//------------------------------//
// LOVE (Epilogue) 
// Story: Love . Sick 
// by KitsuneRisu 
//------------------------------//


L O V E


Spike stepped out of the balloon onto Princess Celestia's balcony. Up there, the rains didn't hit; the clouds were far below the range of the castle.

Celestia stood there, looking down upon the cloud-coated city of Ponyville, and Spike hopped off the basket and joined her by her side.

"I got here as soon as I could, Princess. What's the emergency?"

She just kept gazing down at the town. Overlapping greys and blacks of storm clouds devoured the area, from Fluttershy's lodge to Applejack's barn.

"That's some freaky weather, Princess," Spike remarked. "Why'd the Pegasus ponies do that anyway?"

"Oh, it wasn't them," replied Princess Celestia. "It's a special occasion."

She turned away and walked back into her room, where she, with dour face, stroked her horn upon a small wooden box that lay on her mantelpiece. The intricately carved case popped open, the lid and front panel chucking out its contents, which was a tiny black scroll upon which were written silver letters.

"Princess?" said Spike. "Should I really be here? Twilight's missing and I really ought to go find her."

"Oh, she's not coming back, Spike," Princess Celestia said sadly, but resolutely. "She's not coming back."

She scanned the black scroll all the way from the top to the bottom, as if each entry of the list that lay upon it held dark memories for her. Every entry in the list was crossed out, save the very last, which read, simply, "Twilight Sparkle".

She sighed for a while, as if that would have changed anything. Then with the glowing tip of her horn she ran that across the scroll as well, as a red, ragged line cut across Twilight's name.

The box swallowed up the scroll like a tongue, and shut itself tight.

"Princess?" asked Spike. "Is... everything alright?"

"They just never listen, Spike," she said, careening her neck upward and stretching her back. "Mmmmnn... I try to warn them, but they never listen."



"They never listen."



- The End -