I would have liked to say that I had forgotten my way around a hospital but considering it had only been almost four months since I was last in one I hadn’t forgotten a thing. The only differences between then and now are that there are fewer limitations on what I could do or teach as well as the technology being much higher than before. Of course actually getting the doctors to allow me to help out was the biggest issue to get around.
“And I told you that we don’t have time to hold the hoof of every crackpot that comes in saying that they are a doctor. I mean if you at least had proof of your skill then maybe we could make an exception but right now we don’t have the time to watch over you.” I refrain from rolling my eyes as I glance back at Aurora to see how she’s holding doing before looking back at the doctor. I was at least glad that I finally got him to get around the fact that I wasn’t a pony, granted I probably might have had a slightly easier time if I tried to use my standing as a princess of a kingdom.
“Well that would be rather difficult to do as it would either be from somewhere you never would have heard of or centuries out of date even if I did have them. Everything I know is from actual experience in doing it as well as research into the field. But if you really want to see proof about what I can do then how about this?” I raise my wooden leg for the stallion to get a closer look at. “Not only did I survive losing my leg through my own abilities but I was able to create this one by adapting a variety of spells into something new. While I can tell your medical sciences have improved over the past many years, I have yet to see or even hear of anything on par with this.”
I look around at all the doctors and nurses rushing around as the field medics constantly bring in a stream of wounded. The doctor was looking over my leg with interest and was about to say something when I interrupted. “Look, you obviously need all the help that you can get and I’ve probably got more power than all of the doctors here combined. Just put me on the patients that are the most critically injured that are at the worst risk or are what you would label as hopeless. At the very least I can keep them alive long enough so that one of your doctors can get around to help them.”
He looks a bit uncertain as he looked between me, my leg, and the incoming wounded. Finally he sighs and waves over one of the nurses who had just finished with assisting a patient. “Nurse, make sure that she is directed to the worst patients and assist her in any way she needs it. Hopefully she can do what she says and keep the worst of the wounded alive until a real doctor can show up.” At her annoyed glare and nod to the doctor she waves me along towards the first patient.
For the coming hours I constantly ran around the hospital taking care of as many of the wounded as I could. Some were too far gone for me to do much about, but I was able to help most of them that I could reach in time. The nurse, while unsure about me at first, turned out to be a great help as I saved pony after pony as she went out of her way to help me and gave Aurora enough information to help as well. Things were going as smoothly as expected, considering a war was going on right outside, until about four hours in when a commotion start up in the entryway.
It started with screaming from the entryway, and I was just finishing up with my current patient when gunshots rang out from that direction. I waved to Aurora to stay down as I made my way to the disturbance to help. Peering around the final corner I spot three griffons in the entryway firing at anything that moves and there were already a few pony bodies already out there. “You’re right, this is just like shooting fish in a-“
I didn’t let them get any further than that as I slam them into the wall with my magic, breaking all their limbs in the process. Entering the room I advance on them as I crush their firearms into balls of scrap metal in my telekinesis before turning towards one of the cowering nurses. “Take these three to wherever you keep your wounded prisoners. As long as you keep them from moving too much they shouldn’t get any worse, though if they try anything I’ll remove their wings next. I could use the chance to practice with prosthetic wings.” The gryphons whimper as I say this, but they aren’t in a position to do much else.
There were no further interruptions as I made a quick call to Cassidy and she immediately sent some guards to watch over the place. The pony guards were found outside in critical condition along with a good number of gryphons so this was obviously a direct attack on the area and not a coincidence. If it wasn’t for the fact that this was a high traffic area I would have put up a shield around the entire building but I couldn’t do both that and help the injured.
Night had long since fallen by the time that injured stopped flooding in at an insane pace. It was only when I turned to the nurse for directions to my next patient just to come face to face with Luna that I realize just how long I had been working. Looking around I found that the worst injuries had already been treated and it looked as if the worst around currently were of only a moderate level. I notice that Aurora was barely keeping her eyes open, having kept up with me the entire time even getting me some amounts of food while I worked, so I turn back to the Night Princess. “So how are things going out there?”
