The Greatest Show of Kindness
Chapter Nine: A Bad Memory, Part II
Crash!
Bumble and Flutter both hit a stone wall hardly and painfully, with Bumble’s carapace cracking down the middle. He screeched from anguish as the two dropped off of the wall, hitting the ground with a thud. Both of them fell unconscious in a moment.
Time passed from day to night as they both lay there in the gorge. The night was unimaginably frigid on the rocky surface of the ground.
Eventually, Flutter somehow regained her conscious. Groaning, she grabbed her pounding head with her fore hooves, rubbing at her temples.
She felt tired and weak, almost at the point of fatigue. Intense, nearly debilitating hunger cramped her heart and stomach. She gazed up at the sky, and the moon was shining brightly in the night.
Looking over to Bumble, her eyes widened. Seeing his split shell and the gushing fluids, she lifted him up into her arms and cried.
“Bumble! Bumble! Please, answer me, sweetheart!” she yelled, shaking his body softly. “Please!”
No response.
She put her ear against his chest.
No beating.
No breathing.
Her body tensed up. Fear shot through her as she trembled out of panic. She didn’t know what to do. In her chest, she could feel the weight of her own heartbeat, like a thousand rusted chains pulling down on her chest.
Thump-thump.
Lub-dub.
Thud-thud.
“No!” she screamed as loud as she could, her voice ringing throughout the barren wasteland. “Someone, please help me!”
No sound. Dead silence. A dropped pin would be audible.
The wall seemingly sounded the death knell for Bumble.
Flutter cried over Bumble’s body, putting her hooves up to her eyes. The tears tumbled down her face, leaping to their decease as they dripped to the ground.
Flutter felt like she had failed him. She couldn’t protect him from the villainous chime of death. She let it thunder in his ears against their wills.
She felt she had failed as a mother.
There was a pain in her chest, an agonizing pain. It broke her down inside, shattering her in a million tiny pieces of herself. Overbearing sadness and grief overcame her, swallowing her inevitably.
Eventually, she couldn’t handle it anymore. The pain was too great for her to take.
“No! I won’t let you take my baby boy like this!” she howled at life itself, rushing over to him.
Pressing her hooves down on his chest, she started to perform the little she knew about CPR. Push, pump, push, pump. Lift his head, give breaths. Repeat. She continued this for what seemed like an eternal night.
Seeing as this didn’t work, desperation to save her son kicked in. With the little strength and love energy she had left, she put her horn down to Bumble’s chest. Letting out a pained cry, her horn shimmered with a light-green, sending energy into his heart. The shimmer transformed into an intense glow as her small reservoir of love was completely expended.
Looking hopefully at his body, she saw that still nothing was happening. Miserably, she dropped to the ground in defeat. She had no more energy for tears, no more energy to cry. She just lay there, looking blankly at nothing. Closing her eyes, she fell asleep, silently wishing a prayer that perhaps Bumble would wake up.
Flutter woke up the sound of a soft mumble, of which she couldn’t figure out what from right away. Opening her eyes, she saw that Bumble’s form was shivering. Her eyes lit up, wondering if her eyes were deceiving her. With what little energy she had, she called out.
“Bumble?” she weakly whispered, painstakingly placing a hoof on his back. For a moment, there was no sound. “Are you awake?”
“M-M-Mama?” he mumbled, not having any energy to move.
“You are awake! Thank goodness… I was so worried about you. You, you…” she started, choking up, “You weren’t answering to any of my questions… you weren’t saying anything… I was so worried about you,” she repeated, pulling him into a hug from behind.
“Mama? Where are you? I c-can’t see anything!” he revealed.
“You can’t see? Are your eyes open, sweetie?” she asked.
“I th-think so… Everything is so dark…” he moaned.
“Here, Bumble, let me try something,” she tried, releasing her hooves. In a swift motion, she spun him onto his other side, making him squeak. “Yes, your eyes are open… do you see me?” she questioned.
“No, I don’t see anything, mama,” he confirmed, making her eyes droop.
“Bumble… you’re blind, sweetie,” she informed, tears filling her eyes. “I’m so sorry, Bumble! I couldn’t protect you, and now you’re blind! Please, forgive me sweetheart!” she begged, the tears falling from her eyes, down her face.
“Mama, it’s not your fault, I’m sure. Please, don’t be sad,” he requested, pushing his head forward into her chest, nuzzling her. She sniffled, wiping her tears.
“But, it’s my fault! I couldn’t-“ she started.
“Mama! No! Don’t blame it on yourself!” he shouted surprisingly, cutting her off. “You couldn’t have helped it either way! Please, mama, don’t blame yourself for it!”
“…Okay, sweetie. I won’t,” she agreed, holding him tighter than ever before. "Thank you."
For at least a few hours, they lay there in their embrace.
Eventually, Flutter decided to softly let Bumble down off of her, standing up and looking around. In the distance to her eastern side, she could see the obsidian-colored changeling hive. In her head, she wondered if any of her friends that were in the invasion made it back safely to their homes, or if they met their demises almost as her son did.
Knowing that the only way that she and Bumble would survive would be if they made it back to the hive, she painfully lifted him up onto her back using her magic. Making sure that he was secured over her, she used all of her physical strength to push herself to her fore hooves. Turning herself towards the hive, she began the long trudge through the cold badlands.
Slowly trotting in the direction of the hive, she noticed that there were many injured changelings laying on the side of the ground, moaning and crying from the agony they were feeling. It was a traumatizing sight for Flutter. She couldn’t stand it, but she knew that if she stopped even for a few moments, to help any of them out, she had the strong possibility of not making it back to the hive herself. She hated it.
To deter her attention from these horrible sights, she decided to look up at the sky and the stars. They were a sight that she seldom saw – in the hive, if you left, even for an hour, you had the chance to be trapped outside due to the heavily guarded entrances to the hive.
The reason for the intense security was for one simple reason: Rival hives. Often, in the past, spies from other hives had managed to come into Chrysalis’ hive and steal important data for defenses. It was mainly the hive of Chrysalis’ eldest sister, Miasma, who has had an intense rivalry with Chrysalis for most of their lives. Miasma found it was entertaining to see her sister’s huge frustration as she screamed. She kept her hive mind to Chrysalis for this sole reason.
As she eventually approached the huge changeling city, she noticed there was no external security – they probably were all part of the invasion, as well. Walking in, she had no idea about what kinds of things she would have to go through in the following couple of days.