//------------------------------// // Chapter 7 // Story: Battle Magic // by Gaekub //------------------------------// Twilight shifted against the soft linen underneath her, vaguely aware of some strange hard covering over her leg. She twitched, attempting to rub away the material, but the friction only made a spike of pain drive its way up her leg. She grunted from the sensation, and her eyes fluttered open. Her blurred vision settled upon a light blue blur on the other side of the room. She blinked, and the blob condensed into the form of Silver Chimes. "Hey," he said when he noticed her eyes were open. "How's the leg?" Twilight slowly pulled her leg out from under the covers, revealing an off-white cast. "It's all right," she said cautiously. "Hurts a little." "Glad to hear it," Silver said gruffly. "It's been set and had its healing accelerated by someone who knows what they're doing. It broke in the right place, so if you stay off it as much as possible for the next couple days, there should be no permanent damage." Twilight nodded silently, carefully keeping the relief she felt off her face. Both unicorns stared across the room at each other, each wordlessly daring the other to bring up the metaphorical elephant in the room. Twilight finally broke first. "Are you going to apologize?" she asked. "Are you going to admit you were wrong?" Silver shot back. Twilight chewed on the inside of her cheek for a moment. "...I shouldn't have tried to heal my leg," she finally said. "It was... stupid." "Yup," Silver said, satisfied. "It was." Twilight watched the blue unicorn expectantly, Silver staring back with blank eyes. After a few moments of silence, Twilight cleared her throat pointedly. "What?" Silver asked. "I thought you were going to apologize." "I never said that," Silver replied with a smile. "But!" he said hurriedly as Twilight's face hardened into anger. "I will admit that I may have handled that situation... poorly." "You broke my leg without warning or anesthetic," Twilight said. "That's what I was talking about," Silver said. "So how are you getting home?" he asked, obviously changing the subject. "Teleporting," Twilight said shortly. "Look Silver, you can't just-" "No you're not. Not on that leg. A little walking is okay, but teleporting's too much jostling. You'll rebreak your leg, and you might not be able to make it to your healer friend." "Well then how am I supposed - How do you know about Zecora?" Twilight said, recoiling away from the stallion into her pillow. "Your tooth's back," Silver said smugly. "Those don't grow back on their own, which means you know a unicorn with healing magic. By the name of 'Zecora', apparently. Oh, that reminds me. You need a medic. Not Zecora though; healing magic is too dangerous in the arena. Too much stray magic floating around. That's why I had to drag you here before your leg could get healed. Anyway, you know anypony who's good with herbs and bandages or whatever?" "Yes, actually, but Silver-" "Good, see if you can hire them to come with you," Silver interrupted. "Silver, why don't I just learn healing magic?" Twilight asked hopefully. "Twilight, no." "But if you can just rebreak bones after and get it done properly..." Silver lifted a hoof to his forehead, just below his horn, and groaned. "Twilight, there are so many worse things than misaligned bone that can happen with improper healing. I mean... I didn't want to say this, but the fact that you pulled off what you did, in those circumstances, on your first try, is... it's amazing. I really think you could learn healing magic." "Great!" Twilight said. "If you went to school for it for ten years," Silver clarified. "I don't care how much of a genius you are, this isn't something you can pick up on the weekends." "But Silver-" "Twilight." Silver's eyes hardened. "This is not up for discussion. You can learn healing magic, but you're not using it here until you can show me a degree." Twilight collapsed back into her pillow with a sigh. "Fine..." she said, giving up on the argument, at least for the moment. "Anyway, how am I supposed to get home?" "Do you know anyone in town?" Silver asked. "No, I..." Twilight paused. "Wait, yes. If the announcer's still in town." "You know Sonic?" Silver asked. "I mean, Vinyl. Or DJ Pon3, or whatever she's calling herself these days. ...Man, that mare has a real problem with aliases." "Yeah, I can go ask her if there's any way she could give me a ride." "Great!" Silver stood up, and trotted briskly towards the door. "I'll see you in three weeks then!" "No, Silver wait!" Twilight yelled after him. "Silver, we're not done talking about-" The door slammed shut, and Twilight let out a noise of frustration. She slid herself out of bed, ready to chase after him, but the cast was a larger hindrance than she expected. Instead of trotting towards the door, she instead slammed her face into the floorboards. "Gnyah," Twilight moaned