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// Chapter 1 - The End 
// Story: A Deal with the Pale Pony 
// by DragonsHeart 
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The life of the dead is placed in the memory of the living.
Marcus Tullius Cicero



The sun rises and send its rays down on a sleeping world. One ray reaches through the bedroom window of a certain rainbow-maned pegasus straight across her eyes. She does the most sensible thing - she pulls the covers over her head. It’s a Sunday morning and there is no way in Tartarus, that she’ll be the first one out of bed. She pities the ponies who have to work on a Sunday. Herself? She has no worries, no responsibilities today and nothing to do but laze around and practice her stunts. She snuggles deep within her sheets and sighs happily. It is a good morning. Then, her alarm clock betrays her. The loud noise cruelly drags her out of her sleep again, she reaches a lazy hoof over in an attempt to silence the traitor. It jumps away! She looks at the alarm clock, slightly puzzled. Is she dreaming? She makes a spirited swipe at the alarm, which jumps off the bench and lands on the floor. Unfortunately for her she loses her balance and falls off the bed and onto her face. The sudden jolt of pain causes her to remember why her alarm clock is dancing around just out of reach. She had asked Twilight to enchant her alarm clock to make it harder to stay in bed and give her a bit of a morning workout… it seemed to be a good idea at the time. She tenses up her back legs, ready to pounce on the alarm clock, which is doing a little jig by the slightly open door. The pony pounces… the alarm clock runs through… she hits the doorframe. Luckily her house is made of clouds so it doesn’t hurt too much. She glares at the evil alarm clock ringing in the hallway. She can’t ignore it, it’ll just comeback and annoy her. Even if she closes the door it would just stand outside the door and continue ringing. She gives up on the dream of sleeping in, dashes out the door after the alarm, which runs away at full speed.

Half an hour later she catches the alarm clock in the bathroom. She hits the off button harder than she should and says. “Man, I got to get Twilight to turn down the settings on this,” before placing the clock on the bathroom counter and then admiring herself in the mirror. “Looking good, Rainbow Dash,” she says to herself. She then looks at herself again and sees that she is covered in sweat from her morning ‘exercise’. ‘Ugh, I need a wash.’ She walks over to the rain cloud that is her shower. She gives it a hit and the water pours down over her. While she cleans herself the alarm clock jumps off the bench and heads back to Rainbow Dash’s room.

After finishing her shower and drying herself off, she heads down the stairs with her towel hanging round her neck.

“Hi Tank,” she says to her pet tortoise lying on her couch. The tortoise’s response is to turn to her and blink. “Sorry if I woke you,” she says while giving a quick nuzzle to her pet.

She heads to kitchen to grab an apple to eat. She glances at the open box of chocolates on the kitchen bench, the last present she got from her coltfriend before they broke up some time ago. She finds what seems to be the last chocolate and pops it into her mouth even though they have long stopped being sweet.

‘Sweets from your exes never taste good for long,” she thinks, wondering if she should spit it out.

Deciding instead to quickly swallow the bitter chocolate, she fills Tank’s food bowl and with an apple in her mouth she leaves her house and flies off into the brisk morning.





Rainbow Dash glides lazily through the crisp morning air, doing a few loops and rolls as she makes her way into town. She soon sees a large gathering of ponies at the edge of town and flies down to check it out.

“Rainbow Dash, dear, you’re up early,” calls a sophisticated voice.

“Oh, hey Rarity,” replies Rainbow Dash to her friend.

“Though, it would be wonderful to think that you are fixing your fixing your deplorable sleeping habits, I have a feeling that that this isn’t the case,” jokes Rarity.

Rainbow Dash chuckles, “Nah, I just forgot to turn off my alarm. So what’s going on here anyway?”

“Don’t tell me you’ve forgotten!” says Rarity slightly annoyed.

“Let’s just say I have for now,” counters Rainbow Dash.

Rarity sighs, “It’s the Trash and Grab, remember.”

“Oh yeah,” says Rainbow Dash, “It the thing where ponies bring stuff they don’t want anymore and sell it, right?”

“Yes, Rainbow Dash, quite correct,” answers Rarity.

“I thought you were going to open a stall?” asks Rainbow Dash remembering something else.

“Oh I did,” answers Rarity again, “But I’ve already sold out, so now I’m just browsing.”

“Wow, really?” asks Rainbow Dash surprised.

“Yes, now you should take a look around yourself,” suggests Rarity walking off, “You never know what you will find at these places.”

