//------------------------------// // Chapter 8: One Bad Apple // Story: Twilight's Dawn // by Dinkledash //------------------------------// Dear Princess Celestia, My pretense has been dropped. Everyone knows what I am now. I am all they have of course, so they must follow me. I am still their princess, but a dark, fell and forbidding princess I am. No more do the colts and fillies come to me for comfort, for a shoulder to cry on, a wing within which to weep. Instead they look at me quietly, perhaps frightened, perhaps repulsed, but in any event powerless and utterly dependent upon their Princess of Death. Let me tell you what happened. Two nights ago, Rainbow Dash was taking first watch and I was blessedly asleep. I was awoken by the fire bell ringing. Fire at sea in a wooden ship is a terrible risk, and it would not be rung as some sort of prank. I got to the door of my cabin just as Rainbow Dash yanked it open. “Come on!” she yelled and we ran to the foredeck where the bell was being rung by Sweetie Belle. We didn’t see or smell any fire. “Sweetie Belle, where’s the fire?” Rainbow Dash searched around looking for signs of smoke. Sweetie, who still hadn’t said a word since we were in the cave, stopped ringing and signaled us to follow her as we all ran to the forward companionway. We plunged down the narrow stair under the forecastle, and then I saw what the commotion was about. And if anything, it was worse than fire; it was that candy-colored swarm of adorable disaster, parasprites! Apple Bloom was swatting at the things, but there were hundreds throughout the large storage room, which was packed with crates and barrels representing about half of our remaining food supply. There was an open barrel rolled on its side, spilling out apple seeds and the hard bits of core that are inedible; a parasprite must have been inside of one of the apples when it was picked and it was missed during the inspection. When Apple Bloom came to load up some of the apples to bring to the galley, she opened that barrel and released them. It would not be long before they got into the other crates and then we’d be dealing not with hundreds but with tens of thousands. The swarm would infest the other holds, and we would starve, two weeks away from land fall. I had about ten seconds to consider our options. We could not seal the room; parasprites can squeeze through very small spaces. They are highly resistant to magic, as my last attempt to deal with them, which resulted in hundreds of thousands of bits in damage to Ponyville, had proven. Even if we all collected them by hand, we would surely miss one or two, and it would take so long that they could find their way into other crates and barrels and their population would increase geometrically. The only pony who knew how to deal with them was Pinkie Pie. We had a selection of musical instruments in one of the smaller holds where we kept cultural artifacts, but we had no musicians in our complement. So my decision was well and truly made for me, yet again. I have to accept that solving problems like this is part of my destiny. I just hope others can accept this to. “Apple Bloom, Sweetie Belle, get some other ponies to help and bring an accordion, a trombone, a bass drum… just bring all the instruments in the hold in chest number six to my cabin, and hurry!” They looked bewildered but ran to comply. I turned to Rainbow Dash and saw that Scootaloo had awoken and joined us. “Scootaloo, I need you to go to the galley with some other ponies and bring all the prepared food we have to my cabin, quick as you can!” She nodded and flew up the companionway. Then I was alone with Rainbow Dash. “I need you to go to the infirmary and bring… Gentle Breeze… to my cabin and join me there. And bring Loyalty and Laughter as well. Time is of the essence.” Comprehension dawned on Rainbow’s face, and then horror bloomed there as well, but she swallowed hard and zipped up the companionway. I teleported to my cabin; there was work to be done. By the time the food and instruments started arriving, I had cleared a space in the center of my cabin, drawn the chalk circle with the glyphs of change, death, life and love at the cardinal points, and lit focus candles within each. The colts and fillies looked at my preparations with some apprehension as they stacked the instruments against the wall and placed a dozen loaves of bread, a pot full of oatmeal and about 10 pounds of apple crisps on my table. Then Rainbow Dash came in wearing Loyalty, carrying Laughter in