HEART OF STONE
Chapter Ninety Three: Old Wounds Meets New Flesh
Written by TheCrimsonDM
Covered in sweat, being cradled by the most loving earth pony in all of Equestria, and with sleep hanging heavily over her eyes. Trixie fell into that world of dreams rather quickly. Though she didn’t have normal dreams, nor did she see Scath. Instead, she found herself floating out of her room, and across Equestria. She flew through the night sky, and she went north west at impossible speeds as the glowing lights of a great city approached her quickly.
Trixie’s eyes widened as she realized what city this was. She kicked and twisted in a vain attempt to change direction, but she was being pulled closer and closer. She tried screaming but it didn’t help any. The only thing she could do was watch in petrified horror as her heart beat a million miles per minute. She was returning to the city of lights, of culture and trade.
She was returning to Manehattan.
She sailed through the lit up streets, watched as far too many ponies were still awake and busy. Some ponies went into fancy restaurants, others were at taverns getting drunk and partying, she even caught a group of mares walking into a play. It may have been late at night but that didn’t stop these city ponies from enjoying themselves. She wished she could stay in the light, stay where things were happy and bright, but she had already guessed at her destination, and it was dark.
She flew through the back alleys and slowed down as she approached the sight of a small earth pony filly sitting inside of a snow covered cardboard box hidden behind a dumpster. The box was just big enough for the tiny filly to hide in. Trixie felt her hooves touch the concrete, her dream self didn’t make a sound.
The filly’s mahogany fur was dirty, and clumped together in places. The long red mane was filled with knots, twigs, and other things. This little pony’s body was trembling from the cold, the thin blanket that covered her back was not simply not enough. Finally, she was breathing out of her mouth. With the amount of mucus running from her nose, she had no other choice. Trixie recognized the pony, but she couldn’t quite place where she had met her before.
The filly pushed herself out of the small space and walked into the alleyway. Keeping the blanket across her back. She sneezed, and her little frame leapt from the force of it. The blanket fell to the ground, but the filly simply picked it back up tossed it over her back and finally wiped her snot drenched nose over it.
The filly continued walking down the alley, shaking the entire way. Trixie followed, her side went through the dumpster as she walked, reminding Trixie that she was incorporeal right now.
The two of them walked in near silence for a good ten minutes before the filly’s ears perked up, twitched, and then folded back. The filly trotted behind another dumpster and hid, Trixie wasn’t sure what was up but instinctively she hid as well. Trixie remembered this feeling well, the fear of every little sound that happened. Hiding at the slightest shift of shadows from these alleys. The fact that Trixie didn’t hear anything was either because she didn’t have real ears right now, or because the fillies hearing was better than her own.
Minutes went by before Trixie heard the sound of a something landing on the dumpster above the filly. A cat stood on top, it’s front legs stretched out and a content look on its face. It mewed at the filly who quietly tapped a rear hoof three times in rapid succession. The cat dropped down and landed before her.
The filly smiled and rubbed her, almost clean, muzzle against the cat’s side. The cat purred at the filly, and then looked up expectantly at Trixie. Trixie shifted to the side and the cat’s gaze followed her for a moment.
Can the cat see me? That’s really unnerving.
Eventually the cat pulled away from the filly and mewed at a higher pitch. The cat walked away and the filly followed. It wasn’t long until they reached a small, knocked-over barrel, the cat vanished inside of it. The filly looked down and smiled brightly. Trixie’s head followed along.
The cat was lying inside of it, licking one of the four kittens that were shivering inside. The kittens all looked up at The filly with wide eyes, and filly frowned. Trixie wasn’t sure what the filly was going to do.
The filly looked back, the alley was cold, empty and foreboding. The moon was shining its half light down upon the alley way, letting her see at least a little bit. Enough to know that there wasn’t anything warm around here.
To Trixie’s surprise the filly actually removed her blanket and laid it over the edge of the barrel. Just as the filly turned to leave The cat came out and gave her a distant stare, looked back at Trixie for a moment, and then went back inside.
