//------------------------------// // Painkiller (part three) // Story: Somepony who loves you // by Nonagon //------------------------------// Painkiller (III) A Somepony who loves you Story It was difficult for Cheerilee to find a book the first time. It wasn't just the lack of light in the library, though that certainly impeded her; even by the moonlight and the semi-random flashes and sparks from the middle of the room, she needed to squint for nearly a minute to make out some of the smaller titles. It was just that given the circumstances, subject matter was more important than ever. The foals with her had been through a lot already, and she knew better than to frighten them further with a lengthy adventure story. But at the same time, no foal would be able to take heart in a comforting tale about love and sunshine in a time as dark as this. Almost all three of her classes were gathered near the stairs, huddled together for warmth and comfort. Some were with their parents. Most had come alone. Cheerilee had rounded them together almost automatically, without needing to volunteer, and had been trying to keep them entertained ever since. She’d assumed it would just be for a short while, until the committee from the town hall returned. That had been three hours ago. They’d been expected back in two. After what seemed an age, Cheerilee picked up a heavy book from the bottom corner of a shelf. She paused as she read the title over twice, then clutched it resolutely. Another pony might have called it the worst possible choice, but she knew better than that. She knew where their salvation lay. Nodding to herself, the teacher moved quickly to the base of the stairs and sat down in a moonbeam, laying the book down in front of her with a faint thud. Instantly, the eyes of all the foals were on her. Without bothering with her usual introduction, Cheerilee began to read. "Once upon a time, in the magical land of Equestria, there were two regal sisters who ruled together and created harmony for all the land..." The rest of the room was listening too, she knew. None of the adult ponies would look at her, but she could see their ears swiveling in her direction. The library was packed. Aside from the foals, there must have been around fifty ponies crammed together in the main room. Despite the cramped conditions, nopony seemed keen on spreading to other areas of the building. Mostly they sat in silence, giving each other knowing glances and holding on to each other as they waited. There was one mare she recalled, a green unicorn, who couldn't seem to sit still. She would constantly rise to pace back and forth, jumping up to peer out windows and hopping skittishly from hoof to hoof, until the earth pony she was with would call her to sit back down. This repeated around once every five minutes, with the tone of the warning changing every time it was uttered, sometimes gentle, sometimes sharp. Mostly the others in the room seemed to ignore the pair. They didn't seem to be making enough noise to be bothersome. "And so, one thousand years went by. The ponies of Equestria believed that Harmony had won for good, and they lived their days and nights with renewed hope and joy. And they forgot the fear of the dark, and they forgot the threat of envy. They even forgot that there had once been such a pony as the Princess of the Night." Besides the moon, there were two other sources of illumination. One came from the magical glow of unicorns at work in the middle of the room. Pipes and metals connected a series of beakers, some actual, some improvised, that glowed with all colours of energy as they were magically passed back and forth across the table. Some of the glass containers were filled with liquids and sediments. Others contained flesh in various states. Nopony gave too much thought — intentionally, at least — as to how these samples had been collected. A mix of doctors and scientists clustered around the organized chaos. Some of them Cheerilee recognized, while others looked like they came from out of town. They worked diligently and never seemed to argue, only speaking to each other to compare results in hushed voices. Twilight Sparkle circled around them, occasionally darting in to offer a slight alteration or a comforting word. While she kept herself and the others constantly busy, she still found the time to smile or nod at the frightened ponies around her. Cheerilee couldn't begin to comprehend the kind of work they were doing in that circle, but she was certain that if anypony would be able to lead find a solution to the crisis, it would be her. "And at this, the wicked Night Mare laughed. 