her mouth, and bearing in her forelegs the emaciated Gentle Breeze, a three year old who’s once merry eyes now rolled sightlessly around in sunken sockets. Her twin sister Summer Breeze had followed Rainbow Dash from the infirmary, where she had been caring for Gentle and helping in general. She and her sister were very sweet fillies from a good family of earth ponies; farmers of poplars for lumber on several hundred acres north of Ponyville. I hope her timbering skills will culminate in a useful cutie mark when we make landfall; Plumb Bob will need plentiful raw materials. Dashie looked at me and hesitated. Then a parasprite flew in the open door and headed for the table groaning with food. Scootaloo shooed it away, and Rainbow placed Gentle at the center of the circle with great tenderness. She carefully latched Laughter around Gentle’s fragile seeming neck. She knew exactly what was going to happen. “Everypony please leave, except for you, weather mistress.” The colts and fillies filed out, abuzz with conversation, except for Summer who just gazed at her twin as she stared back vacantly. There was no time to explain. “You too, Summer. We’ll talk later, but you know your sister isn't in there anymore. Please.” Summer’s eyes welled up with tears and she fled the room, bawling. Rainbow Dash closed the door as I finished scribing the last of the stabilizing runes. “You know there isn't any other way, don’t you Dashie?” She looked at me with deep regret in her purple eyes. “Yes, I can see that. It was the same with me wasn't it? So the magical resonance of the elements will let you reach into Elysium and pull her out when we, ah…” she shuddered. “But you don’t have her body like you did with me. And what’s with the food?” “This will be a little different. I need to concentrate. And I need you to help me. Think about Pinkie Pie and look at Gentle Breeze. Imagine Pinkie Pie being there instead.” She blinked and set her gaze on the poor, dying filly, her face screwing up with a variety of emotions. Sorrow, grief, horror and hope warred on her countenance with occasional flashes of laughter at memories of Pinkie’s mad antics. That’s what I was looking for. “Dashie, do you remember when Pinkie used some of Zecora’s jumping juju juice in that birthday cake for Mayor Mare and we had to chase the thing all over town?” Dashie giggled. “How about the time when she got lost in the Everfree Forest and when we found her she was rehearsing a song and dance routine with the hydra?” Dashie barked a laugh, remembering how the hydra heads sang in four part harmony. “What about when we put on that historical play for Princess Celestia and Luna and she forgot her lines and just started ad-libbing?” Her spontaneous jokes were much more entertaining than the moral lesson I had written and the royals as well as the rest of the cast had laughed until they all were exhausted. Dashie started laughing out loud, wholehearted belly laughs, uncontrolled. She laughed until tears ran down her cheeks. She fell on the floor, unable to stand any more, all the tension and fear gone from her. I can’t imagine what the fillies and colts listening at the door must have thought. Then I looked to the Element of Laughter at the throat of Gentle. It pulsed with power. The whole cabin thrummed with magic. Now was the time for the shaping. “By the laws of contagion, and by sea, land and sky, I command you young filly, become Pinkie Pie!” Bands of purple, red and pink flashed between the elements and Gentle’s body rose up from the center of the circle and floated, spinning so that I could see all of her. By the force of my will, her teal coat became pink, her brown mane and tail brightened to magenta, her deep blue eyes lightened, and underneath the pink coat, major changes took place that changed her from a filly to a mare as I applied elements of the age spell. Though Gentle’s soul was still her own for now, her mind was vacant, lost in eternal horror. Her limbs stretched, but as it did, her body grew even more emaciated. I could not add mass to the vessel awaiting Pinkie Pie’s soul. Reversing an age spell would allow me to dip into the magical potential from the body’s previous state, but I was growing an already rail-thin filly here. In magic, the laws of thermodynamics apply and can be lethal if ignored. Rainbow Dash gasped for air now, not having observed the transformation. “Remember at Shining and Cadence’s wedding, when she led that conga line and Celestia joined in at the end? Remember that look of scandal