“Yeah, whatever,” Rainbow Dash says waving her friend off before deciding to have a poke around.





Rainbow Dash walks around the Trash and Grab eating an Apple Fritter she got from Applejack’s stall. She’s seen Pinkie Pie running around carrying a pile of stuff that she bought, but most likely didn’t need. And she’s seen Fluttershy with a few odds and ends that she has purchased. The only one of her friends that she has not seen is Twilight.

“Hi Rainbow!” calls a nearby voice.

‘Scratch that,” thinks Rainbow Dash as she finishes her Fritter and heads over to the young alicorn.

“How is it going?” asks Twilight smiling happily.

“Fine. I see you got a good spot,” Rainbow says, pointing to the large tree behind her which is providing a pool of shade.

“Well I got here early, so I got a good spot,” Twilight says with slight chuckle.

“Yeah, it is rather hot in the sun,” replies Rainbow Dash smiling.

“Although as soon as it hits noon I will lose all my shade,” sighs Twilight.

“Wait, what time is it?” asks Rainbow Dash noticing the sun.

“Nearly 12 I think,” answers Twilight.

“Buck, where’d the time go, I need to get some practice in,” Rainbow quickly turns to go but she feels her tail hit something and hears something break. Turning back she sees that she has knocked over one of the hourglasses on Twilight store. “Oh Buck, I’m sorry Twilight.”

Twilight just sighs, “Don’t worry, Rainbow, it was a stupid place to put it anyway.” Rainbow Dash is about to bend over to clean up the glass when Twilight stops her. “Don’t worry I’ll do it, just as soon as I find the dustpan and brush,” she say looking around underneath her stall.

“Ok, sure,” agrees Rainbow Dash. “Why do you have so many hourglass anyway?” 

Twilight frowns, “Well I recently ordered two new hourglasses, but when they arrived there was twenty! And they refused to take them back, so I had to find some way to get rid of them.”

“Bummer,” replies Rainbow Dash, “Well if you don’t need me I better get going,” and quickly takes off.

Twilight sighs again before continuing her search for the dustpan and brush.

“You should clean up that glass before somepony gets hurt,” comes unfamiliar cheerful voice.

“I’m getting to it!” Twilight growls, annoyed.

“Is that how treat all your customers?” comes the still cheerful voice.

Twilight realizing how rude she sounds, shoots her head back up, “I’m sorry, it just been one of those days.” Twilight now sees the pony in front of her stall. It is a good deal taller than her, clad in a hooded black robe fastened with a skull broach. The little bits of body she can see are bone white. It is carrying a long, oddly curved wooden staff with a metal skull perched on top.

“These are some fine hourglasses,” the hooded pony says cheerfully.

“Thank you?” Twilight says with an awkward smile, she can’t help the feeling that in the deep shadow of the hood there is a broad smiling face for some reason. 

“These are some good books too,” the figure adds, looking at the other items Twilight is selling.

Twilight thinks she hears a slight echo to the voice. She shakes away the weird feeling this pony gives her and gives a polite smile, “Do mind if I continue to look for the dust pan and brush so I can clean up the glass?”

“Oh please, do go ahead don’t mind me, I’m just killing time,” the figure says flicking through one of the books.





Rainbow Dash flies loops overhead above the Trash and Grab. The wind streams in her mane as she swoops through it, dodging other pegasus as they fly by. After several swift laps she glides to a stops over the tree.

“That was a good warm up,” she says to herself, doing some stretches, “Now for some tricks.”

Below her Twilight has cleaned up the hourglass and left the remains on the bench while she goes to get a bin. It seems the strange figure has left.

Rainbow Dash zooms forward ready to start… just as sun reaches its highest peak. It beats straight down on Twilight’s store and the strong rays of the sun catch on the broken glass and are dazzlingly reflected … right into Rainbow Dash’s eyes. Blinded she swerves and crashes hard into the side of large pegasus. Rainbow Dash falls with the blackness of unconsciousness creeping over her vision.

She falls down into the tree. If she was conscious she would have felt the pain as a sharp broken branch of the tree stabs deep into her side before it breaks off and she continues her fall to the ground. If she was still conscious she would have heard the screams of the nearby ponies and her friends as her life blood escapes from her wound. She might have even heard the calls for help and the rushing hooves of her friends and their cries to her. But most likely not for her soul left her body the moment she closed her eyes…