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// All I Want... 
// Story: On Those Nights, Alone 
// by ModMCdl 
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1:12 AM.

Your eyes are locked on the dim, red glow of your digital clock, perched on the nightstand next to your bed. No matter how spread out you get, how tight you clutch your spare pillow to your chest, you just can't seem to get comfortable. The mattress is too hard, your feet are too cold, your chest is too warm. You roll over for the umpteenth time tonight, burying your face into the pillow.

Your body decides the pillow is too lumpy.

With a quiet groan, you toss the pillow down to the foot of your bed, and bring your hands up to rub your face. You end up just sitting there, your hands covering your eyes, attempting to let the unnatural darkness lull you into some state of slumber. It's not very effective.

Once again, you try rolling over. You swing your right arm wide to let it dangle off the bed, but your hand impacts into something soft. You hear a quiet "ouch!" and your eyes immediately shoot open. What the hell was that?!

A wall of purple fur fills your entire vision. You quickly retract your arm, and prop yourself up to look at the creature sitting next to you. It was small, fluffy and purple, and about the size of a large dog. It popped its head up to look at you, a hurt look on it's face. "What was that for?"

You are immediately transfixed by the two large and glossy eyes staring into your soul. The deep purple pools pull you in and you can't quite find the words to reply, so you let out a quiet and apologetic, "Sorry." It seems to do the trick however, as the creature's eyes soften and it lowers its head again.

Overcoming your initial shock, you try and figure out exactly what it is you're looking at. As you noted before, it is just a tad bit bigger than a dog, but it appears more "horse-y" in appearance, complete with a mane and a tail. Unlike a horse however, it is a shocking purple color, and also has wings and a horn. You decide it must be one of those pegacorn whatchamacallits that all the young girls seem to be infatuated with.

Finally deciding to figure out what exactly was going on, you pull up the courage to speak and voice your question. "What are you? And what are you doing here?"

The head perks back up, and you notice with fascination that two pointy ears flip up with it. "Oh, I'm Twilight Sparkle, alicorn Princess of Equestria!" she chirps happily, a wide smile crossing her face. "And, uh, to the second part, I don't know." Twilight shakes her head, before simply sitting there and smiling at you.

"Equestria..." you sound out. "Like, as in equestrian?" The pony looks at you confused for a moment. "Nevermind," you mumble. "So you don't know what you're doing here?"

"Nope!" said Twilight simply. "I don't even know how I got here."

Her happy-go-lucky attitude puts you off. If you woke up in a strange place without knowing how or why you were there you would probably be freaking out hard right now. As a matter of fact, you were quite proud of yourself for not freaking out at the magical horse sitting in your bed.

"How are you so carefree right now?" you decide to ask. "Aren't you like, worried?"

Twilight laughs, and her pupils somehow shrink slightly. "Oh I am very concerned right now. But if I think about it, I'll probably have a mental breakdown." Your eyes widen in concern. "But don't worry!" she quickly assures you. "Some magic thing will probably happen soon and fix it."

You realize that you've been quite tense for a while now, and nothing this creature is saying is helping. So you take a deep breath and try to relax a bit.

"Are you okay? Are you having trouble breathing?!"

You open your eyes as a light weight presses onto your leg, and look down to see that Twilight has come closer and is leaning on you. Her eyes are wide in concern, and you can't help but smile at how cute she looks.

"No, I'm fine. I'm just trying to calm myself down," you explain. "I mean, this is kinda weird."

Twilight giggles. "Yeah, I guess this is a little weird," she says, backing off a little. "But like I said, something will probably fix this soon."

The two of you sit in silence for a little bit, and you just look at the pony sitting beside you trying to figure out exactly what to do. You were kinda trying to fall asleep a few minutes ago, but that seems to not be possible anymore. A sudden urge comes over you as you stare at her purple coat, and you can't help but ask, "Can I like, pet you?"

The question appears to surprise Twilight, and she looks up to you curiously. "Why?" she asks.

