//------------------------------// // Fluttershy // Story: Dear Princess Celestia, From: The Battlefield // by Cabooseforpresident //------------------------------// Dear Princess Celestia: It's Fluttershy. They call me Hospital Corpsman "SAWBONES" Fluttershy, but you know... whatever you want to do is fine. If you are wondering, I'm fine. I'm doing...fine... What am I saying? I'm not fine, I'm not fine at all. Even though I should feel very happy, I feel horrible. I'm one of the leading doctors here, and I am very good at what I do. Why am I not happy? It's simple really, I'm sad. I'm horrified, I'm depressed, I'm scared. Let me cover all of that now. I'm horrified. The thing's I have seen... It makes me want to cry. Because I work in the infirmary, I care for a lot of ponies. I used to get simple gunshot wounds, and small injuries but.... now all I see are dismembered ponies. I don't just mean hooves and tails, but now i see things like dismembered hooves, eyes missing from their sockets. One times, they brought half a pony in. He was still alive too. Luna knows how he survived. He was half awake, and half alive. It horrifies me and I can't go to sleep at night. I have to take sleep medication just to get my eyes to close. I have nightmares too, scary ones.What terrifies me the most is that I can remember every single detail. Scientists say you can't remember dreams and nightmares, but my nightmares are so dug in that i sometimes believe they are memories. If you don't want to read this then that is fine. Whatever you want to do is fine... I was on the floor of a long hallway. There were three rooms on both sides of the room. It wasn't the type of dream where the hall starts moving away from you. Anyway, I figured the only way to get out of the dream was to find out what was in each of the doors. I opened the first door to my left. I saw Twilight, in a classroom in Canterlot. She was studying as usual, not that that's a bad thing. She was a filly, still learning the basics of magic. I then saw the "screen" if you will, fade. Another scene came to play. This time, i saw Twilight rushing towards Nightmare Moon, and saw us use the Elements of Harmony to defeat her. Another scene change. It showed her what i believe to have been after this war. It seemed like we had won but.... Twilight was different. The spark in her eye, the magic within her seemed to have faded. She looked faintly grey. Another scene change. Twilight was married with a stallion of who's name i do not know. Yet another scene change. Twilight had a foal with the stallion, the sparkle in her eye replenished and rejuvenated. And yet again, another scene change. Twilight was at home watching her full grown mare leave for another war. The scene changed, and twilight was reading a letter, stating her little foal was killed in action while buying time for her squad. The whole screen faded to black. I walked out the door, horrified. What I saw next made me fill with complete, utter fear. As i walked out, i saw a frame beside the door. In the frame there was a picture. In that picture was Twilight, a rope on her neck, hung to a ceiling fan. She was dead. In her hooves were two pictures. One picture, was a hand drawn picture of her foal and herself, drawn by her foal when she was young. In her other hoof was a picture of her whole family, taken days before her foal was shipped off to fight the unknown enemy. I instantly ran towards the door at the end of the hallway, eager to get out. Thank Luna i did. Every night i had the same dream, each with a different pony, each with a different friend. What's worse was what was behind that door at the end of the hall after i viewed all the misfortunes of each of my friends. I can't talk about it.... it brings back too much pain. I used to be able to sleep at night, even if the horrors i see kept me up. After that nightmare, I couldn't even sleep 2 hours without waking up. I even used the pills and could only pull an extra hour or so of sleep. Due to both the nightmare, and the things i see each day, I have become reliant on the sleep medication. If i don't take them every single night, then i get hallucinations. Eyes in the dark, sometimes I imagine the other nurses and doctors as horrible beings. Their skin falling off, and flesh becoming liquid. I can't say any more.... I'm depressed. I doubt it's because of the painkillers. I think that i just wasn't ready, just wasn't prepared. How can you prepare yourself from the amount of pain you have to see ponies go through? How many ponies rely on you to get better? How do you cope with the pain and guilt of knowing you let some of the same ponies down? To see their eyes stay open,, as they slip to the unexplored, unknown void we know as death? I have to live with the guilt that i let many of my patients die. DIE. My heart is breaking. So many families, who looked to me to heal their mares and stallions, who once looked at me with hope.... Now they will look at me with hate, rage, sorrow, and grief. How will I ever recover? I am scared. I may have healed a lot of patients, but there will always be one patient I doubt I can heal; me. I will never be able to forget