Together the two of them walked on for a long time. The filly walking with purpose, yet shivering and freezing the whole way, and Trixie as her silent ghost-like guardian. When Trixie heard the groaning sound emitting from the filly’s stomach, and the filly wince at the feeling. Trixie realized the trouble the poor thing was in.
Unable to help, Trixie could only watch as they continued walking. Eventually they made their way the back of a small restaurant. The scent of spices, cheese, and tomato sauce hung lightly in the air. The filly made her way to the dumpster out back.
Oh no, she can’t be looking for food there… even I didn’t get that desperate. Then again, I was only out here for a few months, and there used to be a soup kitchen in summer.
The filly couldn’t reach the dumpster's lid on her own, so she walked around until she found a wooden crate. She pushed it, her tiny muscles straining as the crate slid slowly over to the lid of the dumpster. When she was finished she stood panting for a few minutes, Trixie wanted to help her, but in this form she was unable to do anything.
After recovering from the exertion, the filly climbed up onto the crate and pushed the dumpster lid. It lifted up about an inch before stopping. The sound of something being jostled stopped the filly in her tracks. She looked over and noticed a big metal lock on the dumpster lid. She tried opening it again, only to see the lock move slightly. With a sigh, the filly gave up and set the lid down. She got off the crate, her face held nothing but disappointment. She walked away, and Trixie followed her.
After that they went on together in silence. Although Trixie could try talking to the filly it would make no difference if she couldn’t be heard. The filly went on for an hour, they had passed by several more restaurants, though they all had locks on their dumpsters, and the filly tried a few more trash cans, all of them empty. Trixie imagined that today must have been trash day.
Finally there was a trash can that stood out to Trixie’s eyes, it stood out to the filly too as she was eyeing up a trashcan, Trixie stared at the nasty object, partially frozen from the cold. Unable to figure out what was so special about it, Trixie looked back at the filly for any clues.
A loud rumble came from the fillies stomach, and the tiny thing closed her eyes tightly with a grimace of pain. She stayed like that for a bit, until she finally relaxed and looked at the trashcan with renewed vigor. Trixie watched as the filly moved to the trashcan and stood on her hind legs to lift the lid. She looked inside and poked with a hoof for a moment.
The trashcan fell over, spilling its contents. When the filly slipped, Trixie instinctively reached out with her magic but to no avail as the filly landed in the disgusting mess. Trixie cringed away as she filly just lay there for a moment staring up at the night sky.
A minute went by before the filly finally managed to push herself up, she looked into the garbage spilled out around her. At first she attempted in vain to clean herself, but after giving up with a quiet sigh she began shifting through the garbage. To Trixie’s surprise there didn’t seem to be any food that hadn’t gone completely rotten, she would have figured there would at least be a loaf of bread or something.
A mare came into the alleyway from the street corner and snorted at the filly. “Get out of my trash you wretch.”
The mare was clean, her mane was done in a fashionable style, and she was wearing a nice warm coat. Trixie had no respect for this mare that obviously had enough money to spend on frivolous things, but no heart to give out to the poor.
The filly scowled at her, before turning and running away. Trixie followed behind. The run was short lived as the filly soon ran out of breath and nearly collapsed against one of the old brick walls. Trixie reached out with a hoof to brush back some of the filly’s mane, and to her surprise the mane jostled ever so slightly at her touch before her entire hoof sunk into the filly’s head.
I can touch things like this? That could come in useful.
The filly jumped back with a squeak. She looked back and forth rapidly. Finally she tapped her hoof on the ground twice, after a moment she lowered her head and scowled. She stomped the hard earth and whimpered, Trixie could feel the anger coming off of the filly.
Anger at that horrible mare for having a home, food, and warmth, anger at the trashcan for not having any food and getting her all dirty, and finally anger at herself for being so pathetic, so weak, and so desperate that she was willing to eat out of the garbage. Trixie could feel all of this coming from the filly with so much strength that it nearly knocked her back. A tiny creature like this should never be so angry.
The filly trotted over to a nice little place behind a few stacked boxes. Trixie followed and stopped short as the filly squatted, Trixie swiftly turned and looked away. After the filly was finished with her business, she trotted out and looked left and right. She stood still for several moments, looking lost in thought. Finally she went left and Trixie followed.
