Love Songs and Tooth Picks

Heart and Love slowly slumped to the ground once they saw one another. Gate and Twinkle looked at one another with uncertain glances, before rushing to either side of Heart; while Guyra and Snow appeared at Love’s side instantly.

Gate prodded Heart gently, trying to get her attention. “Heart, are you okay? What’s wrong?”

Heart barely managed to choke back the tears long enough to respond. “It’s… my fault. It’s my fault she’s dead. If… if I hadn’t of been so careless, so reckless, and so… so stupid! She would still be alive…”

Twinkle spotted a few gray hairs among the white streak in Heart’s mane, but thought nothing more of it.

Guyra lifted Love back to her hooves, letting her lean onto his shoulder.. “You alright there? What’s with the water works?”

A tear fell from Love’s chin as it quivered. “I should have trusted her. She said she could do it on her own. If I hadn’t of gotten in her way, if I hadn’t of slowed her down…”

The mare’s weight fell entirely onto Guyra, causing him to stumble a bit. “Hey! Hey, it’s all alright, everything is going to be fine.”

She stepped away from the green stallion and scowled at him. “How can you say that?! Heart is dead and it’s entirely my fault! What the hell is wrong with you?! How are you acting so calm when her blood is on my hooves?!” Love sat on her haunches and looked down at her forelegs. “It was everywhere… I never would have guessed that one mare could bleed so much.”

Snow noticed Love’s yellow mane seemed a little paler, but he assumed it was a trick of the light caused by the setting sun.

I forced myself to stand from the ball I was curled in. If everypony else could accept that the love of my life was dead, I would have to at least pretend to be fine, for their sakes if anything. I cast one more tear filled gaze at the severed head of my friend and tried to steady my breathing.

Gate smiled, apparently seeing that I was at least trying to move on. “Guys, we should get moving. We’re too high in the air, too late at night. Here in a bit, the air is going to get much colder once the sun is done setting.”

We all nodded our agreement, and Snow lifted us one by one, down to the empty streets below. For a moment, I thought it was rather odd that Snow had brought Love’s head; but then I realized that we should probably bury her remains. It would have just been cruel to leave it to the birds, disrespectful even.

Once I was safely on the street, I found myself grinning slightly at the sight of the walls of this concrete canyon. I bet the acoustics would be wonderful right now.

Having decided on a course of action, I started to hum a rather pleasant little tune.

Love’s hooves met the ground, and Snow landed next to her. She was still shaking from the shock of the day’s events, but had agreed to trudge along with her companions. Wherever they were going, it was away from the memory of Heart being-

No. I can’t let myself even think about it. Stop.

Her hooves flung to the sides of her head, face twisted into a grimace of obvious pain. “Agh! Stop!”

Guyra put a hoof over her shoulder and pulled her in for a hug. “You’re going to be okay,” he cooed into her ear.

Once we all had our hooves on the ground, I picked a direction and started walking. I didn’t care if the others were following.

Why should I? Those bastards are acting like everything is perfectly normal! I screamed in my head at the thought. I just wanted to get away from the stench of rotting flesh coming from the head Guyra was holding.

After a few minutes, it occurred to me that I had no idea where I was. I looked down at my dull green hooves, wondering where they were taking me. Surely, a straight line in any one direction would have provided a way out of this damned jungle of bricks and glass.

Gate managed to catch up with me, and was breathing heavily. “Where are you going? We have to-“

“Away.” I replied calmly. “I’m going away from this hell hole,  as far away as I can get, and then I’m going to go farther.”

Gate stopped following me mid-stride and looked over her shoulder.  The rest of the group had stayed behind, talking to one another about something. I could have listened to them to find out what, but I really just wanted to keep going away.

I decided to start galloping, and the blue mare behind me followed suit without hesitation.

Snow, Guyra, and Twinkle stared at the blue unicorn as she pursued their distraught green friend.

Love glanced towards Guyra with a worried look. “Why is Gate running off with Heart’s head? She whispered.

“What? Heart ran off and so Gate is trying to catch her.” He was thoroughly confused at her question.

It was Love’s turn to be confused. “But Heart is dead. I saw her get-“ Her voice and thoughts were both interrupted by a stabbing pain behind her eyes. She fell forward, choking on air for a moment.

Once her coughing fit resolved itself, Guyra still looked confused. “Are you okay?”

“Y-yeah… I just had a rather unpleasant combination of aching eyes and itchy throat. I think it’s all alright now.”

