//------------------------------// // Dusk // Story: Alone in the Night // by BrainLapse //------------------------------// Twilight sighed as she closed the door behind Rainbow and Pinkie. They had exhausted Twilight with all their crazy ideas of telling Fluttershy her feelings, but she had shot them all down. They had varied from a bouquet of flowers to dropping out of the sky while fireworks went off in the background. Twilight had dismissed almost all of them, although the flowers idea did appeal to her. But now she just worried about how she was going to say it. It would have to wait though, Rainbow had warned Twilight of a major storm being made at the moment. It was going to be strong and would last most of the night. It made Twilight worry a little about Fluttershy because of what she had witnessed over the last few nights. But there really was nothing she could do, at least until she figured out exactly how to tell Fluttershy her feelings. She began to think over all the possibilities again, making lists for the pros and the cons. She worried over all the things that could go wrong, slowly making her worry more and more about what could happen if Fluttershy turned her down. Then she remembered what Rainbow had told her. "Twilight no matter what you do involving Fluttershy, you should know that she does look to others for strength. If you want to even stand a chance with her you have to show her true strength, which also means that you cannot freak out about things like this. You just need to trust your instincts and hope for the best." Twilight sighed, letting her mind begin to wander, now that it was no longer harbored down by thoughts of rejection. She slowly sat down to catch up on her studies. She began to read, enjoying the the quiet companionship of her books. Suddenly, Twilight just barely heard the sound of somepony knocking at her door. Curious, she looked up from her book, seeing that several hours had passed. It would have been a little after sunlight if it wasn't for the storm that covered the sky. Slowly she got up from her desk and walked over to the door. When she opened the door, it revealed a disheveled Fluttershy, who appeared to be having troubles standing. Fluttershy looked as if she was barely standing, her hair was covered in grim and twigs, her coat was covered in splotches of filth and she was completely soaked. Twilight was shocked at her appearance. "He-Hello Twi-Twilight. Th-there's som-some thi-thing I re-really ne-ne-ne-need to tell y-yo-you." Fluttershy managed to force out, her ability to stand faltering. She had traveled through the storm to Twilight's library to finally get something off her chest. She had spent all day building up her courage to finally tell Twilight how she really felt. When she had finally built up the courage, she left her home immediately to tell Twilight. But when she had arrived at the edge of Ponyvile, the storm had hit. Her house was further away from the library when it hit, so Fluttershy had decided to forge ahead through the storm. As she traveled through the storm, she had been battered with all sorts of garbage and dirty that was thrown around by the wind, and it stuck to her with the help of the torrential downpour occurring around her. Multiple times during the trip, Fluttershy had been knocked into a building, or any kind of structure, by large gusts of wind. It had taken all her strength to continue forward, but she needed to get to the library. Twilight took a step back to make room for the beat up pegasus. As she opened her mouth to speak though, Fluttershy fell forward, passing out on the spot. Twilight rushed forward, barely catching the unconscious pony before she hit the ground. Twilight struggled, but managed to pick her up and carry her over to her couch, setting her down as carefully as she could. Her body was beginning to run on autopilot, her mind too frantic to be of any use right now. Spike walked into the main room and gasped as he saw Twilight pacing around the couch where the pastel pegasus was laying. "Twilight! What happened?!?!?!?" Spike shouted. Twilight jumped when she heard the little dragon, her ability to process coherent thoughts returning to her as she turned to her assistant. "I don't know Spike. I was studying when I heard her knock on the door. I opened it, she told me that she needed to tell me something and then she collapsed." Twilight said while forcing her panic back down. " What should we do Spike? The storm is just too strong for somepony to travel out in, but if we don't get her help, she could get even worse. I mean we do have a first aid kit but I don't know how much help we can be. Maybe there's a spell that I could use." "Twi, are you ok? You seem to be freaking out." Spike said as he watched Twilight start to look around frantically, using her magic to pull books off the shelf, reading a few pages before throwing it away from her. Spike had never seen her treat books with such disregard, so he figured something must seriously be wrong. He slowly approached the frazzled unicorn before he tentatively put a claw on her shoulder. She snapped her head towards the dragon, her irises much smaller than normal. "Yes Spike?" Twilight asked while cocking her head to the side, sending shivers down Spike's spine. She looked like she should be locked up. "Well, you see Twi, I just thought that maybe we could just teleport to the hospital? I mean that would avoid going through the storm while still getting her in some experienced hooves." Spike said slowly as to not aggravate the purple pony. She looked at him with a blank look on her face before she realized what he had said. She rushed over to the unconscious pony on her couch, carefully putting her on her back. Twilight closed her eyes, took a deep breath and focused on the spell. Her face began to scrunch in frustration before she winked out of the room in a bright pink flash. ------ A/N: Sorry that took so long yall. I just could not figure out how to start this one. But once I got it going it flowed out. I'm thinking that there will probably only be about two more chapters. Anyways thanks for all the support and stuff. The next few should not take as long though.