on Luna’s face?” Dashie erupted in fresh howls of mirth, and Laughter blazed aquamarine light. Then, thinking of the lessons I learned from my anatomy books, as well as the first dissection of a pony in a thousand years that I had performed four days ago, I stopped Gentle Breeze’s weakly beating heart. I felt myself caught up as though by a whirlwind, and my spirit along with that of the astonished Rainbow Dash flowed through our elements to where the element of laughter shone like a blue-white star. Then we launched upward, in the company of Gentle Breeze, her tattered spiritual form taking the lead. We quickly reached a void in the sky, and as Gentle leaned into that void, cold, hard stars blazed through what seemed a rip in the framework of the world. The light from the Elements combined to form what seemed to be a rope and it cast itself through the rift. I could feel it reaching and searching. It snagged on something. I pulled hard with the force of my will, my desperation, and after a moment, Pinkie Pie’s struggling specter burst through the doorway of death at the same time that Gentle Breeze passed over. The last thing I remember seeing was Gentle, comprehension and wonder dawning on her face as she leaped through that portal with joy, her spirit glowing teal and brown, into the waiting bosom of her family. Then there was the sensation of falling as my perception rushed back to my unconscious form in my cabin. When I returned to myself, Rainbow Dash was coming to her feet and shaking her head. There was a sparkling on Pinkie’s flank where her cutie mark had appeared. Pinkie opened her eyes. “Omigosh, what happened?! Where is everypony?! I AM SO HUNGRY!!!” I used my magic to move her weak new body to the table and seated her on a bench. I spoke with the Canterlot voice, “EAT!” Pinkie never has to be told to eat twice, and she reached out weakly for the apple crisps as I cast the haste spell yet again. There was a sort of buzzing sound, as though there was a giant pink parasprite in the room, and inside of 30 seconds, all the food on the table had been devoured. I will have to remind myself to count the plates and silverware later. I reached inside of Pinkie Pie and ensured that the nutrients she had consumed were being processed to fill out muscle, and with her metabolism working at a tremendous rate she visibly changed from a rail thin waif with a bloated belly to the slightly plump Pinkie Pie I knew and loved. While she was still under haste I called to her “PARASPRITES!” using the voice and gestured to the wall with the instruments. A pink blur rose from the table and sped to the wall. There was a deafening cacophony as the needed instruments were set into place and when I dropped the haste spell, Pinkie’s one-mare-band marched out door of the cabin with an oompah beat to do battle with our dreaded foe. Fillies and colts scattered as the door opened; there were shouts of amazement, screams of fear, and several fainted including Summer Breeze. Hundreds of parasprites answered Pinkie's summons, bouncing up in down with the rhythm, and flew in formation behind her as she strode around the deck. Using my magic, I grabbed a sample jar from my desk and caught the last parasprite, a pink one fattened up on our meager stores. It may be useful in the future. As for the rest, they had but one destination. I concentrated and a purple pathway rose up over the railing and down into the calm ocean. Pinkie mounted it and marched towards the sea with the colorful parade behind her. I pushed down onto the surface of the ocean, making a deep depression, and Pinkie played fearlessly her sirens song under the waves, the hapless parasprites following. Then I allowed the waters to close over them all. There was a collective gasp, followed by a sigh of relief as the bubble of magic holding the still playing Pinkie Pie emerged, shimmering from the water. I brought her up on deck and dropped the spell, and then I collapsed, exhausted. Rainbow Dash ran to pick me up, and I never felt a touch that was gentler. She held me as I watched Pinkie finish with a flourish to the somewhat stupefied applause of her audience. She put down the instruments, a process which took the better part of a minute, looked at the colts and fillies around her, the ship, Dashie and finally at me. The look on her face went from one of satisfied determination to one of confusion, fear, horror and finally disgust. She felt about herself with her hooves, and as she did, all the fluff went out of her hair and