fly.' Those three words reopened old wounds, and started a new slash of its own. Her daughter, being a unicorn, could not fly, and she wanted her to be able to as much as she could, to feel the freedom. Before it was too late.

"I'd like to Muffin, but sorry, I uh, cramped my wings." she couldn't risk this, after her mother...

"Aw." Dinky thought for a while. "Is it... visiting the Weather Station?"

"No, I'm afraid not... anyways, we best be going home."

They started walking to Ditzy's apartment, a flat by Sweet Apple Acres. She rang the bell, and soon the door opened.

Her roommate Lyra looked over them grimly. "Today?" she asked.

"Today." Ditzy verified solemnly. "...Dinky? Could you go to your room for a minute?"

"Sure mommy!" she bounced up the stairs.

Ditzy waited for the sound of a clicking lock, and the stopping of the soft hooves.

"...I'm going to miss you Ditzy..." Lyra was on the verge of tears already.

"Don't worry. It was always meant to be."

"Bu- but what if it doesn't happen to you? What if this is all just a big-"

Ditzy spoke in tones like a calming breeze. "It's fine. Relax... When this is all over, I'm sure it will be for the better."

"I- I'll try to take care of Dinky. Bon-bon could help me."

"Thank you. Is everything ready?"

Lyra nodded silently.

They hugged. "I'll see you in the next one."

"Is it going to the petting zoo?!"

"No..." Ditzy tried to keep happy for her daughter. But she couldn't forget what was going to happen. She was at the right age, it happened to her sister, her mother... and hopefully won't happen to Dinky. Right?

"What's that?" the tiny gray filly pointed to a building, wood walls, one story, bigger than their own house by about four times. It gave off a creepy aura.

"Our arrival." Ditzy pulled out a key. Her hooves trembled and she dropped it. Not that she was scared. Her eyes began to twitch. Like a white-hot lightning bolt, pain split through her skull. She fell to her knees, yelling. The world was just gaudy colors and Gaussian blurs, laughing shouts and lunatical gongs, terrifying tremors and quailing quakes.

Dinky backed away in fear. "W- water..." Ditzy pleaded.

There was luckily a river nearby, with a pail filled with fish. But in this time, there'd be no way she could make it. What did Twilight say?

"Focus."

She closed her eyes and slowed her breathing, a feat given the situation.

"Target."

The pail. Right.

"Energy."

Where could she get that? There's always the sun, but that doesn't have enough. Most unicorns just use the regenerating magic in their blood, but Dinky wasn't old enough to have sufficient levels. What could she tap it from...

With closed eyes she looked with her horn. Nothing. There was nothing for her mother- wait a second. Her mother was giving off unusual levels of energy... it was strange, but she couldn't question it.

The pail quickly threw out the fish and pulled the water in, gliding over and splashing loudly.

Ditzy sputtered a few times before moving her mane out of her eyes. "Th-thank you muffin... that was amazing..."

"Mommy, what was that?"

"Y- you'll see..."

She picked up the key and went in.

Her mother's energy flare was completely gone now, back to its normal, soft glow.

The interior was simple. Four rooms. The one the door lead to had a single square oaken table in the center. A metal lamp hung crooked from the ceiling. A window graced one of the walls, and the other an old Wonderbolts poster. The well-trod beige carpet was old, but still all the cleanest.

"Where are we Mommy?"

"Welcome... to our old house. Its stood here since the Apple family."

"That's... Cool!" Dinky frowned, confused. "Why don't we live here?"

Ditzy eyed the walls as if they would swallow her. "Let's just say this place has bad memories. Come, sit."

She pulled out two chairs with a businessmare attitude. She sat down in her old one. The old oaken table still had their marks. The acid burn from her chemistry set. Aura's wooden carving of a Lupus Minor on one of the corners. The blood spilled- no, we must face the future.

"Dinky... I don't really know how to say this, but... I'm leaving."

"Oh..." She looked sad. "When are you coming back?"

"...Never."

"What?!"

"Muffin... There's something I must tell you... about our family..."

"Yes?"

"The mares of our line have always been... different. I do not know why, but it almost seems as if we are cursed. Once we reach a certain age, things begin to change. The first sign is the errant eyes."