unintelligibly. She pried her lips from the painted wood and hobbled towards the door. The stairs proved a whole new challenge, but she eventually discovered that she could crab walk down them with only a minimum of difficulty. By the time she arrived on the ground floor, Silver was gone. Twilight awkwardly clicked across the floor and pushed her head out the door. She glanced around the street, but Silver was nowhere to be seen. "He's gone Dusk," came a voice from behind her. She turned to see Flurry placing a plate with three pancakes on it upon the counter. "You'll never catch him. Trust me, he can disappear in this part of town." Twilight sighed and trotted over to the steaming plate, staring down at the patties for a moment before she dug in. "Thanks for the advice on my recipe," Flurry said lightly, doing some sort of tidying up with the bottles that sat behind the bar. "It'll be nice not having to make a hundred pancakes every morning." Twilight mm'd in agreement around her mouthful of pancakes. "You know, you could have stayed and had a drink with Silver the night before last," the pegasus said, still facing away from the bar. Twilight nearly choked on her pancakes, and Flurry placed a mug of water next to her. The purple mare took a careful sip from it, and finally managed to speak. "What?" "He was just looking for someone to drink with. When you turned him down, he got a little depressed." "He had you," Twilight protested. Flurry scoffed. "Bartenders don't count. Everypony knows that." He turned to smile at her, and then went back to his chores. "Look, just... stay for one drink next time, okay? When he gets down, he always drinks too much cider. He needs a friend sometimes." Twilight chewed her mouthful slowly. "What do you mean, too much cider?" she asked after she swallowed. "Like... he has to go to the bathroom?" The bartender turned back towards her, face contorted into confusion. "What?" "Besides, he can't be that interested in being my friend," Twilight muttered bitterly, ignoring the bartender's question. "He broke my leg," she said, waving the cast over the counter. The look of confusion on Flurry's face was replaced by a thoughtful frown. "You think he did that because he doesn't like you?" "Well... I'm not saying he hates me, but... I may not be an expert on friendship, but I'm pretty sure most people would agree that if you have to break a friends leg, you should give them some sort of anesthetic." Flurry sighed, rearing up on his hind legs to lean over the counter. "Dusk, there's not a lot in this world that scares Silver. I've seen that pony get kicked, stabbed, slashed, frozen, electrocuted, blown up, and thrown through walls." He lifted a hoof and pointed at the wall behind Twilight. The purple unicorn swiveled to see a patch in the wall that didn't quite fit. It was built of a slightly different color of wood, with the planks crossing at a right angle to the boards that made up the rest of the wall. "Did he get thrown through that wall?" she asked. "No, he threw himself through that wall to avoid a spell," Silver replied. "Point is, one of the few things that does scare him is bad healing magic. I think it reminds him too much of himself." Twilight turned back towards the pegasus. "Does he have some misaligned bone or something?" "Nah, all his healing was done fine as far as i know. But I do know he's not as fast as he used to be." Twilight snorted. "He's still plenty fast, trust me." "No, he's not," Flurry insisted. "He just gives the illusion of being fast. He knows how to dodge, but in a footrace? Pretty sure you could beat him." Twilight opened her mouth and then closed it again. She had beaten him in a footrace, sort of. The last time she'd been leaving town, he had chased after her but lagged behind. "All those injuries, those broken bones and scars, they're taking their toll. He's slowing down and getting weaker, and he knows it." "But you just said all his healing was done right!" Twilight pointed out. "What does that have to do with what happened to me?" Flurry placed his hoof on the cast. "Because that misaligned bone would have a similar effect on you. He knew that one spell was going to do to you what thirty years of having the shite kicked out of him did to him. That scared him." Flurry took a deep breath, and let it out in a sigh. "Apparently, it scared him enough that he burst into my bar with the bleeding body of a filly and yelled 'I need some place to put her!' at me." Twilight winced. "Guessing you didn't do a lot of business that night." "No, not after that," Flurry said with a smile, dropping back on to all four legs. "Everypony seemed to remember they had somewhere to be." Twilight looked down at her plate, and discovered to her surprise that it was empty. "Okay, well... I should get going. I have to find a ride back to Po- back home." A hoof reached over and swept the plate out from in front of Twilight. "Alright, see