April 29
"I'm feeling better" acknowledged Lightning Dust, when I saw her stood up this morning, off the sofa where she had lay for how long I'd forgotten. "Thanks to you. Fluttershy."
I smiled as I looked at the smile on Lightning Dust's face. The one she had when she was Dash's partner at the academy. A smile that reflected none of the horrific abuse she had sustained.
"Don't mention it. It was my pleasure" I say, shaking her hoof. "So Lightning Dust. What do you think you'll do now?"
Lightning didn't need long to think. "I'd like to meet your friends" she replied nervously "I want to meet them personally so I can apologise for hurting them so badly. And then I want to see Rainbow Dash. I want to tell her that it was wrong of me not to let her lead and I want to apologise to her as well so she understands there's no hard feelings. And then Spitfire. Spitfire needs to know how much I loved her when I was her student and how sorry I am for failing her."
I shook my head sadly. "You can't. I'm sorry. If other ponies see you, they'll put you back in prison or even kill you. The only reason they haven't come for you yet is because they think you're dead. But once they realise your corpse was never found, they'll start to get suspicious."
"But Spitfire needs to..."
"There's no point in going back to Spitfire, she'll probably just arrest you again without giving a flying feather about what you have to say. Same with Rainbow Dash"
Lightning Dust nodded sadly. "Then I should let Spitfire arrest me again. You probably don't understand this, but Spitfire was the closest thing I had to a family since I left my own. She knows best whats best for me. And Rainbow Dash is my partner. Partners should stick together. I'm sorry Fluttershy. I should go. You've already done so much for me Fluttershy, I can't burden you any more." And she began to walk towards the door.
I flew in front of her and blocked her, doing what I could to stop her advancing. "No Lightning Dust. They'll kill you. Please, do it for me. For my sake, stay here with me. Stories will be told about you Lightning Dust, about how great a Wonderbolt you were. So live, and you can tell the stories yourself."
Lightning Dust immediately stopped walking when she saw the tears in my eyes. She looked at me emphatically. "If that's what would make you happier, then I will. If that's really what you want, then I will. But first tell me, do you really trust me. I have to know. Tell me if you really trust me."
"Rainbow Dash told me you were trustworthy" I lied. I knew it was a blatant lie but I needed Lightning Dust to know how much she meant to me "Rainbow Dash told me stories of you being a pony of honor. I value honor highly."
Lightning Dust smiled, but shook her head. "She didn't tell you that. She certainly didn't tell Spitfire that. I appreciate your compliment, but, I don't deserve them. Rainbow Dash probably told you that I was nothing more than a reckless, mean spirited brute."
"That's not true at all" I knew lying was bad, but in this instance it seemed the lesser of the two wrongs. "Rainbow Dash told me you were the best Wonderbolt, the best flier and most of all, the best leader she could ever hope to have. She was horrified when you were taken away from her."
"No. Rainbow Dash was upset with me. She was upset with me because Spitfire made me the lead pony and not her. I need to tell her that I'm sorry for that. But you're avoiding the question. So please, tell me, I have to know. Do you trust me."
"Yes. Yes I trust you. I trust you with my life." I meant it. I trusted Lightning Dust much more than I trusted Twilight or any of my other friends. And I trusted that had Rainbow Dash not made that cloud to save us from the fall, Lightning Dust would have saved us instead. Till this day I wished it was Lightning Dust who saved us first.
Lightning Dust sighed and covered her face. It was clear she did not believe me. "I let down my teacher. I let down my partner, and then I nearly killed five ponies when I blew a tornado. All I wanted to do was clear the clouds. It was meant to be safe, it was meant to be harmless. Had those five ponies not come from nowhere, the hurricane would be harmless. But I screwed up. It was my fault, however I look at it. All my fault. I don't deserve trust. I don't deserve trust."
"I trust you completely" I shout. "You see where you went wrong and you want to improve. You want to take full responsibility and not put any blame on others. That takes guts and honesty. So I trust you. I trust you with my life. Don't feel guilty, I saved you because it was the right thing to do. And I know you'd have done the same for me. I trust you Lightning Dust, I really do."