these memories. I will carry them forever. The screams at night, the sobs of patients, the scribbling of the last letter of a dying patient to his family. I'm scared for the well being's of my friends. They all seem to be changing, not for the better. I'm not only scared for them, but for myself. I'm scared for my life. So many what if's clutter my brain... Oh princess i don't know anymore. What if they attack us and break our lines? What will become of my friends? What will become of me? I don't want to die... I don't want to die.... I DON'T WANT TO DIE!!!!!! I'm sorry princess.... but i hope the message is as clear as day. I simply don't want to die. I'm sad. Ponies are changing. I don't just mean any ponies, but i mean my friends, your elements of harmony. It's like the magic inside them died. Let me cover what i know about their changes. I don't get to leave the infirmary, so I only know so much. Applejack is very scary. She almost got blown to bits last time she was in the infirmary. She gets hit a lot and is here regularly. she has been in the infirmary about fifty to seventy times. Don't ask me how a mortar mare gets hit fifty to seventy times, cause it just happened. So here's a story about how she almost got blown to bits. She was doing her normal duty as a mortar mare, raining hell on our enemies. As she was firing, a shell exploded only FIVE METERS From her, sending shrapnel into her pony. I saw her that afternoon, with more than fifteen pieces of shrapnel littering her pony. Miraculously she didn't have shrapnel anywhere vital. She is a very lucky pony. She simply said after I asked if she was OK that it was nothing. Just another day in the life of a soldier. She has a few permanent scars, but is otherwise alright physically. Through my first scans of how she acts, she seems to be clouded mentally. Probably all the drinking she does. Rarity comes in every once in awhile, to come talk to me and give me a bit of company. She hasn't been injured ever. She's one of the lucky ones who gets to be a sniper. I rarely get snipers come in, and its usually just something minor like a broken bone. Physically she is in a good condition. I seriously doubt I could say the same about her mental condition. Distress if visible on her face. Stretch lines, streaks on her forehead... Small stretch lines but its still a sign. She usually talks about home and how she misses Sweetie Belle. Sometimes I think of all the ponies and animals we left in your care. Angel, tank, Sweetie... How are they? Ooh getting off track. Anyway, Rarity doesn't like when i ask her if anything is wrong so i can't say much about her. Pinkie has definitely changed the most. Pinkie went from being the insane, harmless, party with balloons pony to an insane, unstable, play with fire pony. The mare is unstable. She has been in our infirmary more than a hundred times. Eighty percent of the time the wounds are caused by her lack of judgement. When she is in the infirmary, she hurries me up so she can burn some more changelings. Physically Pinkie needs frequent medical checks, and mentally she is insane. Twilight was in the infirmary three times. Don't worry princess I took good care of her. She suffered very minor wounds, though nothing vital was damaged. Out of all of us she seems to be the most distressed. She once told me the only thing that would get her to sleep at night was quote: "your angelic, healing voice when you calm down the patients." After hearing that, I make sure to take a bit more time to calm down the patients for her sake. Sometimes i sing too. I can't say much about her, but stretch lines and blood shot eyes read distress and lack of sleep. Physically, she needs more sleep, and needs to strop stressing out. Mentally, she is depressed. Rainbow has tons of charisma and charm, which of course feeds her huge ego. She once saved our commander sure, but its not an excuse to blindly charge in and get shot a billion times. I had to patch her up 10 times in a week once. She has a couple scars, though none permanent. She is in great condition otherwise. Her body was made to take damage. It's probably because of all the crashing she does. She loves flying laps around the perimeter of the base. She complimented my voice too, but doesn't really talk too much about anything else. She has abs too, which scare some of the privates. Actually... they don't look that bad... They feel nice and strong... Oh... I mean like... I don't like her... I mean I do but as a friend.... OKAY OKAY OFF TOPIC!!!! Uh... lets wrap this up quickly. She has a one track mind, and is very egotistical, but physically in good shape. Well, that's all I have to say princess. I miss you. Please tell all the ponies and all the animals we left in your care that Fluttershy loves them and will be back soon. Lots of love, Hospital Corpsman "SAWBONES" Fluttershy. ______________________________________________________________________________________ Authors note: I purposely was vague about Fluttershy's dreams for a reason I might be making another series just for that. An idea that came to my head :) Hope you enjoyed! AND VOTE CABOOSE FOR PRESIDENT!!!! -Cabooseforpresident.