//------------------------------// // Doctor Hooves 7 // Story: Unwell // by HazamaBrony //------------------------------// I was a little worried when Twilight dragged herself into my office. She looked disheveled and tired, and worst of all, her eyes just seemed dull, instead bright and lively. “Hello, Twilight. Are you feeling all right?” I asked, concerned. She gave me a disbelieving look, and asked, “Can’t you tell how I’m feeling? I mean, I only had three ponies ask me if I was okay on my way here, so I must actually look better than I’m feeling.” “So, not well. Are you physically ill, or is this related to what we talked about last week? About telling your friends about your A.C.M.S.?” I asked. “Yes…” Twilight said, looking miserable. “Did one of them react badly?” Twilight nodded. “Did more than one of them react badly?” Twilight nodded again. “I see. Well, then, how about you tell me about it? First of all, who reacted badly?” I asked. “Applejack. And Rarity. Sort of.” “Sort of?” I echoed, puzzled. “It’s complicated,” Twilight said, looking away from me. “Well then, why don’t we start there? What exactly did Rarity say and do?” “Well,” Twilight said, taking a deep breath. “Everything was going well up until I began to describe my symptoms to her. Then she stopped me, and told me that if she knew more, she might never be able to look at me the same way again.” “I see. And forgive the cliche, but how did that make you feel?” I asked. “Well, I wasn’t sure how to feel then, and after that everything else kind of pushed it out of my mind. But looking back now…” Twilight fell silent. After giving her a minute to think, I prompted her to continue with a gentle “Go on.” “Right now, thinking back on it, I feel sort of, thankful, I guess. Don’t get me wrong, I still feel a little angry that she wasn’t willing to listen to me all the way through, but I didn’t even ask her how much she wanted to know. I guess I’m grateful that she stopped me before I said something that could permanently damage our friendship. But on the other hoof, I still feel sad that she can’t accept all of me. I just… gah! I feel so mixed up about this!” Twilight exclaimed, rubbing the back of her head with a hoof. “I think that it is natural to feel mixed up about something like this. You took a big leap of faith, and tried something that you never even would have thought about before. And in the end, it didn’t pan out like you had hoped, but it wasn’t a complete disaster either, at least as far as I can tell. So, I can completely understand feeling a bit confused about this,” I said, smiling sympathetically. “I see,” Twilight said. “Yeah, that make sense. Thank you, Doctor. You always help me sort this stuff out. You know, sometimes I wish emotions were more logical, that way I could sort them out myself.” “Twilight, I think the only pony whose emotions are completely logical would be some sort of golem. Emotions are not logical things, and trying to apply cold hard logic to them all the time would just be very frustrating,” I said. “I know. There are some things that logic simply cannot adequately explain, like emotions or Pinkie Pie. That was a lesson learned the hard way,” Twilight said, with a weak laugh. I smiled again. It was good to hear her laugh, especially after how morose she had been when she entered the room. Unfortunately, I had a feeling that her cheer wasn’t going to last much longer. “So, Twilight, what do you plan to do about the situation with Rarity?” I asked. Just as I feared, Twilight immediately looked depressed again. “I… I honestly don’t know. I guess all I can do is see if she acts any different around me. I mean, if she acts like nothing happened, I could live with that. But if she does act differently, I guess that we will have to talk about it. Especially if she acts like Applejack did…” Ah. The elephant in the room. “Twilight, why don’t you tell me how Applejack reacted?” Twilight’s face fell even further, and she looked downright miserable. “She’s afraid of me now. And what’s worse, I think she might be right to,” she said, hanging her head. “Listen to me, Twilight. Nopony in their right mind should be afraid of their friend. You know that,” I said sternly. Sometimes I had to be a little firm with Twilight, especially when she got to some dark places. If I let her, she would twist the facts and words to paint herself in the worst possible light. “I know that, but I’m not sure if Applejack even wants to be my friend anymore. And it’s not like I haven’t given her enough reasons to be scared of me.” I sighed. This would be a little bit harder than I had hoped. “Twilight, what do you mean you gave her reasons to be scared of you?” I asked, wanting more information. “Well, Applejack and Rainbow got into a fight, and I thought that they were going a bit too far with it, so I pulled them apart. I think… I think how easily I did that scared her.” “Is that all?” I asked. “Isn’t that enough? Applejack is one of the strongest earth ponies around, and I thoughtlessly tossed her around like she wasn’t even there. Wouldn’t you be scared of me too in that situation?” Twilight shot back. “Twilight, I think you might be exaggerating a bit. I doubt you ‘tossed her around,’ I would bet anything that you just gently pulled them apart,” I said, smiling. Twilight looked away from me. “Twilight?” I said, the smile slipping from my face. “I also held their mouths shut. I didn’t want them to argue anymore, so…” Twilight said. I grimaced internally. “All right, I can see how that might make Applejack a little wary around you. But—“ “You see! Even you agree! She’s right to fear me! She can’t trust me, I can’t even trust myself! I—“ Twilight said hysterically, but I cut her off. “Twilight, you made a mistake, that much is true. But from what I understand, you just wanted your friends to stop fighting. Anypony would do that. And I trust that you haven’t had any symptoms since we last talked?” I asked. “Well, no, I haven’t had any symptoms…” “Then you most certainly can trust yourself. You need to give yourself more credit, Twilight. Like I’ve said before, you are not some crazy mare constantly on the edge of a breakdown, you are a well-adjusted mare who happens to have a health problem. You need to keep an eye on it, like all chronic health problems, but it does not make you any less than any other pony. You laugh, and love, and yes, even make mistakes, just like any other pony. Do you understand?” “Yes, Doctor Hooves,” Twilight said, pensively. After a minute or two of silence, I had to ask. “So, what are you going to do about Applejack?” “Well,” Twilight said, scratching her chin, “she did send me a message that she needed some time to think about our relationship, so I guess I should just wait for her to get in contact with me. Right?” “I think that sounds like a good plan. Give her some space to realize how good of a friend you are, and that all of the adventures you have been through together show that she has nothing to fear.” “I suppose that would be the best case scenario. Better than showing up early and forcing her to say if she still wanted to be my friend or not,” Twilight said, still looking thoughtful. I nodded. “Much better.” Twilight nodded, and fell silent. I felt that it was best to leave her to her thoughts for the time being. “Okay, there was one other thing I wanted to talk to you about. It’s about Rainbow Dash,” Twilight said suddenly, as if she had just gathered up the courage to talk about it. “Okay, what in particular did you want to talk about? Did you two have a fight?” I asked. “Yes. This actually happened right before we talked to Applejack. We were talking with Fluttershy, and it turns out that Rainbow had gone to her for relationship advice. After all, she and Big Mac did get together a few weeks before us,” Twilight said. “I’m afraid I don’t understand. Are you angry at Rainbow for asking Fluttershy for advice?” “No, it’s just… oh, I feel terrible saying this, but you know how Rainbow isn’t exactly the smartest pony around? Don’t get me wrong, she’s a wonderful marefriend, and she is brilliant when she sets her mind to something, but sometimes she doesn’t think things all the way through, you know.” “So, what did she end up doing that had you upset at her?” “She asked Fluttershy what she should do if I had a chronic illness. She tried to make it sound like a hypothetical question, but you know how obvious Rainbow can be.” “Ah, I see,” I said. “Did she tell Fluttershy any of the specifics?” “No, it doesn’t seem like she did. Fluttershy just said that she knew I had a ‘chronic condition.’” “I see,” I repeated. “So, what did you do about that?” “I didn’t really speak to her in much detail after that. I wasn’t in the mood to talk to her much on the way to Applejack’s, and I had asked her to give me the next day just to myself, but then…” Twilight trailed off. “Then she got into a fight with Applejack. Was the fight itself another reason why you are mad at Rainbow?” I guessed. “Yeah. The whole reason they got into the fight was because Applejack said—Applejack stuck her hoof in her mouth, and Rainbow got really angry at that.” “Well, I can imagine that, but for you to feel as if you needed to pull them apart… whatever Applejack must have said must have been pretty offensive to get Rainbow that angry. What in Equestria did Applejack say?” Twilight looked away from me. “I’d rather not say. It was just an accident, and she didn’t mean anything by it. Rainbow really overreacted.” “And I take it this overreaction is another reason why you are mad at Rainbow?” “Yes. She just suddenly got so overprotective of me. She didn’t act that way with Rarity, so why did she suddenly need to be my knight in shining armor?” Twilight asked, looking directly at me. I smiled sadly. “I believe that she did that because she wanted to make up for letting something slip to Fluttershy. Granted, getting in a fight with another pony is a poor way to try to repair a relationship problem, but mistakes are a part of any relationship.” “So… what? She was thinking that she made a mistake with Fluttershy, so she was going to fix it by acting as if I couldn’t fight my own battles? That doesn’t make any sense to me.” “I doubt that she consciously did it. It was probably more subconscious than anything else.” “I see,” Twilight mused, looking at the floor and tapping her chin as if deep in thought. After a minute, I broke the silence. “So, do