Day Six
Ugh. Fluttershy groans as the morning sunlight hits her, turning away from the window and pulling the sheet up over her head. She hardly got any sleep, and already her head is pounding. At this point, the sunlight glowing through the sheet just seems like another assault from the world around her.
What am I even doing? she asks herself. I’m never going to catch them. Why did I ever think I could?
Fluttershy sighs and tumbles off the bed. The sheet sticks to her for a few feet before slipping off onto the floor, left behind as she heads down into the library. Absentmindedly, she opens up the cabinets in the kitchen before remembering her lack of food, and her stomach growls angrily at her.
So, she drags herself outside. It’s yet another perfect day in Ponyville. The kind of day that should be filled with the singing of birds, the chitter of animals, and the laughter of ponies.
Yet it’s filled with silence. The birds, the animals, the ponies, they’re all gone. All that’s here is her, an empty wind, and the scattered basket of apples.
Right. The apples. Fluttershy stumbles into the middle of the street and sits down before grabbing an apple off the ground to eat. Great decision there, Fluttershy. You really made Dusty look silly in front of all their friends.
The note is nowhere to be seen. Maybe Dusty took it, maybe the wind just blew it away, but it’s definitely not here. Fluttershy rolls over onto her back, staring into the vast blue sky. What was that even supposed to mean? I never had a chance to be nice in the first place. She sighs. I’m not even good at threats.
Fluttershy closes her eyes to think. The throbbing in her head is a constant backdrop to her thoughts. So now what? Do I beg Dusty to leave me alone? Do I run away, go hide in Canterlot? I don’t even know if Canterlot is still there. Well, I suppose it must be if I could send those—
Her thoughts are cut off as a drop of water hits her face. Then another, and another, and she opens her eyes just in time to see the wall of water falling from the rain cloud above. She does not, however, see it in time to avoid it, and in an instant she’s completely drenched.
Then, like clockwork, a breathy laugh rings out from above as a cloaked pony speeds away.
The rain pours down on her relentlessly. It sticks her fur to her body and throws splashes of mud at her sides. Every drop is another blow, another insult from above that Fluttershy must bear.
She grumbles under her breath as she pushes herself up from the now muddy road. “Wonderful. Now I’m sad and wet. Just what I needed.”
Mud and water pool onto the wood floor as Fluttershy walks back into the library. She tries to shake off the rain, but isn’t able to accomplish much. Her back is still matted and grimy, and her tangled mane is now plastered to the side of her face by mud. She ignores it all.
Good one, Dusty, she thinks. You really got me again. We can’t have Fluttershy feeling too safe when she eats. Not when you can make her a failure at that too.
She sighs and leans on a bookshelf, cringing at the wet splurch as mud and water splatter onto the polished wood. Her first impulse is to ignore it, to stop caring about little things like ruined books, but her nature wins out in the end and she peels herself off of the sturdy frame. With no place to relax, it isn’t long before she’s wandering aimlessly around the library.
I had a decent hold on things before they showed up, Fluttershy thinks as she slinks through the rows of books. Maybe I could’ve fixed one of those machines, or gotten through to somepony in Canterlot. But I can’t do any of that with Dusty around.
She turns in place and starts pacing through the library. I might even be able to go find more books without them! They ruined that too.
Her eyes narrow. I’m only a failure because they made me one.
You know what, Dusty? I’m done playing your game. Doing her best to push away all the parts of her mind telling her to give up, Fluttershy kicks open the door leading down into the basement. Do your worst while you can, because I’m leaving.
The wooden steps creak in protest as Fluttershy steps heavily down them. Nothing downstairs seems out of the ordinary. Old, broken machines, dark corners, vacant cobwebs. The only thing that really sticks out to her is a pungent damp smell, but that could also just be her.
Okay… Fluttershy stares out into the crowd of machines that she doesn’t have the tools to understand.
Now what?
She starts to walk slowly through the aisles. How do these get me out? I mean, I suppose if I’m going to be stuck here for years I could study Twilight’s notes and build something myself, but…
Fluttershy walks over to a corner table and picks up a dingy old notebook. Inside are pages and pages of notes, formulas and everything else, and Fluttershy can’t read any of it. Wow, she thinks. Twilight, your writing is really bad.
She tosses the book back on the table. Maybe if I’m desperate.
Then she comes up to the machine where she sent out her cry for help. She finds herself staring into its blank screen, her eyes locked on the warped reflection of herself. This is just going to disappoint me, right? I shouldn’t—
Suddenly, static blasts out from behind Fluttershy. She jumps and wheels around, her heart racing, but the static moves too, staying firmly behind her. She tries looking over her shoulder, but can’t get a good enough view to find the source.
Then a voice breaks through the static. It’s a thin, wispy voice that cracks with every inflection. “Stupid wires! Get off me!” A muffled, far off frustration.
Fluttershy lets out a held breath as she remembers the radio strapped to her side. I don’t even need Dusty to scare me, she thinks. I scare myself.
A deep sigh helps to settle her nerves. Nothing to worry about. Just Dusty getting caught in a trap.
It takes her mind a moment to catch up.
Dusty got caught! Her heart rate jumps straight back up again. I did it! I have to go— She’s just about to run off, but as she turns she catches sight of herself in the monitor again and freezes.
Actually… She reaches out and turns the machine on. Dusty can wait. If the trap worked, they’re not going anywhere. I have to stop letting them control my life.
The screen buzzes to life as the machine quietly whirs. She squints her eyes as a familiar blue light breaks through the darkness of the room. They adjust before long though, and she sees just what she expected.
Nothing.
