The Islander

by Dunsparce

Rating: teen
Tags: Adventure, Tragedy
Length: 2585

An old pony by the sea shore at the end of day gazes the horizon with sea winds in his face. On a tempest tossed island where seasons are all the same; there is anchorage unpainted and a ship without a name.

This is for long and forgotten; the light at the end of the world. With the horizon crying, she left them behind not but half a day ago; the tears of the king sitting prompt in his tower and the children running in his field. Those small children now run above her in the soft sky as she drifts toward the island that holds her universe upside-down.

Published 1970-01-01 00:00:00 UTC
Last updated 2013-04-12 20:50:03 UTC

Light Up the End of the World

A lone mare in a life boat at the morn of day gazes into darkness with waves to rock her boat

A tempest tossed island with seasons all the same; anchorage rusted and a ship without a name.

Sea without a shore for the banished one hurt; her light is the beacon at the end of the world

Showing the way lighting hope in her heart; she begins her way homeward from a world afar.

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

Salted, wounded eyes begin to painfully shove off crust to see the world, or at least what is left of it for Rarity. Familiar creaks and moans make her ears cringe and she hops up with a gasp, checking her location. The morning mist, however, doesn’t let her see past her imagination.

“No… this can’t be happening.” She whispers to herself. Swishing and swashing water barely and calmly plops into the lifeboat of which she lay in. Her beautiful dress that she wears is beat up, wet, dirty, and has a gigantic, lightning-shaped rip near the left of the back, but it is mostly wet. The small boat that she rocks back and forth in is also beat up from the storm that occurred last night.

Just merely thinking about the storm sends her hooves to her face like an iron to a shirt and tears down her cheeks like a rapid to a river. It was all stripped away from her with one single act of nature; her luxurious cruise, her favorite clothes and accessories, but most of all, her little, scared sister. It was all gone, only to be seen again underwater in the investigation possibly a few weeks in the future, soggy and wet. Now, she is the only one left, drifting aimlessly in the morning mist of the ocean with no hope, no love, and bloodshot, stinging eyes.

The sun’s light barely shines through the thick, airy mist from the right, letting her see inside the boat better. Fabric scraps and drips of blood lie on the watery floor. Rarity’s heart begins to pump a little faster and she excerpts a gasp, for she is not used to dealing with blood because of her pristine, proper city mare attitude. Suddenly, she spots a splatter of red and a dent on the edge of the boat’s rear. Her heart suddenly sinks as her mind flashed light.

_ _ _ _ _ _ _

It was the dead of night, and the last one for many.

The rope holding the lifeboat to the gigantic ship snapped earlier than Rarity wanted it to due to the extremely harsh wind. From a height of teen meters, the lifeboat, with Rarity in it, began to plummet down to the harsh seas and waves as fast as the stinging rain that was pouring down from the sky. The ponies on the sideways, sinking ship were screaming and jumping off the edge of the ship into the water, only to be carried back into the monstrous ship by the harsh current and hitting it hard enough for them to be knocked unconscious. The waves began to slowly carry the lifeboat away from the ship with only Rarity on it, and poor, crying Sweetie Belle sat on the top of the ship’s edge.

“Sweetie!”Rarity yelled, holding out her hooves by the edge, silently signaling a jump. Sweetie didn’t budge, but her legs were shaking terribly fast and her heart was about to explode out of her chest. Suddenly, an ear-piercing crack and a flash of light jumped little Sweetie from behind. It shook the entire ship, or at least the part of it that was above water. Lightning had struck the tip of the boat, sticking up like a needle, and the ship began to sink faster.

“Jump! Now!” Rarity screamed at the little filly. Sweetie backed up a few steps to prepare for her leap of faith to the lifeboat. Hard metal creaked behind her as ponies shoved her out of the way to get to the ledge of the ship, most of which fell off due to the rain making the floor slippery. She twitched left and right to find an opening in which to run and leap. Suddenly, her opening appeared and, without hesitation, sprinted. All the little filly could hear was the sound of fear and rain. She grew closer and closer to the edge of the sinking cruise ship, and was ready to leap for her life.