you have any idea what to do with Rainbow?” “Well, I told her I wanted to speak to you before I talked to her again, so I think that she might be waiting just outside to talk to me. As for what I’m going to say to her… well…” “Take your time. I don’t mean to rush you.” I said. Twilight nodded, “Well…” she said slowly, “I want to forgive her, but I’ll need to put some stipulations on that. First, to be more careful about who she talks to and what she says. And second, that she needs to let me decided what I want to do when things like what Applejack said come up. She needs to let me fight my own battles, so to speak.” “I think that sounds good,” I said, nodding. “But Twilight, be sure to listen to what she has to say too. Don’t just lay down the law without regard to Rainbow’s feelings, okay? Forgiveness is a two way street, and if Rainbow really is sorry, she will have more to say than just listening to your rules and going along with them. What I’m trying to say here is that while I think Rainbow will go along with what you ask, you should give her a chance to explain why she did what she did.” “Got it,” Twilight said, and then fell silent. I glanced at the clock. “And it appears that our time is almost up. Was there anything else that you wanted to talk about before we finished for the day?” “Not really. Wait, actually…” Twilight said, looking at the clock as if it were an enemy. “There was one other thing, but I don’t think we have the time for it.” “Whatever it is that is on your mind, we can talk about it. I don’t mind going over the time limit,” I said, smiling at her. “But, what about your other patients? I don’t want to take time away from them!” “Twilight, I don’t have another patient for another half hour. We have time.” I neglected to mention that I used that time to finish up any paperwork I had, but I could always catch up on that later. “Okay. The thing I wanted to ask, Doctor is… well… am I selfish?” Twilight asked, looking a little sad. “Selfish?” I echoed. “In what way?” “Well, when I look at it objectively, I can consider myself pretty lucky, especially for a pony with A.C.M.S. It’s just, well, my symptoms are manageable, I haven’t had a hallucination or delusion for a pretty long time now, and I have a family and friends that care about me. Some ponies with A.C.M.S. have symptoms that don’t react to medication, are unable to function on their own, and some of them are even homeless, without anypony to help them. And here I am, fretting over the remote possibility that I might lose a single friend, and mad at my marefriend for trying to find out how to help me. Compared to what other ponies with A.C.M.S. go through, I feel like I’m taking everything for granted,” Twilight said, looking a little tearful. I smiled. “Twilight, could you tell me, in simple terms, what the project you are working on for the Canterlot Charity Society is?” Twilight looked taken back. “Well, what does that have to do with anything?” “Just humor me, please.” “Okay…” Twilight said, looking unsure. “What I’m doing is basically trying to find a way to store and retrieve magical energy in crystals. Better than the methods we have now, I mean. I’m looking for a way to keep the magic pure and uncontaminated. That way we could store magical energy from willing ponies to give to ponies that have problems creating their own magical energy. Sort of a blood transfusion, but with magic. We can do that now, but so much energy is corrupted that it would take draining about eleven or twelve average ponies of their magic completely to get a big enough dosage to actually help somepony. ” “And why are you doing this? For the grant money?” I asked, knowing the answer. “Well, no, not really. I mean, sort of, but as a means to an end. If I got the grant money, I could hire some assistants and actually field test my new crystals and methods. But as for why I do it, well… you know that little pegasus Scootaloo? She can’t fly yet, and I have a sneaking suspicion that it is because she doesn’t have enough magic to work with. If my research is successful, then I could help her and all the other ponies that have similar problems,” Twilight said. My smile grew wider. “So, does that answer your question?” Twilight just looked confused. “What?” “After saying all that, do you still think you are selfish? Because from where I’m sitting, I heard a mare that is doing her best to improve the quality of life for countless ponies, and to improve our medical magic and science.” “Oh…” Twilight said, her mouth hanging open a bit. “Was there anything else you wanted to talk about, Twilight?” I asked. “No… No, I think we covered everything,” Twilight said, sounding a lot happier. “See you next week, Doctor?” “Actually, no. I have a family obligation next week, so I won’t be here. I’ll be here the rest of the week, so if you need anything, come in then,” I said. “I assume you have enough medication for the week.” Twilight nodded. “I’m just about to open the new bottles from the prescription you gave me.” “Very well, see you week after next, Twilight?” “Sure thing, Doctor,” Twilight said, then trotted out the door. I, meanwhile, turned to my paperwork, ready to work at extra speed to make up for lost time.