Once again, Octavia woke up and found herself intertwined in Vinyl Scratch’s legs, this time unable to get up without waking her. As she stood up, the DJ’s eyes fluttered open for a moment before retrieving her glasses and placing them on her face and yawning.
“Good morning, Tavi,” she slurred a bit, still just barely awake, “Sleep well?”
“I… well…” Octavia colored slightly, “Yes, thanks to you.”
Even with the glasses on, Octavia noticed one of Vinyl’s eyebrows arch, and decided to explain further.
“I was having this nightmare… I was back on the ship, but it was already sunken. There were these white shapes. I couldn’t tell what they were at first, but then they got closer,” Octavia paused a moment, forcing down the growing lump in her throat, “They were ghosts, Vinyl. Ghosts of my parents, Beauty Brass, that yellow Pegasus yesterday, that stallion at the concert… ghosts of ponies I’d never seen before. Hundreds of them, everywhere, underwater, in the ship. Then, my parents came up to me… and started dragging me down, further underwater. I was drowning. And then… you came. You pulled me away from them,” Octavia paused and chuckled a moment, “It’s kind of funny, I thought you were a ghost at first, being so white and all,” and for some reason the thought of you dead scared me the most, she added silently, “But then you…” she trailed off, and Vinyl raised an eyebrow, “I knew it was you. That it was really you. You told me you’d never let me go.” Vinyl colored noticeably, and quickly turned around and marched out of the cave.
“Well I’m glad you’re alright, Tavi. Why don’t we head over to that lake and wash up, then go to the beach again?” Vinyl was talking significantly louder than was necessary, and the sudden change of topic confused Octavia, but she grunted her consent and followed the unicorn mare. Vinyl waded down into the pool, relishing in the cool water coming up to her neck. Without anything resembling a washcloth or bar of soap, the best she could do to wash herself was simply scrub her hooves all over her body, hoping for the best with getting the dirt off. She brought her head beneath the water for a moment, shaking it violently and running her hooves through it in an attempt to clear the worst of the knots. As she brought her head above the water again, it fell in thick, wet ropes around her ears and down over her shoulders, revealing her fuzzy mane to be substantially longer than it appeared when dry.
“Vinyl! Your mane is so… well, it’s very pretty. I never knew it was so long. Why don’t you ever wear it down? I’ve always wanted a long mane, but I’ve never been able to get it to cooperate once it gets much longer than it is now,” Octavia asked, truly captivated by the long strands of electric blue hair, following it's path down Vinyl’s head, shoulders, and body. She caught herself following the other curves of Vinyl’s body with her eyes before averting them, and ducked her own head under the water momentarily, before resurfacing.
It was Vinyl’s turn to gawk, now – unlike her own mane, which was knotted and rough, Octavia’s well-kept mane hung from her head in arrow-straight sheets, not clinging to her body at all but instead falling neatly away from her. While it didn’t have the same stunning effect that Vinyl’s own wet mane did, she envied the cellist’s easily tamable mane.
“Honestly, Tavi? I never wear it down because I can’t ever get it to cooperate. So I just kinda shake it dry, like this,” Vinyl shook her head violently, spraying water all over Octavia, “It’s much easier.”
Octavia looked up, with a mischievous glint in her eyes. She rolled her neck around once, whipping her soaking hair into a straight line, launching what Vinyl could only describe as a bolt of water, right at her head. The water impacted her head at the base of her horn. In a flash, an idea entered the unicorn’s head. She clutched at her horn, groaning in pain and falling over into the water.
“Oh my Celestia, Vinyl, are you ok?” Octavia rushed over to her friend, expecting to have to pick her up out of the water. Instead, she received a forceful stream of water to the face. Surprised and confused, Octavia recoiled, eyes and mouth wide as Vinyl stood back up, rolling with laughter.
“Oh, Tavi, you should see your face, it’s priceless.”
“How did you… can you use magic again?”
“What? No, I did this!” Vinyl bent her neck down and sucked some water into her mouth, lifting her head again and spitting it back at Octavia.