Unfortunately, another bolt of lightning struck nearby, startling Sweetie Belle before she could jump. She tried to stop her momentum before she tripped off the edge, but the slippery floor prevented her from even slowing down at all and she blindly slid off the edge of the ship and into the air above Rarity. Time suddenly slowed as the filly’s face filled with horror. Rarity gasped dramatically as a small rogue current suddenly hit the lifeboat, lifting it up violently and knocking Rarity to the back of the boat with a squeak. She opened her eyes in time to see her sister falling onto the edge of the uplifted boat. A squeak erupted from the poor filly as she slammed the edge of the boat, spewing blood from her jaw and sending her into the waters below the ship. Rarity’s voice cracked in terror as a scream erupted from her mouth. She rushed over to the edge after she quickly regained balance to only see the most terrifying thing she could ever imagine; a small blood pool outlining the shape of a small body underneath the water. Rarity was about to jump in to save her when an explosion came from the sinking cruise ship, followed by metal screeching and breaking.

“Sweetie Belle!” Rarity cried as she reached her hoof into the water, but by then, the shadow had disappeared. She looked up to see what the creaking near her was about, and the metal monster in front of her began to snap. The ship was breaking apart. As Rarity raced for the opposite edge of the lifeboat, a sharp bang ripped the ship’s metal apart, sending a force of water that the sinking ship held within it directly at Rarity’s life boat. The wave that the force created was large and began to carry Rarity’s lifeboat away from the cruise ship, with Rarity screaming all along the way. The wave calmed after about ten seconds, allowing Rarity to stand up on the ship. She looked back at the humongous ship from the distance the wave had carried her and saw ponies screaming their head off jumping out of desperation and fear into the waters below, only to be carried back into their demise. It was at that moment, all of the lights on the ship vanished and all she could hear was the sound of the deaths of her own kind.

A harsh spray of water awoke her from her staring trance and knocked her to the ground of the ship once again. Wiping her mane from her eyes, she was only welcomed by another one, except this one was much larger and more powerful. It was at least fifteen hooves high, and it was crashing down on her lifeboat.

“No, please nonononono!”She pleaded as the devilish wave crashed down upon her terrified face.

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

“Gyah!” Rarity yelps suddenly as the lifeboat mildly shakes. She breathes heavily as she looks around. The mist has died a tad and her lifeboat has reached something she’d never thought she’d see ever again: Land. Her lifeboat had floated up upon the beach of an island while she was having her horrible flashback to the night before the morn she existed in now. Rarity slowly begins to gain a very large smile.

“Ha… haha!” She laughs as she jumps up and down. The tragedy of the night has been discarded from her mind completely for the moment. It is as if Celestia was looking out for her survival, but can’t reach her. Rarity cares not, for she is too happy about finding a beach. Rarity ditches her beat up dress and launches herself upwards to rid herself of the wretched lifeboat, but her hind legs trip on the boat’s rim and she ends up face first into sand. Not amused, she lifts her face up from the sand with a groan as the shore line hits her side, getting salt water in her eye.

“Ow! Ow ow ow ow!” She yips as her eye turns red. She bounces up and begins bouncing around holding her hoof to eye in pain. Squinting and blinking, she wipes away the watery tear with a dissatisfying hum. She looks forward beyond the beach to see trees: Lots and lots of trees. Her mind shifts from joy to wonder and curiosity as she glares into the forest as far as she can until the white mist cuts off her view.

“Hmmm,” Rarity says with a scrunched face, “what does one do first when he or she is on a stranded island?”

Rarity plops her rear into the upcoming wave and sits for a moment with her hoof to her chin thinking back to all of the stranded isle, romance movies she had seen. Suddenly, her belly rumbles, breaking her thoughts. She nods at her upcoming idea.

“Drat, I’m hungry. Sweetie Be-“ Rarity stops herself in the midst of her call when she realizes what she is about to say. Her mood plummets rapidly as she hangs her head to the ground.

“Sweetie Belle…” She finishes as a small spot of sand below her eye turns dark. Rarity excerpts a sigh of sadness as she draws a heart around the darkened spot in the sand. With a yell, she smashes the sand below her with all of her force, all the while tears of agony streams onto the ground. She continues to beat the ground.

“Stupid! Storm! Dumb! Ship! Wretched! Island!!” Rarity yells in beat with her pounding. With both hooves, she body slams the ground with all the anger she can muster. On the ground, face in her hooves, the only thing that she hears is the apologizing shoreline of the vast ocean and the only thing that she sees is never ending darkness.