"I don't know," you reply, scratching the back of your neck. "You kinda look, soft and pettable? It's a thing most people like to do with small animals." You instantly wince at your word choice. She probably found that offensive.

"Oh," she says, sounding surprisingly less insulted than you thought. "I guess you can, if you really want to." She crawls slightly closer to you, allowing you to reach her more easily.

Hesitantly, you reach your hand out and hover it over her back. She gives you a nod, and you gently lower it onto her. Your hand automatically molds into the curve of her back and you relish in the soft feeling of her fur intertwining with your fingers. It is inexplicably fluffier than you imagined, and you're rubbing your hand through her coat in a matter of seconds. Twilight seems to enjoy the attention, and arches her back up into your touch, letting out a soft murmur of approval.

You both just lay there in near silence, the pony by your side and your hand running over her coat. You venture out a little further rubbing in small circles as if she were a common house pet. You pause as she lets out a slightly more startled coo, and you look down, realizing you've reached the base of her wings.

"S-sorry," she stuttered, a red blush somehow burning through the fur on her cheeks. "Wings... my wings are a bit sensitive."

"Oh," you say, lifting your hand up and away. "I didn't know, sorry."

"It's okay," she replies quickly. "You can keep going." Her voice sounds almost pleading, as if she did not want you to stop. So, with a small smile, you decide to oblige her. Your hand falls back down on her, lowered more towards her haunches to try and avoid her wings. The two of you fall back into a steady rhythm, and you find yourself getting drowsy. You glance over at her, and realize that your ministrations are having a similar effect on her. You don't let up though, and simply lean back as you continue to rub her back.

It's her voice that brings you back into the land of the living a few minutes later. "Uhm, do you mind if I sleep up here?" she asks quietly. "I don't know when I'm going to be able to go back, and-"

You cut her off silently with a nod, and slide over. You lift up the covers beside you and she crawls in, settling up against your side. Twilight yawns as the sheets drape back over her, and you turn to rest your arm over her. She snuggles into your warmth, her head moving up to rest against your chest.

The two of you lay there silently for a while as you shifted your arm up and down her body. Suddenly she shifted slightly, and the sheets moved away from both of you. You open your mouth to playfully complain, but are silenced as her wing unfolds and drapes over you, effectively taking the place of the sheets. The soft feathers graze your bare arms and tickle the bottom of your chin, and you find the feeling quite pleasant. 

Her wing is larger than you expected it to be, it looked a lot smaller when it was folded up at her side. Outstretched, however, it covers nearly your entire torso and even stretches past your arm. It was also surprisingly heavy, but not unbearingly so. Instead, it acted like a weighted blanket, adding a comfortable weight over your body.

"Good night," she says sleepily as she settles in closer to you, pulling you tighter under her wing.

You reciprocate the action, tightening your hold on her with your arm. "Good night, Twilight," you reply before closing your eyes and letting sleep find you. The warmth of her small body pressed up against your own was soothing, and her soft fur against your bare arm was a welcome comfort. It was definitely a feeling that you could get used to, and definitely one you wanted to occur more regularly. The combination of comfort and companionship was an excellent sedative, you drifted off to sleep in no time.

Your alarm wakes you up hours later, and you scramble to slam the snooze button before it wakes up your guest. You rub at your sleepy eyes, and glance down only to realize that Twilight is gone. She sheets beside you showed no signs of her, and she was not anywhere to be seen. It doesn't take a large amount of reasoning to decide that it had to have been a dream. There was no way a magical pony visited you in the middle of the night, was there?

With little fanfare, you get ready for your day, putting on your clothes and getting ready to leave. But as you make your way out the door, you notice a flash of purple on top of your dresser. You walk over to it, and a smile warms your face as you see two purple feathers placed next to a simple note that says "thank you."

You decide that you're going to buy a purple unicorn plushie on your way home, but it was more than likely going to just be a poor substitute for the real thing.