“What was that you were saying about Heart? You saw her get what?”

“I- I don’t know what I was going to say. What I did see though, might be a bit more than worrisome.”

By this point, Snow and Twinkle had been silently eaves dropping. Snow decided to stop being so silent. “What happened before you two fell through that window?”

Love looked away and to her left, eyes glazed slightly over from deep thought. “I know what happened, but when I picture it… it’s like someone recorded something over an old VHS movie. It sort skips in my head, almost like a scratch on a CD that plays a few seconds of the wrong song, before jumping back to what I’m certain of. Well, that’s not quite right. I can’t really explain it any way else though. Hmmm.”

Guyra and Snow looked at each other with raised eyebrows and slight frowns, before Snow just shrugged his wings. “Mare logic, just pretend it makes sense.”

Twinkle jabbed him in the chest with her hoof, without looking away from Love. “So it’s like you KNOW what is supposed to be there, but when you try to remember it, something else shows up instead?”

Love looked a tad dumb struck for a moment. “Well, yeah. That actually makes far more sense than what I was saying. Thanks. Anyways, it was all as planned until we got in the elevator. Once the guys inside of it were disposed of, the lights sort of flickered a little, but then came back on in a bit of a yellowish hue. When I try to remember that fact, all I can picture is Heart laughing over a guy who’s bones she had broken.”

Snow stamped his hoof against the side walk. “Heart would never do that, she might be weird but she would never hurt somepony, not without regretting it immediately.”

“Exactly why this is giving me such a headache, Snow. Now stop interrupting. It was a rather creepy laugh, kind of sounded like it was overlapping with somepony else’s, a deeper male one, it sounded like it would of if he was still human. It continued on until we left the elevator. The memory goes back to solid certainty at this point. We walk out, stepping in unison to the door to the guy’s office. We both pause for a minute, and look at each other with disturbed looks. Right then, the memory skips over to the unclear. Heart is grinning ear to ear as she cuts the wrists of some fallen guard that wasn't actually there. She plays with his corpse like a dog with a rag doll, getting his blood everywhere.”  Love shuddered and paused for a moment.

After a deep breath, she continued. “Then it jumps back to clarity, we walk through the door as it opens itself. We both walk over to the window and stand there staring at one another. The office is empty, beyond the large desk in the middle. Papers were moving around on it on their own accord. We stared at each other for what feels like it was several minutes. Memory skips again, more like a broken record than anything, and we are only just having walked in. We were both covered in that man’s blood and Heart just sprints for the desk. There is a tall, slender old man sitting at it. Really, he looked like nothing more than a bag of bones. Heart jumps into the air while laughing, but stops just as she is above the desk. I see the faint glimmer of light reflecting off of something like thin fishing wires, that were suspending her in their grip...  She twitches a bit, but screams in agony. Every time she tries to move, the wires cut clean into her flesh. One of her hooves fell off. Clean off, it bounced onto the desk, covering the paperwork in red.”

A tear fell from her eye, and she noticed Twinkle had her hoof around her shoulder. It was rather comforting. “You don’t have to remember it…”

Love just shook her head. “No, I do. The man didn't even look up from his paperwork until the words on it were hidden behind the red. He just grimaced at Heart and said ‘Insignificant whelp. You aren't even important. Stop trying to be.’ He snapped his fingers and then…”

Love started to sob, and Twinkle wrapped her in a hug. No one had anything to say, so Love continued through her weeping. “I don’t think I've ever seen so much red at once… It was like a cloud that just floated there, mocking gravity.  The memory goes back to reality again and Heart and I are still looking each other in the eyes. She had obviously been crying, the air reeked of vomit. I looked down and saw a puddle of it under me. A sudden wind pushed us both head first through the window, and then nothing. Next thing I know I’m waking up on the roof.”

Snow cleared his throat. “I think I can fill in the blanks there. Gate, Twinkle, Guyra and I had just made our way out of the building. We knew that you and Heart were going after whoever was in charge, and figured that anyone who was in charge of such a place would be on the top floor. So Gate suggests we get to some high ground fast, and watch the upper floor windows. I spotted a nearby building which had a clear view of the building we woke up in, so I dragged those three up onto it’s roof. We were all just staring at the windows and waiting for movement to happen. Twinkle spotted you two standing near the window of the top floor, so Gate hummed to herself for a moment. Her eyes glowed blue for a bit and she told me to go hover near the window and wait for something to happen. I did, and within a few minutes, you both just sort of flew out the window. I managed to catch you both at once, luckily. Somehow the two of you got caught up in an embrace before I caught you. That made it easier.”