It was always frightful just how maze like the back alleys of downtown Manehattan were. Sometimes you would find entire city blocks, surrounded by buildings with no roads in or out, little places that had been completely forgotten by the rest of the world, now left to ruin.
Eventually the filly found an old store, left to rot with its walls filled with giant holes. A group of mare’s a few years older than the filly stood out front. Upon her approach one of them pulled a knife and faced her. Trixie felt fear crawling down her spine. The little filly had gotten herself into trouble.
The teenager put the knife away and smirked. “What’s up, Mute?”
The filly rubbed at her stomach and pointed at her mouth. Her stomach rumbled again, and she froze with a grimace of agony. The teenager with the dark blue mane stepped out and reached out to pet the filly. The filly quickly ducked away and frowned, shaking her head slowly.
“She doesn’t like being touched, Blueberry,” the knife wielding teen said. “None of us do.”
“Sorry,” Blueberry replied. “We’re also out of food… if we had any, we’d share. Have you tried the soup kitchen?”
“Yeah, and what would she do there? Get locked away in an orphanage? Most of us ran away from those kinds of places you know,” the knife pony said. “The adults there will hurt her. And they won’t get in trouble either, the government doesn’t like to prosecute stallions.”
“Just because they are the weaker race doesn’t mean they can get away with that crap,” the last teen spat angrily. She had a black curly mane.
“Yeah, well it doesn’t change how the world works,” the knife pony said. Her green hair moved aside just enough to showcase her hardened red eyes.
Blueberry knelt down and looked the filly in the eyes. “Me and the girls are about to do another job, if you want you can wait here. After we get paid we’re getting food, I’ll bring you some.”
“Hey, don’t give her free food! If she wants some she can work for it. Besides we could use a tiny thing to help us sneak into places, it’d make our jobs a whole lot easier,” The knife pony said.
Blueberry gave her a mean look, and a shake of her head before returning to the filly and saying softly, “I don’t like the way she said it, but she’s right. If we had your help, our jobs would go a lot smoother. So how about it? You wanna join the thieves’ guild?”
The filly shook her head. Trixie was proud of the filly for staying away from crime, but at the same time she wanted to see the filly get something to eat. She shouldn’t have to be in these situations.
“Okay,” Blueberry said. “Well, just wait for us and we’ll come back. Don’t go stealing food from any of the other gangs around here though, if you get caught… well you know what will happen.”
The filly looked away.
“She likes stealing from that one gang that hurt her friend,” The knife pony said. “I guess it’s her way of getting revenge.”
“If they catch you, they will hurt you too. Do you understand that?” Blueberry asked seriously.
The filly made a squeaking sound in protest and galloped away. Blueberry frowned and the knife pony laughed. “Serves you right for telling her what to do. We’ll get her a donut or something special. Maybe that will make her think twice about joining us.”
“That’s a good plan. I’d love to have her on the team,” Blueberry said.
That was all that Trixie was able to hear of that conversation before she was dragged through the air and towards the filly. She caught up quickly enough and kept pace after that. The filly was glaring ahead, hate filled her eyes, and anger steamed off her body. Covered in filth, hungry, tired, and angry, It was clear that this filly had experience far too much of the world, and none of it seemed good.
The two continued moving for a long while. Eventually the warm flickering light of a fire came into view from around a corner. The filly moved cautiously up, hugging the wall and peaked around the corner. Trixie joined her.
There was a barrel fire. It was good that the filly had hid, because there were two mares and a stallion sitting by the fire, each of them had a dangerous look about them. These ponies looked familiar to Trixie, but she didn’t want to know why. She had one goal right now, and that was to protect the filly, in whatever way she could.
Each one of the ponies by the fire had a plate of food. Some square pink slimy thing was sitting on their plate next to a bowl of rice. There was a fourth plate lying on the ground next to the knocked over shopping cart that was being used as a seat. The filly was eyeing the food hungrily.
Trixie moved towards the group, and full well knowing they couldn’t see her, she took a seat next to them. Trixie fell through the seat, and felt very uneasy as she looked at her waist disappearing into the shopping cart. Smooth one, you’re a ghost right now, you can’t exactly sit on furniture. The fact that I’m not sinking through the earth is pretty amazing, I shouldn’t expect anymore more favors than that.