you in a couple weeks," Flurry said, carrying the plate into the back. After a short goodbye, Twilight headed upstairs to get her things and then left for the arena, hoping to figure out where she could find the white unicorn with the electric blue mane that could give her a ride home. Vinyl Scratch leaned back into the fabric of her carriage's seats. She mentally ran over her schedule for the next couple days. Manehatten, Canterlot, quick stop over in Hoofington, and then back to Fillydelphia. No problem. "Ma'am?" came a voice from the front of the carriage. "Call my Vinyl," the unicorn said automatically. She hated being called ma'am, especially since the carriage pullers she hired were often older then she was. "What is it?" "There's a pony chasing the cart. She's shouting at us to stop." Vinyl sat up, a look of confusion on her face. She leaned forward and craned her head out the window, twisting it to look back. Her eyes fell on the form of a purple unicorn, desperately galloping after them. Her legs moved in a strange, off beat rhythm, thrown off by the cast that wrapped around one leg. As soon as she saw Vinyl's head, her mouth opened wide. "Vinyl!" she shouted. "It's me! Dusk! Stop the cart!" The white unicorn chuckled under her breath for a moment at the ungainly strides Twilight was forced into taking, but tapped her hoof on the wooden side. "Hey, hold up a minute," she told the ponies pulling the cart. The cart slowly bounced to a halt, and Twilight caught up, huffing with exertion. 'What's up Dusk?" Vinyl asked with a hint of amusement, leaning over the edge of her window. "Hey... hey Vinyl," Twilight panted. "So, I was wondering if you could give me a ride back to..." she glanced around. "Ponyville?" she whispered. She held up her cast and waved it back and forth. "Normally I'd teleport, but... yeah." Vinyl grinned down at the awkward purple pony. "Hey, we got time to stop in Ponyville?" she asked the two ponies strapped to the cart. They turned to each other, and talked in low voices. The one closer turned towards the unicorns after a moment. "Yeah, we should be able to pull that off ma'- Vinyl." "Looks like yup," Vinyl said with a smile. "Hop in." She slid open the door to the carriage. Twilight jumped up into the cart with a grunt of effort. "Thanks Vinyl." "No problem." The white unicorn hooked a hoof through the window and pulled the door shut. "Alright, let's go!" she shouted, and the carriage trundled off down the street. "So. Leg," Vinyl said, relaxing back against the seat across from Twilight. "Surprised to see you wearing a cast. From the way you walked across the arena, I thought you'd healed your own leg." "I did, but... the bone was misaligned and my trainer re-broke it." Vinyl laughed. "Wow. That must have sucked." She reached into a cabinet in the side panel and pulled out two bottles of water. "I guess you expect stuff like that when you're working with Silver though," she said, popping the top off one bottle and tossing the other to Twilight. "What do you mean?" Twilight asked, twisting the lid off her own bottle and taking a sip. "Well, hey, I don't hate the guy or anything," Vinyl said quickly. "I'm just saying, you know. Dude's got some problems." Twilight stared back at the DJ. "...Leg breaking problems?" "Well, no, I mean." Vinyl was starting to look flustered, her usually cool demeanor cracking at the edges. She slipped the cap back on the bottle. "Problems," she said, tipping the bottle near her mouth as if she was drinking from it. Twilight just looked back with a blank face. Vinyl coughed. "Uh, hon? Do you know what alcohol is?" "Of course," Twilight answered. "Alcohol is any organic compound in which the hydroxyl functional group is bound to a saturated carbon atom." "Right... But I meant in the... recreational sense." "Oh, some ponies drink certain forms of alcohol because they enjoy its debilitating...effects..." Twilight paused. "Is Silver a... drinking... pony?" "Well, yeah. I thought you knew," Vinyl said, surprised. "And you think... that maybe that's why he did what he did?" Twilight asked, the doubt rising in her own mind. "Well, hey, I don't know," Vinyl backtracked. "I didn't mean to come between you two or anything." "I don't want to talk about it." Twilight leaned over to the side, and stuck her head out the window. A moment later, she screamed and backpedaled away from the window, panting heavily. Vinyl burst into laughter, the awkward tension shattered. "It's a pegasus carriage hon. How else did you think I was going to get you back to Ponyville today?" Her voice took on a note of concern. "Hey, you're not afraid of heights are you?" "No, no." Twilight's breathing slowly returned to normal. "I was just surprised." "Ah. Alright." "I'm not, really!" Twilight insisted, heaving herself back onto the seat. "I've flown plenty of times! I even went to Cloudsdale once!" "Sure you did," Vinyl said with a