'Does my crown no longer count, now that I have been imprisoned for a thousand years? Did you not recall the legend? Did you not see the signs?’" A few ponies were giving Cheerilee some dirty looks at this point. Even so, she didn’t speed up or stop. She embellished the voice of Nightmare Moon as she would on any other occasion, and when she reached the wicked Queen’s evil laugh, she didn’t hold back in the slightest. Her students cowered in front of her, clinging tightly to one another with bated breath. But her little ponies were braver than most adults would give them credit for; not one cried out or turned away. All their eyes were fixed upon her, and not, crucially, the horror that burned outside. The library’s third source of light, distressingly, was Canterlot. Mere hours after the moon had frozen in the sky, it had sprung up into a glorious red blaze that shone like a second sun over the mountain and surrounding countryside. As the crisis wore on the fire had only grown, perhaps feeding on the magic woven into the stones of the city itself, and had gradually shifted through every colour of the rainbow before settling on a deep violet. It had stayed this way for some time, casting a flickering purple glow that rose and fell at unpredictable intervals. Staring directly at it for more than a few seconds hurt her eyes, so Cheerilee had soon devoted every part of herself — body and mind — to ignoring it. "But Pinkie Pie wasn't frightened by the faces on the trees. Instead, she laughed! She giggled at the ghosties that had appeared in the forest, and she told her friends to do the same.” By that point, nopony had seen the real Pinkie Pie in over four hours. There were whispers that she had gone to gather supplies, though what and where remained unspecified. It didn’t seem to have crossed anypony’s minds to worry about her, though. Imagining a pony like her being hurt was somehow unthinkable. From the doctors’ table there was a spark and a puff of smoke that quickly rolled down onto the floor. Amidst the sudden coughs and shuffling hooves there was a gasp of delight, followed by excited whispering. Twilight Sparkle ran to that section, a smile on her face, and more frenzied discussion and explanation began. It took a great deal of Cheerilee’s willpower not to stop reading then and there and listen in. The spark was all it had taken to bring the room back to life. Ponies began to whisper to each other again, stirring their limbs for the first time in ages. After the threat of eternal darkness, hope had started to return. Cheerilee’s fixed smile became a little more real as her story reached its climax. “But just when all hope was lost, just when it seemed like Nightmare Moon had won for good, Twilight Sparkle heard a noise. She looked back to the front of the hall, and she saw a light, and heard voices and hoofsteps coming towards her. It was her friends, coming to help her. And that’s when she realized something, something she’d been very foolish not to see right from the start.” Out of the corner of her eye, Cheerilee saw the real life Twilight Sparkle blush. She grinned and raised herself up, speaking just a little louder. “She turned to Nightmare Moon with a smile on her face. And at the sight of that smile, even the Night Mare found herself afraid. ‘You think you can destroy the Elements of Harmony just like that?’ Twilight said. ‘Well, you’re wrong. Because the spirits of the Elements of Harmony a—’” “Lyra!” One frightened scream plunged the room back into silence. Cheerilee glanced up and froze, her mouth still open. The green unicorn had risen again and was standing in a moonbeam, looking around in confusion as other ponies backed away from her. One mare stood her ground, the cream-coloured earth pony she’d been with earlier. She stared at the floor between them, trembling in place. Realization dawning, Lyra followed her gaze and slowly raised her front left leg. She left a bright red hoofprint in its place. --- The library was surprisingly easy to reach. The moon was almost perfectly aligned with the streets in this part of town, leaving flat, brightly-lit roads with no broad shadows to circumnavigate. The door was closed as Cheerilee approached; evidently the last pony to leave had had the foresight to close it on their way out. This meant that the building was almost certainly secure. They didn’t bother with such formalities. She instantly resisted the idea that somepony else might have returned in the meantime. The evacuation had been complete. There was nothing here worth coming back for. The heavy door opened soundlessly, a little residual magic masking its usual creak. Cheerilee stepped briskly inside and shut it behind her, taking a deep breath before looking around. She instantly regretted doing this. A swamplike stench lay thick upon the air, sickeningly sweet, but at the same time bitter as a mouthful of rust. Cheerilee gagged, covering her nose and mouth in an effort to keep what little hay she’d consumed that morning from making a reappearance. Breathing as little as possible, she took a few stumbling steps into the middle of the room. A few seconds delayed, the realization of what she was breathing hit her. Her eyes widened, and only a sudden, pressing need to hold back vomit kept her from simply bolting for the door. She pressed her mane across her face and breathed through it, reassuring herself that the smell wouldn’t harm her if she didn’t stay long. At least she could say with