I could see the gaps between the walls of the buildings. The edges of the city were coming closer. Noticing this, I forced my legs to move faster, despite their protests. The rapid clop of my hooves against concrete had been echoing endlessly with every step, and I was quite sure my ears were bleeding from the sound of it.

Gate was still following me, the damned fool was making enough noise for me to be certain of it. She was breathing heavily, and her pace was slowing. Won’t be long until she can’t keep up; that noisy ass is too out of shape!

My thoughts were interrupted by my front left leg going entirely numb. I failed to correct myself in time, and my face met the concrete.

Gate was laying on her stomach next to her still sleeping friend. She had carried Heart the rest of the way down the road, onto a small grassy hill that marked the city's limits. Even as a pony, she still sleeps like a brick. She smiled at the thought. Maybe this wasn't as much of a change after all. Gate felt something warm press against her. She looked and saw that Heart had rolled over and was cuddling against her. The sleeping mare looked scared, and was twitching occasionally. Gate ran a hoof through Heart's dull green mane and sighed. She looked back the way they had came.

The road that Heart had taken had a few cars parked along the sides. Small orange discs could be seen on many of the tires. Why are so many cars booted? Heart squirmed again and whimpered in her sleep. Must be having a bad dream...

Gate's horn started glowing a pale blue. The light flowed into a three small orbs on the tip that were about the size of base balls. She put a little more energy into them, and let the spell finish casting. The blue Flares flew into the sky and hovered at a height well above that of the buildings. The sky was filled with the pale blue glow they gave off, as the last remnants of the sunlight were drowned out by an otherwise black sky.

Guyra, Love, Snow, and Twinkle were slowly walking in the direction that Heart and Gate had run. Nopony said a word, until Love looked up. "Guys? Whats that?"

Twinkle looked and saw the source of the light. From this distance, it looked like a star, but it was too bright and too large to be seen at this hour. It was also blue. "That must be Gate's flares."

Love raised a confused eyebrow. "Flare?"

"Yeah, while we were waiting on the roof for something to happen, Gate and I were playing with magic a bit. Figured out a way to shoot flares made of magic. It's really no more than just a really tightly packed ball of energy, levitated really high."

Guyra gave a rude cough. "I still say this is all a bunch of malarkey. Magic shouldn't even be real, it denies all laws of physics!"

Snow just shook his head. "You aren't getting this are you? Just treat it the same way you treat mare logic."

Twinkle only just barely resisted the urge to say something, and just smirked instead. She lowered her head and started to cast two of her own flares.

Love looked at the pink lights. "Why are you only doing two when Gate sent three?"

"Because, we agreed on a simple code. One flare means we need help, two flares is a confirmation, three flares basically says 'over here'. As we get moving, I'll keep my flares directly over us. Gate will start to lower hers as we approach, and so will I, until we see each other."

"Neat."

"Yep."

Guyra imitated a gagging noise.

I felt a familiar warmth next to me, and snuggled closer, grateful for something to ward off the chill of the night. I heard a light giggle, but I ignored it in favor or returning to sleep. It wasn't until I noticed a wetness on my left cheek that I decided to touch it with a hoof. It was sticky, and warm. There wasn't a lot of it, but there was definitely a line of it across my cheek. I opened my eyes and looked at my dull green hoof. The tip was red.

"Oh, you're awake, good. I was a bit worried that you'd hurt your head when you fell."

I looked up and saw that the warmth I was cuddling against had been Gate. I immediately pulled myself away and stood up. I noticed my face get considerably less cold, and decided to avoid that subject. "I fell?"

"You were running, but sort of just fell forward." She smiled at me.

"I remember my leg had gone numb, but then nothing."

"Your leg went numb? Let me see it." Her eyes started to glow the same blue as the ambient light that I hadn't noticed before. "Which one was it?"

I started to raise my left foreleg, but she just levitated me off the ground. She twisted and turned me to get a better view of my leg. Couldn't she of just moved her head? I'm certain that at that moment, I started looking a little greener than usual.

"Not broken, no signs of muscle damage, either. There is a small bug bite on your fetlock though."

"On my what?"

"Basically the back of your hoof. Anyways, this looks like a bug bite."