Fluttershy unlocked her door to the cottage and cringed, preparing for another brawl in the room. She slowly opened the door and peeked her little head in. Before she knew it, she ended up with a pillow in the face. It took her a few seconds to regain her sanity but she finally got to that state and peered inside. To her dismay, Angel and Quinn were having another brawl. Angel was chasing Quinn again but more different than last time, he was was throwing objects at him. Quinn had good dodging skills though. He just stood there and dodged everything Angel was whipping at him.
Fluttershy was in pure shock. "Angel!" She trotted inside and stood in between them. Her pulse rate went up. She never stood in the middle of a fight before. While her insides shook, she was determined to make this feud stop.
Angel halted his throwing but lunged forward at Quinn, this time striking him and sending him flying out the open window. Fluttershy felt like she could pass out from the amount of violence she was not used to seeing. Angel paused all movements and stood in his place for a while to catch his breath.
Fluttershy was speechless. All she could get out was, "Angel..."
----
Angel and Fluttershy hadn't spoken for the rest of the day. Night had fallen and they still hadn't spoken to each other. Fluttershy was still recovering from the amount of violence and horror she had just witnessed late that afternoon. Quinn still hadn't come back home and that made Fluttershy feel even more sick to her stomach.
Fluttershy stared out the window and watched the droplets roll down the pane. It had just started raining lightly mere minutes ago and Fluttershy hoped Quinn was under some leaves or something to keep himself dry.
BOOM!
"Eeeep!" Fluttershy's reflexes tightened and sent her into the air with a light screech. She had to be quiet, for it was late and the animals were all sleeping. A fit of worry went to her stomach once again for the fifth time tonight as she thought about Quinn perhaps being scared of the thunderstorm. She suddenly felt a burst of courage rush through her veins as she stood up and stood tall. She was going out to the Everfree Forest to look for Quinn. She knew that that's where he would go. That's where she had found him after all.
She knew she was going to get drenched so she didn't bother putting on any extreme gear because the wet gear would only drag her down. The only thing she did was write a little note telling the animals where she was incase one of them woke up from their slumber and was looking for her.
Once finished with that, she stormed outside to be welcomed by an instant wet mane. The rain had gotten heavier and was pelting Fluttershy's face. She didn't like the feeling of the sharp raindrops so she hurried into Everfree Forest to be sheltered by the trees.
Fluttershy ignored how dangerous it was to be out in the Everfree Forest at night and continued to walk through the path. Fluttershy's random burst of courage was in fact random as with each crack she heard, her hoovesteps became slower and softer. She didn't like this at all. In fact, she was tempted to just turn around and head home. She was cold, wet, soggy, and frightened. States Fluttershy never wanted to experience.
Crack...
An "eep!" emitted from Fluttershy's throat as she cowered close to the ground. She didn't know what that sound was or where it came from or more importantly, what made it. She covered her eyes with her hooves fro a brief moment until she couldn't hear the sound again. She slowly slid her hooves across her eyes to shed some light to them again. She slowly lifted her eyelids. The rain was at its hardest which made Fluttershy squint in order to see slightly. At this point, the trees didn't shelter Fluttershy that much. She stood up and peered around the forest.
CRACK!
An ear splitting noise shook Fluttershy's insides as she felt something heavy hit her head. The pain was too much for her to handle and it vibrated through her skull. Her body felt weak and her brain was too shaken up to control the rest of her limbs. She collapsed immediately with a soft thud on the forest floor. Her vision became even more blurry than the rain caused and with that, her world turned cold.
----
Ouch...
Why does my head hurt so much?...
Am I awake?...
Fluttershy slowly opened her eyes and let them clear properly. The first face she saw was Quinn's as he stared down at her limp body. As soon as their eyes met, he emitted a tiny chirp sound. It was a sound of joy.
Fluttershy looked around and tried to move her neck to see where she was. A voice stopped her movements. "Don't move."
Fluttershy recognized that voice. It was Twilight's.
Fluttershy then saw Twilight standing in front of her with her horn lit up. She became a little nervous. "Twilight...w-what are you doing here?" Fluttershy couldn't remember how she got back home. She didn't even know why Quinn was home. They were both in the forest, right?
"You were passed out in the Everfree Forest." Twilight explained. "Zecora found you and brought you home. She told me to stay with you until you awoke." She studied Fluttershy's body and gently patted the bandage on her head. Fluttershy yelped as she felt the pressure sink into her wound. "Ah!"