some degree of confidence that the air wasn’t infected. It was clear that her suspicions had been correct; nopony had come this way since the group had left. Chairs had been overturned, one cracked pitcher lay on the now-empty table, and a copy of Tales of Harmony was still at the base of the stairs where she’d left it. She made her way over and picked it up, then immediately dropped it as her eyes watered. The pages reeked of the same smell that permeated the rest of the library. With equal parts sorrow and resentment, Cheerilee turned her eyes towards the far corner of the room. Some volunteers with strong stomachs had cleaned up once it was over, leaving no visible evidence behind. But the smell seeped up through the floorboards, haunting the building with its presence. Sadly, Cheerilee shook her head. I can’t bring back anything from here. Not with that smell. It would only bring the nightmares back faster. On a hunch, she went upstairs and found herself facing a closed door, which opened into Twilight Sparkle’s bedroom. To her relief, the smell didn’t seem to reach up as high as this, and she quickly set about exploring. Unfortunately, the books that Twilight kept close to her were of little use. Mostly they were thick texts with needlessly long titles about advanced magical and mathematical theory, which Twilight evidently considered ideal late-night reading material. There was certainly nothing that might catch the minds of young ponies, not enough to drag their thoughts away from the nightmares. What looked like a toy chest lay against one wall, but it was empty. Frustrated, Cheerilee checked the desk nearby, and at last she had some luck. Within one of the drawers she discovered several thick packages of paper, both blank and lined. Most of their supplies of these at the schoolhouse had been eaten by Snails during their first few hungry days, and the rest had quickly been consumed in the weeks to come. Happy memories. Healthy minds. Stories to drive the terrors from their dreams. Cheerilee nodded. These will have to do. She left the quills and ink; they had plenty of those already. The blanket had been stripped from Twilight’s bed, which was something of a relief — dragging that through the door would be nightmare fuel in and of itself — but she found some spare sheets in a cupboard, and placed those on her back as well. She did a final sweep of the room before heading back downstairs, placing a corner of a sheet over her muzzle so she could breathe. Before leaving the library, Cheerilee stopped at the door and let the sheet fall from her face. She looked towards the basement door and breathed in slowly, smelling the cause of all their problems for what she hoped was the last time. “I’m sorry,” she said aloud, without fully understanding why. “I never got to say it at the time, but I am. I’m so... sorry.” With that, she turned away and walked back out onto the streets. The journey back was always easier. In one short trip the roads had become familiar again, with considerably less threat that every step might be her last. The papers were far lighter than her usual load, and the sheets provided a little warmth against the enduring chill of the night. Though she had a far longer trek before her than usual, her heart felt lighter than it had in a long time. The pills were only a temporary measure anyway, she reasoned. We have hope. We have each other. That’s all we need. That’s all we’ll ever need. --- Almost as soon as she was through the door, Cheerilee was caught in a desperate embrace from a filly on either side. “Cheerilee!” Silver Spoon cried, pressing herself against her teacher’s foreleg. “We were so worried about you!” “We thought you weren’t coming back,” Twist sobbed from her other side. “It’s all right, girls. I’m here.” Cheerilee quickly turned the inside lock and gave both of her students a squeeze in turn before gently moving past them. Both trembled at her touch. “You know I’ll never leave you. Don’t ever worry about that.” Diamond Tiara sat at the end of the hallway, her forelegs folded across her chest. “Miss Cheerilee,” she whined as soon as her teacher was close. “Snails tried to make breakfast by himself, and then he spilled flour everywhere and tried to clean it up by drooling all over it.” “Not now, Tiara. We’ll deal with that in a few minutes.” Cheerilee lowered herself and unloaded her bounty, prompting a smile that the spoiled filly wasn’t quite able to hide. “I found some new sheets, and some paper! Won’t it be nice to start drawing again?” Snails stuck his head around the doorframe, his muzzle covered in white powder. “Miss Cheerilee? I can explain...” “It’s all right, Snails.” Cheerilee put on her best smile. “Everything’s all right.” In the end, the damage to the flour wasn’t as bad as Diamond Tiara had made it out to be. Snails had only spilled a little, the foodstuff’s tendency to spread making it look like a lot more, and Cheerilee was able to salvage most of it. While her students set upon their new art supplies, she began preparation of what she supposed