//------------------------------// // IV - Hollow // Story: Last Light // by Scampy //------------------------------// “Sunset! Sunset!” Rarity’s shriek was deafening. Her words broke into sobs as she collapsed over the fallen girl’s body. “Take us back...” Sunset spoke under her breath. When she heard no reply from Luna, she said it again, louder. “Take us back. I don’t want to see this. Luna?” Sunset turned, and saw nothing. The spot where the alicorn had stood just moments ago was as cold and empty as the fallen girl’s blue eyes. “Luna!” Sunset shouted. "Luna, please! I don’t want to see this!” There was no answer. Another trembling voice joined Rarity’s as Rainbow Dash burst out of the parking garage. When Sunset saw Rainbow Dash’s tear-stricken face, the sounds of the world seemed to spin out of focus, so that all Sunset could hear were her own panicked breaths over the ringing echoes of muted screams. Sunset felt some crushing force rooting her to the spot. She dropped to her knees, quivering. “Luna, please, don’t leave me h-here... I don’t want this, I c-can’t...” Rainbow Dash was shouting something as she approached the fallen girl’s body. She knelt down, holding the the girl’s scarred wrist. Sunset watched, unable to look away, as Rainbow Dash lightly pressed her head against the girl’s chest. For several seconds, Sunset swore she could feel a warmth pressing over her own heart. In an instant, Rainbow Dash shot up, shouting something at Rarity, whose hand reached into her purse, retrieved her cell phone, and dialed a number. As Rarity frantically shrieked into her phone, Rainbow Dash cradled the fallen girl’s head in her lap, whispering something over and over. Rainbow Dash’s entire body was shaking as she ran her hands through the girl’s red and yellow hair. When the fallen girl’s head lolled to the side like a broken toy, Rainbow Dash began screaming at her, so loud that it broke through the fog suffocating Sunset’s senses. “No! Not y-yet, you don’t get to go! Do you hear me? It’s not up to you!” Rainbow Dash’s face burned red as her voice cracked. She wiped away the blood trickling from the corner of fallen girl’s lips. “You can’t, okay? I’m gonna... I’ll make it up to you! It’ll be okay, you’ll see! Like this never h-happened at all...!” As the fallen girl’s half-lidded eyes gazed away into emptiness, their bright blue color began to fade, and Sunset felt her entire world begin to crumble away. The parking garage Sunset had fallen from faded into darkness and the streets and alleys around her dissolved into nothing, until all that remained were the fallen girl and the ones who had tormented her earlier that night. Soon enough, even Rainbow Dash and Rarity had vanished. As Sunset curled up, whimpering, the only thing she felt was someone embracing her, and the only sound she heard was the faraway call of voices she no longer recognized. “Stay with us, please!” “It’ll be okay, I promise!” “You can’t give up now!” “Please...” “I’m so, so sorry, Sunset...” “You have to keep going...” “Don’t go...” “...Sunset!” Then the voices faded, and she was alone. She no longer heard her own breaths, nor felt the comfort of someone’s touch. There was no color, no darkness, no more. There was only nothing. Nothing at all. Nothing. ... As the last vestiges of the fallen girl’s mind drifted away, something sparked within her. “Gaaah—!” Sunset cried out, her entire body convulsing as her eyes shot open. “It is alright, my child,” Luna said. She lay next to Sunset, her wing cast over the trembling girl's body like a feathered shroud. “I-I... I shouldn’t be here,” Sunset whispered, her voice marred by the shudders that still ran through her. Tears brimmed in here eyes as she pressed herself into the warmth of Luna’s body. “That was... I should be—I’m supposed to be dead. This is all wrong...” “Do you want to die, Sunset Shimmer?” Luna asked. “I...” Sunset didn’t have an answer. “I’m so tired, Princess Luna,” she said. Luna said nothing as Sunset tilted her head up. “I don’t know what’s wrong with me. I feel like I'm coming apart at the seams. There’s either too much, or nothing at all. Life is either so blinding and deafening that I want to scream, or so completely devoid of anything that I can’t bear it.” Luna nodded her head. “One cannot reconcile such extremes.” Tears began to stream down Sunset’s cheeks. “I was supposed to be past this. I worked so hard to find meaning, to reach out and connect so I wouldn’t be alone in my head all the time. And yet...” She rested her head on Luna’s side. “There’s nothing left. Things like me aren't supposed to be here. I was so full of all these colors and sounds and passions and now I’m just... Gone.” Sunset felt Luna’s wing pull her closer as she continued. “I should be scared of dying, but I'm not. Is that itself scary? I don’t even know anymore. I can't remember what fear feels like.” Cracks began to break through Sunset’s voice. “It doesn't hurt. Not anymore. There's so much I should be feeling, but it's all just outside of my reach. When I would cut myself, I was just trying to feel something, but it was never enough.” She felt a wetness where her tears stained her gown as she curled into a ball beneath Luna’s wing. “It’s wrong to hurt myself. I know it is. It doesn’t even help me. So why do I want to do it?” Sunset stared up at Luna with tear-stained eyes. “I can’t put the pieces together,” she said. “Why? Why do I feel this way, Luna? Why am I alone in this pit? What’s wrong with me...?” Luna only smiled at her. “My child, you are not alone. Not now, nor before you came here. When you were there, witnessing the aftermath of your fall, what did you see?” Sunset took several moments to catch her breath before she finally answered. “I-I, uhm... I saw me. My body. And the others. They were there—they were crying. Rainbow Dash...” The memories of the other girls’ actions seemed a lifetime ago to Sunset, and yet she still remembered the warmth of Rainbow Dash holding her, the sounds of her desperate cries, the trembling in her hands as she held Sunset close... “Why?” Sunset said, her voice breathless. “Didn’t they want me gone? Didn’t they hate me? Why did they try to save me...?” “You already know the answer,” Luna said. “I don’t understand,” Sunset said as she stifled another whimper. “I j-just don’t understand...” “Do you want to die, Sunset Shimmer?” Sunset looked away. Despite everything that had just transpired, she still knew the answer, and it haunted her. Luna nuzzled Sunset as she spoke. “It is alright, Sunset Shimmer. There is no shame in that feeling.” “It makes me horrible!” Sunset cried. “I saw their faces—how much I hurt them! But I-I still w-want...” “Hush now, little one,” Luna spoke softly. “There will be time to understand such things. You do not need to do so now.” Sunset said nothing. She collapsed entirely into Luna’s body as her chest heaved. Luna only held her, her wing covering Sunset as she sobbed, just as Celestia had done so long ago.