Twilight immediately pulled back her hoof with a guilty look on her face. "I'm sorry Fluttershy. I didn't mean to go too hard."
Fluttershy gave Twilight a sympetic look. "It's okay Twilight. Thank you so much for looking after me. I think I'm okay now." She tried to sit up but ended up requiring help from Twilight. A few minutes later, she managed to sit up. She looked around her cottage with a look of horror. "W-What happened in here!?"
She saw Twilight bite her lip which made Fluttershy's head sink low. "W-What?"
Twilight appeared to be debating with herself whether or not to tell Fluttershy. Fluttershy was losing it and just wanted to know what exactly happened to her. "You know you can tell me. I won't be mad."
Twilight sighed. "I hate to tell you this..." She stopped and that made Fluttershy's eyes start to water. "Hate to tell me what?"
Twilight looked like she too was about to tear up. "I can only show you what happened." Fluttershy nodded slowly and started to shake. She walked over with Twilight to the corner of the kitchen table. There was a blanket with a lump underneath it. Twilight held the corner of the blanket but didn't lift it. She looked at Fluttershy with complete sadness in her eyes that Fluttershy didn't like the look of.
"I'm so sorry."
Twilight lifted up the blanket to release a little clump of fluff and previously chewed up flesh. Fluttershy nearly fainted at the sight but managed to keep awake. She studied the pile closer and then gasped in horror when she found out what the pile was. She couldn't tear her eyes away from the sight no matter how much it would haunt her later.
"Zecora found him this morning like that. She didn't know what had happened to him. The cottage was a mess but she called me over to help clean it up." Twilight saw the tears start to leak down her cheeks. "I'm so sorry..." She pulled Fluttershy into a hug which broke her. Fluttershy began to weep loudly over the death of her dearest friend, Angel.
She suddenly remembered how they last talked. They had a fight over Quinn.
"We d-didn't make up..." Fluttershy wept into Twilight's shoulder. Twilight rubbed her hooves through Fluttershy's mane gently. "What do you mean?"
Fluttershy could barely speak through the tears and her shaky voice. The insides of her nose were clogged her throat and caused her to choke. "W-We had an argument and...and...an-" She broke out and started to shout through her fast falling tears. "I never told him I was sorry!" She wept even harder into Twilight's fur which made Twilight's tears start to fall slightly. She hugged her friend even tighter and reassured her. "I'm sure he knows how much he means to you. Best friends have fights. But they always know that deep down, it's because they really care about each other."
Fluttershy couldn't get ahold of herself enough to answer Twilight so she just continued to hold Twilight tightly and empty out her sorrows for her best friend, Angel.
----
Fluttershy had spent the full day in bed with the bandage still wrapped around her head. She was still at loss with the news about Angel but she had no more tears or energy left to cry so she laid in bed, staring at the ceiling with a blank expression on her face. Quinn tried several times to visit her, as well as the other animals but Fluttershy told them nicely that she didn't want visitors. She needed to be alone to be left with her thoughts.
She couldn't bare to see Angel in the state he was in. He didn't look like himself at all and if she didn't know what he looked like, she wouldn't have been able to see that that pile of chewed up flesh was him. She got Applejack to burry him properly around the back of the cottage where they held a proper funeral for him. Fluttershy wrote down all of the information on his tombstone using one of Twilight's quills. The writing was squiggly though since Fluttershy couldn't hold still enough from her tears and shakily weak hooves but it turned out well. Fluttershy knew that Angel liked it. After she settled down a little and after the funeral was over, Fluttershy had a time alone with Angel and apologized to him. She spilled her feelings out and was one hundred percent honest with him. She felt a little warmness fill her heart at that moment which made her smile. That must be him. She thought. That must be him...forgiving me...
Fluttershy smiled at the ceiling as she relived that warm feeling. It was a weak smile, but a smile no less. She stood up and decided that Angel wouldn't want her to lie in bed sad all day. So not wanting to disappoint him, she stood up and went to her bathroom. She looked in the mirror at her bandage and ignoring what Twilight said about keeping it on, she slowly began to unwrap it. She did it slowly, being careful not to hurt the wound. Finally the last piece was removed and she studied the wound carefully. It was red and had a bit of dried blood on it but it wasn't what Fluttershy had expected at all. She expected it to be a lot larger. She washed it gently with some warm water in her sink, cringing at times when it stung. After a few minutes of gentle rinsing, most of the blood was gone and it looked much cleaner and less painful, even though it still was painful at times. She studied it in the mirror again and it was only two marks that looked like scratches. The scratches were only a hoof long each and as thin as a strand of a horse's mane. Fluttershy couldn't believe it. She then thought that they must be deep because of the large amounts of pain that was emitting from them.