Now all I have to do is either grab some food for the filly, or distract these guys somehow.
From this position Trixie was able to hear the ponies eating. They were all being quiet. She noticed then that they were all wearing shabby clothing; it looked like they had plundered a garbage bin and found discarded, torn jackets. It was enough to keep them warm though, which is more than what the filly had.
“The neighponese food is pretty good,” The mare to Trixie’s left said.
The stallion looked up at her, and stared silently.
The other mare sitting next to him smiled, her smile was evil. “Yeah, I’d almost pay for this. Good thing we get our food for free.”
“Boss said that since we’re running protection for them, we can get free food.”
“Yeah,” the second mare said, looking down at the untouched plate of food. “But the boss isn’t here yet.”
Trixie leaned in to the food on the ground and tried to grab it with her muzzle. As she had expected she went right through it. She frowned as the salty smell of the pink thing assaulted her nostrils. Ew, I don’t think I would eat this. But the fillies hungry, and I’m going to feed her.
Trixie looked up at the stallion who sat there quietly. There had to be some way to get them to leave this place, though Trixie was having a hard time figuring out exactly how. Suddenly a trashcan from one of the alleys, thankfully not the one where the filly was hiding, tipped over and landed with a crash. The group of ponies all looked in that direction.
“Should we check it out?” The mare next to Trixie asked. “Can’t let ponies too close to this spot. Boss would be pissed if somepony got near the merchandise.”
“Boss’d be pissed we let somepony near our base,” The second mare said. “Yeah, lets go check it out.”
The stallion stood, and the other two followed suit. The mare next to Trixie drew out a dagger from the inside of her jacket before heading out. Just as the trio left the safety of the fire, Trixie watched as the little filly dashed in, her hooves made almost no sound as she darted straight for the food.
The pink thing was gone the second the filly reached the plate, and the bowl of rice was next. The filly looked around and stopped. Just off to the corner laid a naked pony, the teal fur was covered in patches of dark stains, and the sandy brown mane was lying over her face. The filly stared at her.
Something struck Trixie as being wrong as she watched the filly trot over to the mare. The filly should just run, before the adult ponies came back. The filly prodded the mare gingerly, the mare stirred to life and cracked open a sickly yellow eye.
“Who’re you?” The mare asked quietly, her voice was raspy. “Wait a minute, you’re that filly that’s been living all alone out here, aren’t you. Valiant Heart, right?”
Trixie’s jaw dropped. Valiant Heart! The filly that I befriended when I was living on the streets, the one I told bedtime stories too, the one who I sacrificed myself to save? Of course I remember her now… and she’s still living on the streets. I had hoped that she found a home by now, but I guess that I was wrong. I should’ve come to get you, I should have come to save you. I’m sorry, Valiant Heart.
The fillies eyes widened, and she looked to her left and right before taking a step back and nodding. The mare pushed herself upright, and shook her head, she looked dazed. “Well, I’m Frailty.”
The filly stepped forward and using her hooves, she tugged on the mare’s foreleg. The mare sniffed a the air a few times. She frowned. Frailty lifted up a foreleg and brought it down onto the fillies skull, smashing the tiny thing into the hard ground. Frailty held the filly down after that and shouted, “Guys! I just caught some brat eating my freaking dinner!”
The other three quickly returned. Valiant Heart tried to move, to run, but she couldn’t possibly overpower the older mare. Trixie tried to lash out with her magic, to threw Frailty back and save Valiant Heart. But her magic was just as corporeal as she was, and nothing happened. The adult ponies quickly surrounded the filly.
One of the mare’s pointed a hoof and said, “Wait a minute, that’s the brat that Trixie was protecting. Boss, she’s the one that got away!”
Frailty smiled, her smile made Trixie shiver with fear, she could sense the evil oozing out of the mare. “Oh, little filly, you just screwed up. You thought that this blood was mine and that I was being hurt didn’t you? You poor, poor thing. When I’m finally done with you, you’ll never make that mistake again.”