grin. "Drink your water." "So where do you live?" Vinyl asked, leaning out the window as they descended over Ponyville. Twilight squeezed past the other unicorn so she could look out the window at the same time. "Oh, at the lib- Actually, you can just drop me by the forest," she said, pointing over at the Everfree Forest. "You live in a forest?" Vinyl asked. "No, but I need to talk to somepony who does," Twilight replied. "Sure, no problem," the DJ said. Her hoof rapped against the wood paneling, drawing the attention of one of the diving pegasi. "Hey, just by the forest, alright?" The pegasus nodded, and relayed the information to his partner. The caravan tilted crazily as they homed in on the road that led into the Everfree. After a bumpy landing (and a bit of grumbling from the pegasi about country roads) Twilight found herself on the edge of the Everfree, looking up at the unicorn that had given her a ride. "Look, I know you said you didn't want to talk about Silver," Vinyl said, leaning out the window. "But I want you to check something out for me. Fillydelphian Times, sports section. About... 28 years ago. You'll know it when you see it." "What? Vinyl, what happened?" Twilight asked. The white unicorn said nothing, just gave a cheeky grin and rapped her hoof on the side of the compartment, which accelerated down the road. "No, Vinyl, just tell me! What is it?" Twilight shouted, vainly trying to chase down the vehicle. After a few steps, her healing leg gave out underneath her, and she crashed to the ground. She lifted her head and glared after the DJ as she soared into the sky. "Well if she didn't think it was worth telling me, it's not worth looking for," she muttered, getting her legs underneath her and turning back towards the Everfree. For a brief moment, she considered the wisdom of walking into the untamed forest with a broken leg. "The road to Zecora's is pretty safe though," she murmured, walking into the shadows. Twilight quickly discovered that what was a even, safe path normally turned into a aggravating and hazardous mess of roots and holes with an immobile leg. She stumbled over a tree root that was normally a quickly hopped over obstacle, and finally found herself at Zecora's door. Balancing on the cast, she rapped on the door with her other front leg. A moment later, the familiar voice of her zebra friend drifted through the door. "Who could that be, at my door. Come on in, I implore." Twilight reached out with her magic and opened the door, revealing the striped mare picking an herb from many on a shelf. Zecora turned to face her visitor, dropping the chosen herb into her bubbling cauldron as she did so. "Hello Twilight, when I saw you last, I do not believe you had a cast," Zecora said, gesturing towards the bandage around her leg. "That's actually why I came to see you," Twilight said. "Or, part of it. I was wondering if you had anything for broken legs." "Of course I do, friend of mine. I'll have that ready in no time." Zecora busied herself among her many bottles and plants. "So I actually have another question for you," Twilight asked. "It has to do with... Well, it's really more about... I mean... remember that black eye? And my missing tooth?" Zecora turned to look at her. "Twilight, just start from the beginning. I am certain you have not been sinning." Twilight nodded, took a deep breath, and proceeded to tell Zecora about everything that had happened over the last few months. "And now Vinyl's hinting at some weird secret or something and I don't know if I should look for it or even what I should be looking for and I don't know if I should trust him!" Twilight finished, out of breath and on the verge of tears. This was the first time she had told the entire story out loud (even Spike only knew bits and pieces) and it had been surprisingly emotionally draining. "...Twilight not to disappoint, but I believe that I have missed your point." It suddenly occurred to Twilight that one of the only things she had left out was the reason she had decided to tell Zecora in the first place. "Oh, right. I want to... hire you, I guess. As a healer. I make at least fifty bits a game, every three weeks." Zecora stared at the purple pony for a few moments, her striped face unreadable for the unicorn. "Twenty percent is my taxation, and I will require transportation." It took Twilight a few moments to decipher exactly what Zecora had said, but when she did, she was overwhelmed by relief. "Oh! Sure, twenty percent, that's fine. And... and I'll figure something out. I'll hire a pegasus carriage or something." Zecora nodded with a smile and turned back to her bubbling cauldron, ladling out a dollop of the pea-green liquid. She poured it into a small wooden bowl, and passed the bowl to Twilight. "This concoction will fix your bones, but the sensation may make you moan." Twilight groaned, looked down at the bowl Zecora had given her, and then gulped it