Luna sighs as she waves her head for us to follow her, though Aurora is so tired that she doesn’t notice when I carry her in my magic as she is nodding off. “I never would have believed it possible until you arrived, but we managed to completely rout the enemy forces. In fact we have learned that the minotaur and gryphon leaders were present during the battle and were killed, along with many of their top leaders.” She sighs as she leads us back towards the building being used as their headquarters.
“They had thrown almost everything they had at us in an effort to end the war today and now that it’s failed we can finally push them out of Equestria. After that we will need to decide on if we shall push out into their lands or if other actions will be taken.” She glances back at us as we reach Cadence’s room and enter to find the other princess laid out on a couch. It looked as if she had been crying for a while and I watch as Luna joins her on the bed and puts a wing over her. “Now let’s talk about that spell you had Cadence use as the battle was starting. What did it do to her? She hasn’t said anything since I found her on the roof.”
I wince at how threatening her voice sounded as she says this and what’s worse is that I have little idea about what caused this. “I really have no idea what it did to her, and it shouldn’t have done anything as the spell doesn’t work like that. I’m sure you recognized some of the ghostly ponies that appeared during the battle?” Luna nods though she doesn’t look any less angry. “Well the first one to appear was her husband and he said something to her that I didn’t hear. Whatever he said started all this her, though I thought she recovered by the time I left her to help in the hospital.”
Luna’s eyes widen as I say this and she looks at Cadence with pity in her eyes. “I see.” I can see her tighten her wing over the pink princess and moves in closer to her. Her eyes lose all the anger she had and they are now filled with a sadness that I hadn’t seen in a while. “Our loved ones really do have the power to hurt as in ways that we’d never expect. That spell is really more terrible than I thought and I believe it should never be cast again.”
I think over her words and think about what would happen if I saw my own husband again and what he might say if I did see him. I look at Cadence and how she is reacting to this, but I can’t tell if she is truly sad or if she is overwhelmed by another emotion. “I think I might just agree with that, but we both know that there are times where the risk is worth it. The spell is something that won’t even work in most cases anyways and is really only possible in dire circumstances.”
Luna looks over at the other princess before sighing. “True, but I hope that it never is needed again since that would mean that our ponies are once again in danger.” I look out the window and think the same thing with my own subjects who had gone through too much the past many decades.
<><><><><><><>
The following months were a whirlwind of problems as Equestria tried to recover from the war, and my own subjects tried to get on with their lives once again. Without their leaders the minotaur and gryphon kingdoms began to fight amongst themselves as civil war broke out to determine who would lead them after their defeat outside of Manehatten. I hadn’t heard much about the other kingdoms involved in the war, but the few allies of Equestria were also recovering now that they could focus on their own problems again.
Of course much of that was in the future as I returned to Ponyville after all the wounded were helped and, my own problems were just beginning as the train began to pull into the Ponyville station. I didn’t notice anything at first but when I stepped off the train I was surprised to find that the town appeared to be deserted. I was starting to worry that something had happened here when I heard a sound from nearby. “Psst, you’d better hide if you don’t want her to catch you. The town has been on a Code Lavender alert for the past few days now and it doesn’t look to be ending any time soon.”
I look over and notice the pony running the ticket booth peeking out from under the grating that covers the window when it is not in use. I look back to Cadence with a raised eyebrow, who was only now leaving the train, to have her return my look with a sigh of exasperation. “This is why you have to be careful about letting Twilight know of the existence of a library she hasn’t been through. While she has gotten better about overreacting over every little thing, she still tends to go a bit overboard with things like this. At least it’s only a Code Lavender as she can still be calmed down by somepony other than Celestia.”
I look around at the empty town before turning towards her once again. “What exactly is a Code Lavender though? I don’t remember hearing anything about it before I left so it means little to me right now.” Cadence sighs again as she starts walking towards Twilight’s palace.
“We started using it shortly after you left to describe situations involving her going on a downward spiral of various kinds. Without her friends to keep her stable she tended to overreact to many things and you could tell when it starts by just watching her. The biggest sign of something starting is when her mane starts to randomly pop out all over the place.” I think back and remember that being something that happened before she decided to cast a Want-It-Need-It spell on her doll.
“I just hope that we’re in time to stop it from becoming a Code Purple or Violet.” We arrive at Twilight’s palace to find it empty of everyone, even the guards. I wonder why the guards would vanish as it should be their job to either prevent something from happening or at least cleaning up after it. Cadence brings a wing up to her face as we find no sign of Twilight at her home. “Of course we have to find her first before we can do anything.”