The filly squeaked frightfully.
“Oh, you're going to be my new favorite pet,” Frailty said. “I’m going to enjoy the buck out of training you.”
Trixie screamed at the top of her lungs. She remembered Frailty now, she’d heard of her leading the Black Hoof gang. The gang that had tortured and hurt her for pleasure. The ones that sent her over the edge of depression and straight into suicide. Trixie just knew that they were going to do something worse to Valiant, so much worse.
Rage surged up inside of Trixie and she lashed out with her mind, she felt mental tendrils reach out and wrap around the stallion behind her. They slipped into his thought’s, his disgusting perverted thoughts. The things he had planned for the filly were twisted, and Trixie wasn’t going to let that happen. She pushed her way into his mind, breaking every wall she found like a sledgehammer until she felt her body jump back, grow a foot in height and a beating heart in her chest.
Trixie looked around, she was now in his body, in that filthy stallions body. She took a step forward, towards Frailty, her eyes narrowed on her target and she reared up, preparing to kick the mare with both of her new bodies hooves. She could feel the stallion fighting for control of his own body, his thoughts were full of fear and confusion, and Trixie beat them into submission.
Frailty rose up, placed a rear hoof on Valiant’s back preventing the filly from escaping, and hit Trixie’s new body in the chest. The mare’s strength was unbelievable, and Trixie felt the body she was in lift up off the ground and fly back. She hit the brick wall, and heard a horrible snap.
The world went white, and she felt the life energy and all its warmth being drawn somewhere far away. For a brief second she could see the outline of a glorious alicorn, and felt the welcoming embrace and the warmth of an early spring sun across her face. A kind motherly voice called to her, “Welcome home, child. Now you can rest at ease, Wonder Smith.”
The world returned to Trixie as she was flung out of the body, and her dream self landing in front of the stallion. She turned towards the stallion and found blood dripping from his open mouth, his eyes rolled into the back of his skull, and his back twisted at an unnatural angle. With a single hit, Frailty had ended her subordinate’s life.
Something tugged at Trixie’s dream self, and she slid five feet. She stopped and looked around. I’m not done here, I need to save her!
She was tugged again and this time her mental self went flying through buildings a few blocks away before stopping. Trixie tried to race forward but she was unable to move, it was like something had grasped onto her and wouldn’t let go. Trixie fought and screamed in rage.
She was jerked back one last time, only this time she flew at such speeds that one second she was in the air over Manehattan and the next she was in her bedroom. Her body was thrashing about wildly, there was a scorch mark on the bedpost, and Maud was shaking her violently shouting something that Trixie could not hear. Trixie closed her eyes.
Trixie opened her eyes again and sat up in bed, pushed Maud back and shouted, “I NEED TO SAVE VALIANT HEART!”
***
The air attacked Trixie’s bare skin as she trudged onward through the snow. The moon offered enough light to see by, so Trixie could avoid the deep patches of snow at the very least. Maud was right behind her and had barely managed to find their coats before Trixie stormed out the front door. Maud was continuously trying to give Trixie her white coat, but Trixie ignored it. She was driven to make haste to Manehattan. She could only think of one pony who could get her and Maud there in fast enough time to make it matter; Twilight Sparkle.
When Trixie arrived at the castle she used her magic to push open the doors. She walked in, and hit an invisible wall. Trixie frowned. Twilight had mentioned the barrier she uses to keep untrustworthy ponies out. I guess that after I stole something from her I wasn’t very trust worthy.
Trixie stared at the invisible wall for a second and growled. Screw this wall, she can’t keep me out.
“Maud, go inside, find the sigils next to the door frame and smash them,” Trixie demanded.
“Trixie, I am not doing that. You are being erratic,” Maud said calmly. “We can’t break into Twilight’s home.”
“Maud, there is a filly out in Manehattan, probably being used as some stallions play thing right now. I am the only one who can save her, but to do that I need Twilight’s help getting there,” Trixie explained as calmly as she could.
“I will not,” Maud said flatly. “You are suffering from hallucinations again, there is no filly.”
Trixie screamed enraged. If she won’t help me, I’ll do it myself.