Suddenly, something rustles in the leaves in front of her as the weather suddenly chills. Looking up with a gasp, something immediately has gone wrong; she is again surrounded by misty fog. However, this time, there are noises to accompany the mysterious, cool fog. Suddenly worried about her well being, Rarity hops up as fast as a bolt of lightning and begins to back up.

“H-hello? Anypony there?” She mildly asked into the blurring fog. An echoing sound hits her ears softly and mischievously. It sounds almost like a wind instrument. She looks around frantically, unable to see nearly anything but her own body. The sound continues to come in all directions as she keeps backing up. She suddenly feels something cold and wet touch the back of her neck.

“YAAAH!” Rarity yells as she turns around. Breathing heavily, she soon recognizes that the thing that poked her was nothing more than her cold, metal lifeboat. She chuckles an embarrassing laugh.

“Oh, haha. That’s just your lifeboat, Rarity. You must keep calm to keep stable. You must be calm. Calm yourself. Calm.” She encourages herself as she takes deep breaths. She turns around to see a giant pair of blue eyes staring into her face from the fog. No body, just eyes.

“AAAH!” Rarity yells as she rockets to the right. She looks back as she runs, but sees nothing but white mist. The mist doesn’t thin as she runs; rather, it feels as though it is getting thicker and denser. Rarity begins to shift her direction to the left. She soon feels plants and dirt at her hooves and hears the rustling of leaves. She’s suddenly running in front of trees, barely dodging out of the way before she hits them. Poor Rarity trips as something sharp snips the bottom of her hoof.

“Augh!” She groans as she looks at her hoof. She had accidentally snagged a thorny branch off of a bush that was now impaled in her hoof. With her horn, she carefully picks off the thorny branch like a set of buttons on a shirt. Wounds soon came into her vision as the familiar, woodwind sound made her ears rise. When she put her hoof down to run once again, it hurt badly. It wasn’t possible to escape quickly.

“Please, don’t hurt me, Mr. Creepy Mist-Man! I didn’t mean it!” She pleads to the sky of which she cannot see.

“Deep dark door to the horrors of life; a claw, a soul, a journey will give you a knife. The knife you will use to smite your foes, and escape in the way that the sea wind blows…” A mysterious, crusty voice rhymes from the mist. Rarity, scared out of her mind, squeaks a scared peep and dives her head into a nearby bush, closing her ears with her hooves.

The cool temperature fades as morning sunshine peeks in. It shines on her back and the birds begin to sing. Unscrunching her face, Rarity opens her eyes slowly, only to be greeted by a lone, black spider but as big a pea. The poor mare explodes with a yelp from the bush as the flapping of birds’ wings are heard escaping a tree. The fog has settled mysteriously again, but strangely, Rarity feels more unsecure. Looking up to the sky, Rarity sees quite a large cliff of rock towering over her. She sits staring blankly at cliff, wondering what is at the top of the behemoth of rock and soil, until her stomach growls again, distracting her for the second time this morning. Rarity sighs heavily.

“Oh yes, I’m hungry; wonderful. How am I supposed to find food with an injury?” She complains as she wiggles her cut hoof, barely bleeding at all. “Nature expects too much out of proper mares.”

Rarity looks around the forest floor and sees nothing that looks edible or wound healing. Striking out, she has no choice but to walk, or rather, limp along the bottom of the cliff to an unknown destination. She hears nothing but the sound of the wilds around her as she struggles to accomplish even the most basic survival tactics. Her greasy, wet, and salty mane remains uncombed and filthy as it waves in the wind. All the time she thinks about her poor sister lost in the ocean. Tears spur from her eyes as a foggy filly dances around her in joy, laughing and beaming a smile. Rarity sees her, but cannot look up and keeps walking.

Her Sweetie Belle is dancing, making her daydream.

The day before she became one of the world’s unseen.

Celestia in her tower, the fillies in her field.

Life gave her it all; an island of the universe.

Now, her love’s a memory; a ghost in the fog.

She sets sail one last time saying farewell to the world.

Anchor to the water; seabed far below, grass beneath her feet and a tear beneath her eye.

She lights the beacon at the end of world.

Now, she lives in the last of the wilds; the leaves slowing her fall.