was a late lunch. The trick, she’d found, was adding just the right amount of water to the flour. It had to be just enough to make it into a paste, but not enough to leave it dripping to the touch. She hummed as she worked, sifting miniscule amounts of sugar and chocolate into a large bowl. At home, she’d never had much patience for cooking. Now, after just a few weeks of practice, she felt like a true gourmet. The foals were hard at work when Cheerilee bustled back into the room, carrying their meal and a mismatched set of smaller bowls. The three fillies huddled close together with one of the new sheets pulled over the three of them, differences momentarily forgotten as they squinted down at their pages in the dim light. Snails sat nearby, amidst a pile of salvaged quills and pencil crayons. Cheerilee put the bowls down, approaching the colt first with a smile. “And what are you...” She stopped dead. Snails wasn’t much of an artist. He’d drawn a blocky yellow unicorn with a long neck and sticklike legs, almost an image of a uni-giraffe if not for the green mane and tail. Beside this he’d drawn another unicorn, this one short, round and blue, a red mane half-finished around his head. “I couldn’t get the colours to look right,” Snails said, leaning back to admire his work. “But I think it looks okay.” Nodding vaguely, Cheerilee walked over to the other foals. Twist had drawn herself with the Cutie Mark Crusaders. Diamond Tiara had drawn her family. And Silver Spoon... Silver Spoon had drawn everypony. Every foal from her class was neatly grouped together, with plenty of space for more to be added. With a small flourish she finished the tail on Sweetie Belle, then looked up expectantly as Cheerilee stared down at her. For what was probably too long, Cheerilee only watched. She felt almost weightless, and for a moment she was struck by the feeling that her heart had stopped beating for good. It was only a pulse of blood behind her ears that reminded her that she still had duties to attend to. “They’re all lovely,” she said weakly, a smile plastered to her face. “Why don’t we eat?” Without protest, the group rose and reassembled around Cheerilee’s setup. She doled out portions of the sugary dough in carefully practiced servings, making sure that all five of them received the same amount. She smiled at the group before digging in to her portion. It didn’t taste like anything much; to this day, she wasn’t sure how much of the flavor came from the food, and how much from unwarranted optimism. For some reason, the others didn’t seem as interested in eating. Twist stared at her food for a good ten seconds before dipping a hoof into it, and Silver Spoon only began her meal once Diamond Tiara started hers. Cheerilee swallowed hard, glancing around nervously. None of the foals were smiling. “You really should eat,” she said to Snails, who was simply pushing his food around in his bowl. Snails shrugged. “I’m not hungry,” he said. Less than a second later, the colt’s stomach growled. Cheerilee giggled, but the sound fell flat across the still room. “It sounds like you’re hungry,” she said. “Don’t you think you should eat just a little?” “I guess.” Snails pushed the dough around some more, then shrugged again. “I just don’t really feel like it.” Diamond Tiara snorted. A smirk appeared at the corner of her mouth, and she turned towards Silver Spoon to whisper. “Maybe he’s a zombie.” In a flash, Cheerilee was on her hooves. Diamond Tiara froze up as she realized she’d said something wrong, and Silver Spoon actually shrank away from her. Cheerilee stomped towards the filly and raised a hoof as if to strike her, genuine anger burning on her face. “We do not use that word!” she almost shouted, coming within an inch of raising her voice. The moment passed. Cheerilee lowered her hoof, the anger fading from her face. “I... I’m sorry,” she mumbled. Diamond Tiara only whimpered. Cheerilee looked left and right. Her other students were staring at her in much the same way, as if they didn’t know whether to apologize or run. “Really,” she said desperately. “I shouldn’t have said that. I’m sorry if I frightened you.” It was deeper than that, she knew. They all remembered what had happened the last time Cheerilee had raised her voice. Now shaking, the teacher stepped back. She knelt down and spread her forelegs, beckoning all four foals towards her. “Come here,” she whispered. None of them moved. “Please,” she added. A tear started to build up in the corner of her eye. One by one, her little ponies pushed aside their bowls and moved towards her. All of them avoiding the gazes of the others, they clustered together in a group hug. Cheerilee felt a chill run through her as she held her students close. There was no strength in any of their limbs. Every one of them was shivering. Every one of them was cold to the touch. She held them as tightly as she dared, pressing her face desperately into their collective manes. “I love you, my little ponies,” she whispered. “I love you so much.” Tomorrow. Tomorrow I’ll go to the hospital.