“That’s… disgusting!” Octavia drew back, pumping her forelegs in displeasure, kicking up a surprisingly significant volume of water right at Vinyl Scratch. The force of the torrent of water actually knocked Vinyl off her hooves this time, and she replied in kind by kicked her hooves out as she fell, splashing a substantial amount of water towards Octavia. When the gray mare had finally gotten the water out of her eyes, she gave Vinyl a look of pure anger and leapt at her. Vinyl did the only logical thing – she turned tail and ran towards the shore. Unfortunately for her, Octavia seemed to be more agile in the water, and she quickly caught up to and tripped Vinyl. Octavia hadn't really thought the action through, however, and Vinyl’s tail wrapped around her legs, tripping her up as well. The pair tumbled end over end before landing half in the water, with Octavia on her back and Vinyl straddling her, both panting heavily and soaking wet. They were staring at each other, faces only a hoofsbreadth apart.
Kiss her.
The thought blasted into the front of Octavia’s mind completely unbidden. It took serious effort to avoid following through on the thought, and all of her will to force the thought from her mind. She hadn’t been able to do it fast enough, though – she felt an embarrassing burn in her cheeks and on the tips of her ears and her face colored deeply. Unbeknownst to Octavia, though, Vinyl Scratch had been fighting the same mental battle, and was losing. Vinyl’s face was turning a deep red and her breathing was becoming heavier despite their inactivity.
“Vinyl?” The unicorn was snapped out of her thoughts, reality destroying the desire to physically confess to the beautiful musician beneath her.
“Vinyl, would you mind getting off me?”
“Oh, uhh, yeah. Sure.” Vinyl’s voice trembled slightly as the short, broken sentences forced their way out of her mouth as she stood up and took a few steps away from Octavia.
“Shall we… shall we head down to the beach, now?”
“Yeah, I think we should.”
They walked through the forest, an unpleasant silence between them. Vinyl wanted to break the silence, to just begin a casual conversation, anything to get rid of the tension. Octavia, on the other hoof, was glad to have some time alone to think, despite the awkwardness.
Where did that thought come from? Am I a fillyfooler? No, I can’t be, can I? I’ve never had a marefriend before! I mean, I’ve had coltfri… no, no I haven’t. I’ve had crushes on colts, haven't I? Octavia desperately tried to recall somepony, anypony she’d felt romantic interest towards. Much to her dismay, she couldn’t. But I can’t be a fillyfooler… that’s just absurd. Isn’t it?
But what would be so absurd about it? A second voice, still her own, but with different ideas, sprang into her head.
It’s… it’s unnatural! Besides, we wouldn’t be able to have any foals!
Unnatural? Feelings are feelings, love is love – the gender of the subject of your heart’s desire is irrelevant. And having foals? Getting a little ahead of ourselves, aren’t we?
Octavia colored externally as she realized her mind was right – somewhere her mind had spawned a fantasy of living with, perhaps even being married to, the white unicorn who had saved her life. Yes, saved my life, that’s where these thoughts are coming from. It’s only natural that I’d feel gratitude towards the pony that saved me. It must be the trauma of the accident, my mind is misconstruing those feelings of gratitude as feelings of attraction. Yes, that must be it. Octavia looked over at Vinyl – the white unicorn was rather pretty, now that she thought of it. No, mind, damn it! Stop thinking like that! But what if…
You’ll never know if you don’t try. As much as she hated to admit it, her mind was right.
“Vinyl, I thi-”
“Well, here’s the beach,” Vinyl interrupted, pointing out the obvious – the pair had indeed arrived at the beach. “Were you saying something, Tavi?”
“Oh, no, it’s… it’s nothing.”
Vinyl raised an eyebrow questioningly, but decided to drop it.
“Hey, Tavi, why don’t we look for some rocks, or logs or something, see if we can spell out ‘Help’ or ‘SOS’ on the beach or something. I’ll head that way,” she gestured with her head down the beach one way, “and you can head the other way, and check around the corner for anything we can use. Just holler if you need help with anything.”
“Ok, sure,” Octavia replied. This seems like a shockingly reasonable plan.
“Alright then, I’ll be just down the beach if you need me,” Vinyl stated, turning and starting to walk away. Octavia stared for just a second, watching Vinyl’s hips and tail sway from side to side as she sauntered away. No, damn it! I’ll talk to her about it, or something, but not right now! … Well, I should go looking for rocks and stuff. Octavia unglued her eyes from Vinyl’s rear and turned to walk away. Just a few meters down the beach, it bent sharply, hiding the remainder of the sandy shore from view. She tried her hardest not to think about Vinyl Scratch, but found her mind dominated by the white mare anyway. Focusing intently on the ground, “searching” for rocks, or anything, really, she wasn’t paying attention to where she was going and wasn’t really registering anything she was seeing.