"I thought that was just you..." Dinky admitted.

Ditzy shook her head. "Soon, it escalates to splitting migraines. I once had two sisters... Aura, and Eura. Aura was a few years older than me, quite a few. She had a foal just like you, and was flying her one day... when she had a migrane mid-flight. They fell, mother and foal, out of the sky. They died instantly, no chance of survival."

The mailmare's foal had nothing to say. She just looked on with fear.

"I- is that the worst of it?"

"No. I thought that was it. I was proven wrong, however, by my mother. This was before Aura. I was home from school with Eura; she was a lot closer to my age. Aura wouldn't be home until later. We came in and threw our bags down, when we saw our mother whispering to herself in the corner... we had known she was acting strangely quite recently, the twitches, the headaches... but nothing major enough for us to worry.

"She was mumbling to herself. 'Macabre asks me to the prom... yet Alice awaits! Oh how the sands spin!'"

Dinky was terrified by now. "I- is this a joke?"

Ditzy's eyes were set. "No. This is serious. But that is not all. When she turned and saw us, she was brandishing a knife. I ran, and was able to fly to safety, but Eura... I'm afraid not." the carpet under her hooves felt less warm. "This carpet is so clean... but under it..."

"What happened to Grandma?"

"She never was arrested. Why? The same day she killed Eura, she died an hour later. Eye to mind, then mind to life. It happened to two of us. It can only happen to me..."

"Wh... I... didn't know..."

Ditzy stood up. "My friends are your friends. They will be great family. I only hope my time is not up already..."

They walked home in silence.

Lyra opened the door slowly to see if her new daughter was asleep. She wasn't.

"Thinking about Ditzy?" she asked quietly, walking over.

"..."

She laughed. "You know, I think I have something that might help." she pulled out her lyre and played something.

It started out soft and slow, like a lullaby. Gentle, asleep, without emotion, just... peace. A simple melody, one note after another.

More notes were added, long notes layered in soft chords. Two melodies played together in harmony.

A third part was added, triad after triad, but this one was a bit more... unsettling. It tried to match the chords of the other two but was always off by one bit.

It enticed the others to match its speed, always accelerating to keep them up. Gradually getting faster... and louder- quicker and quicker- a toccata of sorts- quicker, quicker, quicker, rising, rising, rising, up until- nothing.

The lyre finished its piece, a diminished chord hanging in the air. Lyra rose and left.

The song was nowhere near a lullaby, and it seemed to do nothing of the sort in sound, but it brought a sense of... rest. Eternal rest. It was unsettling, but forced you to sleep. To try to forget all of its pains.

Finally... peace.

"G'morning Lyra!" Dinky bounced down the stairs to find Lyra with a coffee cup and a cereal bowl.

"Ello Dinky."

"What are we doing today?"

"I dunno... Prolly gonna go get Bon-bon, and- wait, its the weekend, right? Yeah, so like, um, we can go do whatever today."

"Is Mommy gonna come back soon?"

Lyra froze and had to set her cup down before she dropped it. "D- Dinky... she ain't never coming back..."

"What?"

"She was hanged this morning."

"WHAT?!"

"She didn't want to be crazy in front of you. She was brave, Dinky. She figured that if her death was inevitable, speeding it up by just a little might keep you safe. It may cost you a few weeks with her, but she didn't want to hurt you... or worse. It was all for... the better."

The funeral was quick. Invited were only a close circle of friends, yet it seemed that most of Ponyville had shown up. The processions were a blur to Dinky. Countless ponies saying empty words, empathizing, whatever they felt could make her feel better. Nothing worked. Not like she thought it would.

Her mother's tombstone was simple, white marble with black etchings. It showed nothing of importance though. Her name, her birth, her death, and a hollow eulogy.

The only event of significance she could recall was Lyra playing an elegy... the elegy of a lullaby.

Her lullaby, the last thing she would hear before learning of her mother's death, was her own funeral march.

But that doesn't matter. All that does is that her mother is happy. Euphoria. Free of all her many tormentors, forever.

Free... forever...

Author's Note: I was gonna have yet ANOTHER suicide in my fics, but I figured that I'd done that too many times already. Not that I'm denying it will happen again.