With a sigh, she reaches out to turn the machine back off. Just before she does, however, the screen flashes and refreshes. It takes a moment, a little notification in the corner telling her that it’s connecting to something, and then her heart skips a beat when the inconceivable happens.
A new message shows up.
I don’t know how you got here, but come to Canterlot and I’ll send you home.
Short, simple, and more meaningful than anything she’s read in her entire life. The sender didn’t say who they are. The message is over a day old at this point. Fluttershy doesn’t care about any of that. The only thing on her mind is the possibility of going home.
She races upstairs and starts to pack. Not that she has much to pack, she hasn’t exactly gotten any souvenirs, but it’s a long trip to Canterlot. She needs to at least be able to take some food, and she also heads up to the loft and fetches the Fluttershy book that she had stored on a nightstand. She dumps everything else out of her saddlebags. Leftover string, medical supplies, the radio—
Right. She pauses on the radio. Dusty.
She sighs deeply and sits down. I… I can’t just leave them. What if they’re trapped here too? I have to take them with me.
But… Fluttershy puts her head in her hooves. What if they really are the one who brought me here? Ugh, I… I…
No. Fluttershy gets up decisively and heads for the door. I can’t leave them.
The rain is still pouring outside. There’s no way for her to go anywhere without getting soaked again, but at least it’s only the one cloud. The mud is a lot deeper now and cakes a good portion of her legs, but once she’s out of it, she’s out for good.
It doesn’t take long to find the right street. There’s only one place in Ponyville that she put wires, and sure enough it’s the right spot. Down the road a ways, in the middle of an inscrutable labyrinth of thin wires, is a cloaked figure suspended in midair.
She approaches cautiously. Partially to avoid wires, but also just out of nerves. “D-Dusty?” she calls out as she nears them. “We need to, um, talk.”
There’s no response as she walks up behind them. “Dusty?” she asks again. “Are you okay?” Hesitantly, she reaches a hoof up and grabs the hood. She swallows hard, her hoof trembling, and in an agonizingly long instant pulls the hood down.
Then Fluttershy screams and flies back as what she thought was Dusty’s head falls to the ground and shatters.
In her panic, she forgets about the wires all around her, and one of them snags her leg. Before she can react she’s falling backwards, and then she slams into the ground, sending a sharp pain up her back.
Groaning, Fluttershy sits up to examine what happened. The cloak has fallen to the ground, covering the glass sphere that had shattered and revealing the chunk of wood that had held it up. Fluttershy glares at it furiously.
Laughter reaches her ears. A hollow kind of laugh, like a slow wind through a wide tunnel, but still a boisterous one. She focuses her vision, scanning the street, and then spots them. A cloaked pony, sitting on a rooftop nearby, clutching their gut in a fit of laughs.
Just like that, all of her anger flashes back, flooding her with adrenaline. She jumps to her hooves, crouched lithely amongst the wires, and rockets herself towards Dusty.
Or at least, she tries to.
What actually happens is that just as she tries to take flight, the mud on her hooves steals the ground out from under her. She stumbles forward, going too fast to stop but with no control, and catches a wire with her chest.
She flips forward, turning through the air for a sickening moment until she slams onto the ground. A sharp crack rings through the air as she lands awkwardly on one leg before falling prone. The pain, combined with the vertigo from the world spinning around her, is nearly enough to make her sick.
She’s too distracted by all this to notice when a blue hoof lands on the ground in front of her. She’s barely lucid enough to see when the cloaked pony leans down to get a better look at her, and she’s just about in a sound enough state of mind to hear them when they finally work up the courage to talk to her.
“Hey, um..” they cough awkwardly and shift around on their hooves. Their voice is dry and unused, barely making it out of their throat. “Are you okay?”
Fluttershy groans and tries to push herself up, but a shock of pain in her leg sends her straight back to the ground. “What do you care?” she replies weakly.
Dusty takes a shocked step away. “Huh? O-of course I care, I don’t wanna see you get hurt!”
“Yeah,” Fluttershy coughs, “because then you’d lose your toy.”
Dusty hums sadly and lays on the ground to meet Fluttershy’s eyes. With the shade from their hood and her blurry eyes, though, she can’t make out much more than their blue fur. “I don’t understand,” they say, “I thought we were having fun.”
“Fun?” Fluttershy points a shaky hoof at them. “You’ve been torturing me ever since I got here!”
“I, but, I don’t—” Dusty sputters, trying to form words that won’t come to them. “I didn’t know. I just… It’s been so long since I had a friend, I—”
“We are not friends,” Fluttershy grumbles.
“Oh.” Dusty seems to almost shrink under their cloak. “Of course. I shouldn’t have— I’m sorry. Do you, um, need help getting home or anything?”
Fluttershy scoffs. “I don’t need anything from you. I only showed up because even after everything you’ve done to me, I couldn’t bring myself to leave you here alone. So just go. There’s somepony in Canterlot who can get you out of here.”
“What?” They tense up and look back and forth frantically. “There’s no way… I-I can’t just leave you, though.” They stand up and try to hold out a hoof to help up Fluttershy, but she bats it away.
“I don’t need you!” Fluttershy says. She tries to push herself up again and manages to find a very shaky stance on her hooves. “All you’ve done is make things worse. I don’t ever want to see you again!”
Fluttershy stomps a hoof on the ground in her anger, but doing so sends shots of pain sailing up her leg and through her body. Her leg buckles under her, sending her toppling back down to the ground. Dusty yells something, but Fluttershy can’t hear them over the cacophony of bells playing in her ears. She hardly feels it as Dusty catches her, and the last thing she sees as she fades into unconsciousness is the shock of rainbow hair that falls from Dusty’s hood.