I think about where Twilight would probably be and only two places come to mind if she isn’t around the town. “Since she isn’t here, and we haven’t heard word of her being in town then I can only think of two other places she could be. Either she found the library which is poorly hidden in the old Everfree Castle Library or she’s searching my home for it. Actually she may have been distracted at my home by my own personal library especially as some of the books are magically encrypted.”
We make our way towards Ogitsu Manor and we see signs of Twilight’s passing in the form of crumpled up scrolls on the path to my home. Looking at one of them I roll my eyes as they seem to be various kinds of checklists on getting me to reveal where the books are. Cadence glances at one of them and shakes her head at what she reads. “Oh dear, she’s fallen back onto her old habit of making checklists of everything. I thought Spike had finally managed to break her of that habit before he left.”
Entering my home we soon find that Twilight is there from her shouting. “I’ve already read this one as well! And there is still nothing about where she hid the other library in any of these. Why couldn’t she have used the same spell to protect all of these things so that I didn’t have to take an hour removing the illusion on each one separately?” I look at the pink princess as she looks back at me and we just shake our heads at each other.
Following the sounds of frustration we find Twilight with her nose buried in another book in my study. Around her are piles of books that had been removed from their shelves and from the number of books still on the shelves I assumed that she was only half-way through them. Twilight was muttering to herself as she tried to break through the enchantment on the current book and I notice the small orange CMC emblem on the front of it. Looking at Cadence I just roll my eyes over towards Twilight before sneaking up on her, keeping the book between us and say one word. “Scootaloo.”
Twilight’s head jerked up at my voice but her attention was soon grabbed by the book once again as the enchantment on it was removed. “Oh, thanks Flarenza.” I look back at Cadence as she struggles to hold in a laugh at Twilight’s single-minded focus. Turning back to Twilight I settle down on the floor and start counting the time it takes for Twilight to realize what just happened. I was surprised when it took about fifteen minutes, and half the book, for Twilight to finally react. “Wait a minute, YOU!”
I was ready for her when she tried to pounce at me over the book as she crashed into the shield I had up in front of me. She recovered quickly and she looked at me with eyes filled with a bit of madness. “Where did you hide the books?! Where are they!?” I roll my eyes at Twilight as Cadence comes up behind her.
“Did you maybe try looking in the library I have access to Twilight? It’s not like there are many places that I could store them safely until something gets built.” Twilight’s mouth just opens her mouth but no sound comes out as her eyes shrink to pinpricks when Cadence puts a wing over her back. She looks up to see Cadence and looks between her and me until she finally collapses to the ground.
“I started doing it again didn’t I? But why didn’t you just tell me that you were storing it all in the castle library? And when did you show up Cadence?” Cadence just nuzzles Twilight as the purple mare starts to calm down from her little fit.
“Well I was on my way back to Canterlot to let Celestia know what is going on now that Manehatten is no longer under siege. Luna is organizing everything to take the rest of Equestria back. At the same time I decided to escort the pregnant princess back and make sure that she didn’t do anything too strenuous.” Cadence looks over at me to answer the other questions.
“Well I didn’t expect you to go overboard like this since you should be old enough to know better by now.” Twilight blushes as I say that and continue. “But it did work well enough for getting you to not focus on the war for a bit while I was gone. As for why I didn’t tell you where the library was, it’s partially because there is still a lot of work needing to be done to sort it out, especially with how dangerous some of the books are. I wanted to get the worst books separated out and put into a restricted section. Some of them are nearly as bad as some of the ones that I’ve had to destroy.”
I see a hopeful look on Twilight’s face and I just sigh as I realize what I just said as well as one of her hobbies she always had. “Since the secret is out, yes you can help organize the library when there is time. Of course you might have to convince the librarians to let you help out since they are VERY protective of the books. Actually I’m not sure if that would mean you’d get along with them or clash with them.”
Twilight didn’t hear the last part as she was already rushing out of the room at hearing that she could help with the library. I look at Cadence as she looks back at me and we just shake our heads as we leave the room. We were about to say something when we heard Twilight yelling from outside. “WAIT! WHAT PREGNANT PRINCESS!?”