When she tripped, she let out a small yelp of surprise more than pain or fear, and looked back to see what it was she’d tripped on.
Vinyl heard the scream and immediately left the group of medium-sized rocks she was rolling towards the part of the beach they’d washed up on and broke into a full gallop. Tearing down the beach and rounding the corner, Vinyl realized the scream had devolved into a wail, with only despairing sobs breaking the continuous cry. She could see Octavia hunched over an inert blue and brown form that vaguely resembled a…
Oh, no.
Vinyl slowed to a trot, before reaching a hoof out and placing it softly on Octavia’s back.
“Tavi, are you… no, that’s an idiotic question. Of course you’re not ok. Can I do anything to make you feel better?”
Octavia merely turned around and latched onto Vinyl Scratch, burying her face in her chest, wrapping her forelegs around Vinyl and sobbing. A few words came to Vinyl’s mind, but she decided the best thing she could say was nothing at all. She reached down and returned Octavia’s embrace, prepared for another hour or two of silent comforting. Instead of remaining with her face pressed tightly to Vinyl’s chest, she lifted it and looked up, seeing the white unicorn smiling benevolently at her.
Kiss her.
Again, the thought came to her mind entirely unbidden, only this time she didn’t have the mental faculties to resist. She pressed her head up, lightly touching her lips to Vinyl’s.
Vinyl couldn’t move. The mare of her dreams was kissing her. But this wasn’t how it was supposed to happen. She wasn’t thinking clearly. It was Octavia kissing her, physically, but not mentally. The gray mare in her arms was an emotional train wreck at the moment, not the heavily romanced cellist Vinyl had secretly dreamed she would be moments before their first kiss. Frantically trying to sort out what had just happened, Vinyl realized she had been returning the kiss for just a moment, before pulling her head away.
“Octavia… I… we can talk about this later. Or preferably, we’ll never speak of it again. I care for you, deeply, but as a friend,” the DJ grimaced internally at the lie, “You’re distraught. Come on,” Vinyl picked herself up, and looked over to the body in the sand. “This is your friend… Beauty Brass, right? She was in your orchestra. We can’t leave her here.”
Octavia had managed to calm down enough to form sentences.
“How can you be… so… so nonchalant about this? This is a dead pony. She was my best friend. How can you be so cold? How can you just… not care?” Octavia’s eyes burned with hatred, staring at the white unicorn she’d tried to kiss just moments before.
“I do care, Tavi. I’m just trying to think about something, anything but the reality of what is going on. Because if I was thinking about it as much as you are, we’d both be quivering wrecks, unable to move, think, or live,” Vinyl stated coldly, “And I don’t know about you sometimes, but I want to live. Now, seeing as this mare was a nice enough pony to be given the title of ‘best friend’ from someone as classy, and wonderful, and talented and beautiful as you are… she deserves to be… taken care of. We can’t leave her like this.” Vinyl grimaced, bent down, and pulled Beauty Brass’ corpse over her back.
Octavia’s eyes softened in recognition, and hung her head as regret pooled in her heart, realizing just how foolish she’d been. Then something Vinyl said clicked.
“Do you really think I’m beautiful?” Octavia asked quietly, still staring at the ground.
Vinyl Scratch froze. She hadn’t noticed she’d said that, and she certainly hadn’t meant to.
“Yes, I do think you’re beautiful. But let’s discuss this later. We have… we have a grave to dig.” Vinyl cringed slightly; that had come out a lot harsher than she’d meant for it to.
Another tense silence surrounded the two mares as they walked through the woods, looking for a suitable patch of ground to dig up. Eventually finding a small clearing in the forest, Vinyl gently slid Beauty Brass off her back and began to draw a large rectangle in the ground, big enough to fit a pony inside. Finishing the outline, Vinyl began digging at the ground with a hoof, the soft, loamy soil coming up with relative ease. After having made a little progress, Vinyl looked up and noticed that Octavia wasn’t helping. She opened her mouth to chastise her, then closed it again as she realized she was crying again. Vinyl stopped digging and walked over to her, sat down on her haunches, and wrapped a foreleg around her shoulder.