the color drained out of her face. She looked directly at me, pointed with her hoof, and rage glittered in her eyes as she cried, “Neighcromancer!” Leave it to Pinkie Pie to cause chaos. The deck erupted as fillies and colts all scrambled to put as much distance between themselves and the terrifying thing I had become. A nightmare, come out of legend to steal souls and raise the dead as their servants. And she did have a point; after all, I am a neighcromancer. Pinkie, though horrified, was as ever utterly without fear. “Release me from this borrowed skin! This homunculus is not me!” She stormed up to me. “I belong in the afterlife, enjoying my eternal reward, not here serving as the undead court jester to the Princess of Death! Send me back or I’ll send myself back!” She looked over at the railing and made to throw herself into the sea. “ENOUGH!” The Canterlot voice, when used properly, can be heard for several miles. All movement and screaming on the deck ceased as Pinkie was literally knocked down by the blast of directed noise. She looked up, dazed. “Yes, I am what you say. I will not deny it. But I had no choice, Pinkie, no choice!” I turned to Rainbow Dash and she nodded sadly, looking at Pinkie. “There was no other way, Pinkie. I helped her. I’m as guilty as she is. I’m so sorry. I know what it was like in Elysium, and I would love to go back too, but these colts and fillies need us. If she hadn't brought you back, if Gentle Breeze hadn't traded places with you, all these colts and fillies would have starved within a week. It would have been an awful way to die.” Rainbow slowly stepped away from me, and as I swayed slightly, she walked towards Pinkie, who sat, numb and desolate, on the deck. She nuzzled her and Pinkie seemed to get a little of her color back. I sat down heavily, still worn out from so much magic passing through my body in so short a time. “Pinkie, you need some time. Rainbow Dash can catch you up on what’s been happening and why I did what I did. And I don’t expect you to forgive me, but I need you to work with me, for the children’s sake.” Destiny being what it is, at that moment a nimbus of magic appeared on the bulkhead of the cabin nearby were the nursery had been set up. The Cake twins floated through it and upon seeing Pinkie Pie, threw themselves on her. They cried her name and climbed all over her as she started to come out of her shock. Pound Cake sat down in front of her while Pumpkin nuzzled her as Dash backed away, tears in her eyes. Then Pound spoke. “Pinkie Pie, will you pwease be our mommy now?” All the grief and loss of the past month came welling up out of my heart and I sobbed uncontrollably as Rainbow Dash lay down shaking with tears. Pinkie was hugging and kissing the Cake twins saying yes yes yes, and how she had seen their parents only a little while ago and they were so happy and just waiting to see their kids again, but some time far in the future, not now. All the fillies and colts who had been so terrified of me forgot to be scared for that moment, and just thought of their own parents and families who were no longer with us. They wept and held each other, collapsed in sobs, and cried all their pain out. The deluge went on for ten minutes, and the decks were awash with tears. At the end of it, when the collective emotion had exhausted itself, Pinkie Pie looked up from where she was cradling the foals, her eyes bright red and her voice low but thick with emotion. “Sorry Twilight. I see why you did what you did now. I’m sorry about the whole neighcromantic Princess of Death thingie. Of course I forgive you. Will you forgive me?” “There’s nothing to forgive, Pinkie. I love you, you know that. You saved us all.” “No, we saved us. All of us working together, like it has always been.” Then she went back to cuddling the twins. So now Celestia, I am the Princess of Death. My people will follow me, and perhaps love me, but except for my close friends, there is an undercurrent of mystery and not a little fear. I am powerful, possessed of dark knowledge, and not to be approached lightly. When I went to Summer Breeze to speak with her, she did not recoil in loathing or disgust, but was instead in awe as I told her of the transformation I saw in the spirit of Gentle at the gateway to Elysium. She thanked me for coming to tell her that. I could see that her spirit was lifted, even if just slightly. I killed her sister, and she does not think me a monster. I wish I was quite so sure myself. Your faithful student, Twilight Sparkle