down. "I guess I should get used to this," she wretched. "Spike, I'm home!" Twilight called into the quiet library. "I'm in the back!" came the baby dragon's reply. Twilight followed the sound of his voice to find her assistant filing a pile of books away into the archives. "How did it go?" he asked, not looking up from his work. "Good." Twilight fidgeted in the door for a minute, considering her options. "Hey, Spike, do we have any copies of the Fillydelphian Times?" she finally blurted. "Uhhh... I'll check the cards," Spike replied placing a book back on the stack and trotting over to the cabinet in the corner of the room. "Why?" he asked, pulling open the drawer marked 'F'. "Just something that somepony mentioned I might want to look up," Twilight said vaguely. Spike raised an eyelid at that, but didn't inquire further. "Uhh... no, doesn't look like," he announced after a few moments of flipping through the index cards. "You'd probably have to check a Fillydelphian library," he suggested. "Hmph," Twilight grunted. "...Spike, contact the Fillydelphian Central Library and tell them I'm requesting all copies of the Fillydelphian Times from thirty-five years ago until twenty-five." "...you want ten years worth of newspapers delivered?" Spike asked skeptically. "Yes," Twilight said in a voice that invited no questions. "And if they are reluctant, remind them that I am the Princess's prize student, and that she would want me to have the best education possible." "Twilight, are you sure this is a good idea?" Spike asked, already heading towards the door. "Yes Spike. Yes I am." Two weeks later, a set of crates arrived on the doorstep early in the morning, leaving Spike with a hefty number of forms to sign, and an even larger number of boxes to initial. "My claw," he moaned, shaking the aching digits. "Twilight! Where do you want these?" he shouted up the stairs at the still dozing unicorn. "Are those the newspapers?" asked Twilight, her tired eyes and scruffy mane appearing over the balcony. "Just put the in the back room," she ordered. "Through here guys," Spike told the burly stallions, motioning to a smaller door in the back of the library. "Just put them anywhere." "You've got these for three weeks, max," one of the ponies told Spike as the final crate was placed on the floor. "And they need to be returned in the same condition you're getting them." "Yeah yeah," Spike replied. "I'll have them packed up again by then." The stallion nodded and headed out the door without another word, followed by the other workers. As soon as the door closed, Twilight's head appeared around the bottom of the stairs. "Are they gone?" she asked, her hair still sticking up in clumps. "Yeah," Spike said carefully. "Twilight, I still don't know why you want these." "I know," Twilight replied, pushing past him and into the back room. "I'm going to be in here for a while. Watch the library," she ordered, slamming the door shut. Spike shook his head slowly. He knew what was happening. Twilight had found some new obsession. She would come out in a day or so with a piece of paper, yelling triumphantly. The only question was whether this was connected with battle magic, or if it was going to be replacing it. Spike heard the door open behind him and turned to help the visitor. Either way, Twilight would work this out herself. "Nothing," Twilight muttered casting aside yet another sports section onto the growing pile beside her. She pulled a newspaper from the third open crate and extracted the sports section with the ease of repetition. Her magic flipped through the pages as her eyes scanned for an appropriate headline. When she found Silver's name, she stopped flipping and focused in on the story. She wasn't very optimistic though; Silver's wins and losses had apparently been a fairly popular subject back in his youth. Something set this story out from the rest however. It was about the annual championships, the final round of which Silver was in. Chimes Forfeits Final Match! the headline declared. "Forfeits..." Twilight murmured under her breath. Silver had lost a few matches, but she'd never seen him forfeit before. She scanned through the story with tired but curious eyes. Her eyes slowly widened and her reading accelerated as she followed the story. "I've found it!" she exclaimed as she burst out through the door, pulling a short scream from Spike's lips and causing him to drop the book he was carrying. "Spike, you can tell the Fillydelphian Library that they can come pick up their newspapers!" she continued, heading up the stairs. Spike picked up the book and placed in it's place on a bookshelf before walking to the back room to check the damage. He groaned loudly as his eyes fell onto the scattered mess of paper on the floor of the book room. Repacking all of those was going to be no small job. "Oh, and when are you making dinner?" Twilight yelled down from her bedroom. "I'm starving."