Lightning Dust paused in thought. "Sooner or later I'll have to face up to Spitifire" she explained "But if I don't , I have nowhere to go. No one to take me in. No one..."
"Stay here with me" I begged "I'm your friend now and friends help each other. Stay here with me. You can live here for as long as you need to. Its no trouble, really. I get lonely living here on my own and it would be nice to have some pony to keep my company. Please say you'll stay here."
"You've already done so much for me. I can't burden you like this anymore. I'm better now. I can fend for myself. Really."
"But Lightning Dust, if you leave me, I won't have any friends. You have to believe me when I say, Twilight and my other friends don't come around nearly as often as I'd like them to. They're good friends, but I need you. I need you here with me. Please, I promise I'll be much nicer to you than Rainbow Dash or Spitfire ever will be. I'll treat you like a friend should be treated. If you stay here Lightning, I promise you'll never have to be all alone again."
Lightning Dust closed her eyes. "I'd only be a burden to you." she replied, close to tears. "I'll only put you in danger by staying here. If they find me here with you, they're bound to accuse you as well. I can't have that. I can't let that happen to the pony who gave me so much I didn't deserve. So I should go."
I smiled at those words. Lightning Dust was nothing like what Rainbow Dash said she was. And Spitfire was stupid to expel a pony as responsible and selfless as this.
But that smile was short lived, I couldn't let Lightning Dust leave. If she left, I'd have no one but Twilight and the others, none of whom had helped me in my time of need. I would go back to being the lonely outcast with no real friends, no one to love and no one to talk to or share my feelings with.
This was my last chance. "I am a very depressed pony" I confessed, knowing that I had to tell the whole truth and nothing else if I wanted to show Lightning Dust how much I trusted her "Since I was a filly, I suffered from severe epileptic seizures and a range of other very painful symptoms. And that was even before I lost both my parents one tragic night. Without my parents, especially my father who I liked to call Freud (I forgot what his real name was), my depression only worsened. When I went to flight school, ponies laughed at me and insulted me. That made me want to kill myself since I was young. And when Rainbow Dash pushed me off that cloud in an attempt to kill me knowing I could not fly, that made it even worse."
"I am a very depressed pony" I explained, too sad for any tears to form in my painful eyes "Each day I have to fight to stop myself from killing myself because of the voices in my head that beg me to end it. Each time I walk down stairs, I have visions of myself jumping off the stairs so I can crack my head on the ground below. Each time I bathe, shower or go near water, I have visions of myself drowning myself in the water. And every time I hold or even see a knife, the voice in my head begs me to stab that knife through my chest so that it can all end. These are the true things I think about every day. And when I tell my other friends about my condition, they laugh."
"I need you here" I beg "Stay with me and help me. Save me. Please Lightning Dust. You could be my last hope. Please for my sake, stay with me as my friend and keep me company. I can see it in your eyes Lightning Dust. You're tired of being neglected and abused for so long. All you want is someone who won't treat you like an outcast, all you feel you need is a true friend. Let me be that true friend Lightning. I've walked in your shoes and I know how it feels. We're meant to be together. Please."
I look at Lightning desperately.
Lightning covers her face and a long, silent and tense minute passes.
Then she turns to me and looks at me with a serious and urgent expression. "For your sake Fluttershy. I'll stay here. For your sake and only your sake, I'll stay here if it makes you happier. You saved my life, something I didn't deserve. You forgave me, something else I didn't deserve. And now you want to be my friend and stand by me even if it puts you at risk with your other friends, that I deserve even less. You've given me so many things I didn't deserve and now, the least I can do to try and repay you is to do whatever makes you happy. I have no one but you in my life now that I've let everyone down. The only thing I can do now, is to do what I can to show you how much I value you as my friend. So for your sake Fluttershy, I'll stay here and hide."
I breath a sigh of relief, and thank Celestia silently in my mind.
"So you trust me?" asked Lightning Dust slightly nonchalantly, struggling to hide what appeared to be a blush.
"Of course. I've told you that before"
Lightning nodded, and her face began to redden as she looked me in the eye, trembling with fear as she did so. "Well, I hope you trust me when I tell you that...y, you're, you're cute."