“Promise you won’t try to kiss me again?” Octavia nodded weakly. Vinyl paused a moment before continuing, “… how old was she?”
Octavia sniffled a couple times before responding. “She was… she was nineteen. A brilliant rising star, and truly an amazing sousaphone player for her age. It’s… why couldn’t she have lived, and not me?” Octavia looked up at Vinyl, tears still flowing from her eyes. “I’ve pretty much come as far as I’ll ever go. Beauty, though? She had such a career in front of her…”
“Hey, we talked about this, remember? We’re here, and we can’t go back on that. Look, there’s nothing that I want more than to tell you ‘It’ll all be ok.’ And I can tell you that. But things are going to be unpleasant until they get better. It might be a long time before they get better. But until they do, I’ll be here for you, helping you as much as I can. What are friends for? Now come on, help me out a little. The sooner we finish this, the less time we have to be here dealing with the unpleasantness of the present.”
“Alright… alright. Let’s… yeah. And Vinyl? About earlier, I’m so sorry…” Octavia said, weakly, before standing up.
“Don’t mention it. Emotions get the best of us sometimes,” Vinyl replied, straining to keep a placated smile on her face.
The two set about digging. It took several hours at least before they had excavated enough dirt by hoof to lower the cyan mare as smoothly as possible into her grave. The sun was setting by the time they were piling the dirt back over Beauty Brass’ body. As Vinyl finished smoothing the dirt down, Octavia started to tear up again.
“Do you want to say anything, Tavi?”
Octavia shook her head in response, before saying, “There’s nothing I could say that would do justice to her loss. She was taken far too soon. That’s… that’s all there is….” Tears began to flow again.
“Tavi… Tavi… don’t cry. It’s late, let’s go get some rest.” Vinyl put a foreleg over the cellist’s shoulders and began to lead her back to the cave. After a silent, meager, and quick meal of berries and leaves, they curled up once again and fell asleep.
***
For the second night in a row, Vinyl Scratch awoke with a start at an indeterminable hour. The moon was high and provided a surprising amount of light, enough for objects to cast rather distinct shadows, even. Luna must have some reason to be happy tonight… the moon’s always brighter when she’s happy. Good for her.
She could feel that Octavia was still asleep, the regularity of her breathing reassuring the tense unicorn. However, that moment of calm didn’t last very long – a low growl pervaded the cave, causing her to sit bolt upright, eyes searching fearfully for the source of the sound. Her eyes finally came to rest on a large body that occupied the mouth of the cave. She couldn’t make out details, due to the light source being behind the creature, but she didn’t need to – the segmented tail, dragon-like wings, and lioneqsue mane. There was no doubt in Vinyl Scratch’s mind that this was a Manticore, a creature she had been warned of since her early days. Gently placing a hoof over Octavia’s mouth to stifle any yelps she might make as she shook her awake. Thankfully she woke quietly, but Vinyl was rewarded with an angry stare from the mare’s purple eyes.
“Mmph?!”
“Octavia…” Vinyl hissed, “Manticore. Quiet.”
“MMMPHMMHH?!?!” The gray earth mare’s eyes widened in fear as she tried to let out a terrified yell, drawing the attention of the beast. It roared, causing both ponies to jump to their hooves in fright, Vinyl taking up a defensive posture, placing herself between Octavia and the Manticore.
“Octavia. I’m going to ask you to trust me. Run. Run and don’t look back.”
“Vinyl, I could never leave you here alone with… that! You don’t even have your magic!”
“I have a horn. That’s something. It’s better than what you can do. So Octavia, please just RUN!” Anger was beginning to rise in Vinyl’s voice, the frustrated and terrified mare losing her patience with her stubborn friend. In the course of their argument, the beast had come closer, and had one massive paw raised in the air. Vinyl noticed this far too late to do anything but watch in horror; the world seemed to go into slow motion as she was pushed aside, Octavia now occupying the space she had just been in.
“VINYL LOOK OU-”
Octavia’s cry was cut short with a sickening crack as the beast’s paw smashed into her side and his claws dug across her flank. The small mare was lifted off the ground by the force of the blow, soaring through the air and slamming into the wall of the cave, her spine bent back at a terrifyingly unnatural angle. She could hear screaming and saw a flash of orange, her eyes slowly closing, and lost consciousness. The last thing she saw was what she hoped was Vinyl Scratch rushing over to her.