//------------------------------//
// All that Sparkles 
// Story: Breaking Cute 
// by GoldenState3 
//------------------------------//

Twilight Sparkle looked up from the book she was reading. She'd been lost in it for the past few hours, and she'd lost all sense of time and space. It was late afternoon now, and the sun was starting to set low on the horizon. Spike was pulling at her leg, trying to get her attention. 

"They want you at Ponyville Hospital. That one pony that was staying with Applejack, is very sick." Spike said. "No one at the hospital knows what's wrong, and they're hoping that you'll be able to help." Spike said. 

I wonder what it is this time? Twilight Sparkle thought to herself. Twilight didn't know much about medicine, but she did know a little bit about everything. She wondered what could be wrong. She assumed that it was something potentially magical. Twilight consulted her emergency medical book checklist, mumbling to herself, and revising the list as she galloped around the library, gathering the books that the checklist dictated. Twilight had composed the checklist after the incident with the "baked bads", and it was one of her checklists that she hoped that she'd never have to consult. 

Twilight was finished gathering her books now, and she headed out towards the hospital. It wasn't that far, and it only took a few minutes to get there. As soon as Twilight entered the hospital, she was whisked upstairs to a patient room by a nurse. Twilight noticed Applejack, and the Cutie Mark Crusaders standing off to the side, the three of them looking lost. In the center of the room, there was a bed. On that bed, lay a small brown filly with a pinkish mane. Twilight could tell that the filly was in bad shape. Her fur was completely covered in sweat, and Twilight could tell by the amount of chest movement that the filly was having  trouble breathing. 

"Will she make it?" Apple Bloom asked. 

"Don't worry a hair on that little head. Babs 'll be just fine." Applejack said. "You four will be out and playing around before you know it." 

Twilight knew Applejack well enough to know that the pony was just putting on a brave face. Applejack was no dummy, she would know that blue hooves wasn't a sign of a pony that was going to be out and about anytime soon. Twilight gulped. This was really way beyond anything that she'd ever had any experience with in the past. She'd been expecting something clearly magical. 

Not that this wasn't magic. There were spells that could be used to draw another pony's life force to power one's own. Those spells were dark magic. But that kind of magic was kept under lock and key by Celestia herself. Not even Celestia's favorite student would be granted access to that kind of magic. Twilight did a few simple detection spells. Any spell that was sucking a pony's life energy for power would need a connection to the pony that was consuming the life energy. She knew spells that could detect this connection. 

Twilight ran through a wide variety of spells, including some spells that were specially designed to detect the deceptions of dark magic. This wasn't working. There was nothing. There wasn't any kind of magic touching the small filly on the bed. If there was something wrong with her, it was beyond anything that the purple Unicorn had ever experienced before. 

"Get Fluttershy! Have her find Zecora!" Twilight shouted at the Crusaders. "Maybe she knows whats wrong. This isn't magic. Maybe she ate something that she shouldn't of." 

"Ate something? Like what?" Scootaloo asked.

"I don't know, she's from the city right? Maybe she ate a plant that's poisonous without knowing it." Twilight Sparkle replied. 

Twilight watched the Crusaders gallop out of the room as fast as their little legs could carry them. She hadn't meant to panic them, but it was cute that they were so concerned about their little friend. Twilight took another look at the pony on the bed. Her breathing was getting more labored and shallow, and the blue was starting to spread up her legs. One of the doctors entered the room. 

"She's drowning." He told Twilight Sparkle. "We don't know where the fluid is coming from. We hoped this was magic."

"It's not." the Unicorn said slowly. 

She felt helpless, like she had the time that she didn't have a friendship report for Celestia. Only now, this was worse. If she failed, she wasn't going back to magic Kindergarten. No, a little filly's life would end as a consequence of Twilight's failure.Twilight Sparkle didn't want to think about, but there was a real danger that the pony on the bed wasn't going to survive. Zecora knew plants and flowers better then Twilight Sparkle. That was the basis of Zecora's Zebra magic. Unlike the arcane forces harnessed by Unicorn magic, Zebra magic was tied to the natural world and its plants and animals. Now that she thought about it,  doctor's should have bothered with Twilight Sparkle. They should have known to get the Zebra in the first place.  No, Twilight should have had Spike go to Fluttershy's cottage to send her to Zecora's immediately. Twilight's success in helping with the incident caused by the baked bads had made her cocky. 

Twilight hoped that the Zebra would get there soon. It was quickly becoming clear that the little filly didn't have much time left. Her breath was becoming more and more shallow, and even her center was starting to turn blue from the lack of oxygen. Applejack had moved in to hold the little pony's hoof. That's all they could do, provide comfort to the filly. 

Twilight wondered what had happened to the Crusaders. While they could be annoying, and had a tendency to get badly underfoot at the worst possible of times, they were good fillies. They had bright futures ahead of them once they found their Cutie Marks. Maybe she should go look for them. Had they been so panicked, that they'd decided to go into the Everfree themselves? That was definitely something that the crusaders would do. What if they got trapped or injured themselves? The death of one filly would be bad. The death of four would be a disaster that Ponyville might never recover from. 

"That sister of mine and her friends probably went after Zecora themselves I reckon." Applejack said. "Why don't you go and rescue them. I'll stay with Babs." 

Twilight Sparkle left the room. She was glad that she didn't have to stay. Whatever magic or poison or whatever was killing the little filly on the bed, scared Twilight.