She shrugged it off and let her mane go over top of the scratches. She still wondered what had fallen and hit her head but she tried not to hurt her brain while trying to remember.
She walked down the stairs of her cottage to see all of her animals standing around the bottom of the staircase. Fluttershy gave them each a soft smile, one at a time. "I'm okay guys. Thank you for caring about me."
It was already getting close to dinner time and Fluttershy didn't want to have stayed inside all day. So she trotted outside, waving goodbye to her animals and peered at the setting sun. She made a special trip to the backyard to say goodbye to Angel as well before she headed into Ponyville to perhaps purchase something to treat herself with.
----
"Well howdy there Fluttershy!" Applejack was ironically in Ponyville at the same time as Fluttershy. Both of them apparently wanted grass sandwiches.
Fluttershy sat down on one of the benches beside a table. She kept her back to the sun so she could warm her body up. The ground was still quite wet from the rain that night and it was making her hooves cold. "Hi Applejack. Thanks for helping out with Angel today. Angel, the animals, Quinn, and I all appreciate it very much."
Applejack smiled. "It was mah pleasure, Sugarcube. Still, ah am so sorry for yer loss." She grabbed a bunch of napkins from the condiments table and sat them down gently in the middle of the table Fluttershy was sitting at. "May ah do the honours of treating you?"
Fluttershy nodded. "Okay. Thank you. It's very kind of you, you know." She handed Applejack three bits. "But please, here's some bits to help pay."
Applejack took the bits without any fuss. She knew Fluttershy wouldn't take them back no matter how much she begged. She walked up to the counter of the little outside food cart and turned her head to Fluttershy. "One grass sandwich good?"
Fluttershy nodded.
Having received the answer, Applejack turned back to the pony serving the food and exchanged the bits for the sandwiches. Applejack order a special flower for Fluttershy. She knew that she loved Daisies. Applejack just enjoyed plain grass sandwiches.
Applejack carefully balanced the tray in her mouth and gently slid it across the table until it reached the middle. Fluttershy and Applejack both helped themselves to the sandwiches. Fluttershy had only taken three bits into the sandwich and was already full. She looked down at the bitten sandwich in confusion. How could this be? I was starving before coming here...
She tried her hardest to eat more but then was forced to stop or else she would be sick. Applejack was a tad concerned for her sake. "You okay there, Sugarcube?"
Fluttershy nodded. "I'm just full."
Applejack titled her head as she stared at the half eaten sandwich. "Full? You have hardly taken a bite."
Fluttershy shrugged. "I don't know why but I have a feeling of fullness." She didn't quite understand it and understood Applejack's confusion. "But don't worry about it. I'll just wrap it in some napkins for later."
As she stood up, a light wind blew past her and caused her mane to flow away from her face. Applejack then noticed the scars on her head. "Whoa nelly!" She grabbed Fluttershy's left hoof and pulled her close to allow her to study the cuts. "When did this happen?"
Fluttershy shrugged. "I was in the Everfree Forest looking for Quinn and something fell from above and hit me in the head. I don't know what it was because it knocked me out shortly after it hit me."
A look of seriousness swept across Applejack's face at the mention of Quinn's name. "Now listen here Fluttershy. Don'tcha think Quinn is a little...odd?"
Fluttershy didn't quite know how to respond to that. Quinn was fine in her opinion. Sure his eating patterns were weird but that didn't make him odd. She shook her head no and Applejack sighed. "Ah guess Ah am just overreacting. Ya know, ah still think you should keep a close eye on him. He did come from the Everfree Forest after all."
Fluttershy accepted what Applejack had just said and she gave her head a cute little nod. "Oh I will Applejack. His eating patterns are a little strange but I'm going to work on that meal for him. Maybe what I'm serving him isn't something he likes to eat."
Applejack just nodded her head in acknowledgement. "Alright Fluttershy. Just...be careful ya hear? Ah don't want anythang else happenin' to ya."
Fluttershy smiled. Applejack was so caring. She did notice that she was beginning to cast a far shadow on the table. That meant it was getting dark and Fluttershy needed to head home to the animals.
"Well, I better get heading home to feed the animals. I'll talk to you later Applejack!" She waved, quickly wrapped up the leftovers of her sandwich in some napkins and soared off to her cottage.