As the anger filled Trixie, she focused on the memory of Frailty hurting Valiant Heart. She drew in the power from it like Scath had taught her, and felt the dark power inside stirring. She grinned madly as she wrapped her magical grasp around the door frame and squeezed. The door frame cracked, and splinters of crystal flew out in every direction. Trixie relaxed, her body was shaking and she was drained from the effort.
She took a few steps forward, the barrier was gone. Triumphantly Trixie marched forward, Maud followed closely behind. It was nice getting out of the cold, the anger inside might have kept her warm, but she was beginning to feel it. With adrenaline was pumping furiously she nearly flew up the stairs as she turned her march into a gallop.
At the top of the stairs Trixie saw light flickering underneath one of the doorways, she recognized it as Twilight’s personal study. Trixie pushed open the door with her hooves, it slammed open. Both Twilight Sparkle, and a tall blue unicorn sat at a table, eyes wide as they took in the sight of Trixie and Maud.
“Twilight, I need your help to get to Manehattan, now!” Trixie exclaimed. “Teleport me and Maud there.”
Twilight’s jaw worked but she couldn’t seem to find words. She looked at her pale blue companion, the candle light in between them flickered silently. Lovingly crafted salads sat in front of either pony, and the scent of roses filled the air. A vase with a red rose sat on the table next to the candle, it hadn’t been eaten yet.
“What’s going on here?” Trixie asked, her drive was temporarily halted by the strange sight before her.
“This is private,” Twilight finally said, she sounded shocked.
“So you’re dating some new floozy? What happened to Luna? She’s going to be heartbroken if she finds out that you went behind her back like this. I’d figure that after my screw up, at least you would stay loyal to her,” Trixie said sternly.
“I… uh… you knew about Luna?” Twilight asked.
Trixie looked over at the unicorn. The unicorn recovered from the initial shock of Trixie’s break in and began speaking; her voice was far younger than she looked. “Trixie, you don’t understand.”
“Shut it slut!” Trixie screamed at the unicorn. “I’m going to tell Princess Luna that you were attempting to steal Twilight away from her. You know what happens then? You’ll have nightmares, for the rest of your life.”
The mare looked mortified. Trixie was pleased with that. Twilight stood up from the table and marched toward Trixie. “Trixie, you blind idiot. She’s using an illusion so that anypony who sees her doesn’t know who she is. We were almost caught last time.”
“Oh, good for her, I’m sure that will help her avoid Luna’s wrath… you betrayed Luna, and you won’t take me to Manehattan,” Trixie was suddenly reminded of what she was here for.
“Take me to Manehattan now, a filly’s life depends on it,” Trixie exclaimed. Trixie was beginning to feel light headed.
Twilight stomped her hoof down, hard. “First of all, I can’t teleport that far. As far as I know nopony can. Secondly, that mare sitting at my table is Princess Luna! I haven’t betrayed anypony.”
Trixie looked away from Twilight and watched as the unicorn mare grew in height, her fur darkened and her voice deepened. “Trixie Lulamoon, you better start explaining what’s going on, and do so in a calm manner, for if you insult me or my lover one more time, you will be the one suffering from nightmares.”
“HA!” Trixie proclaimed, driven half mad from her blind rage. “I already beat you to it. I have nightmares all the time, and prophetic dreams, and remote viewing, and I can see what’s inside of other ponies’ heads. My mind is a giant mine field and everypony is just waiting for it to go off.”
That got odd stares from all three ponies. Trixie’s suddenly realized that she wasn’t breathing anymore, and she suddenly gasped for air. Her head spun and the world went sideways. As she lay on the floor with a numb tingly feeling spreading through her cheek, she wondered about what she was actually trying to do here. Everything went black for a moment, and somehow she had gotten on the couch.
For about a half hour after that, all Trixie could do was lay on the couch, covered in a nice thick quilt that had Twilight’s cutie mark on it and breath, slowly. Maud stayed by her side and instructed her on how to breathe for awhile until she was sure that Trixie had gotten the message. Trixie was so cold though, so very, very cold, and her hooves were damp where the snow had melted.
The whispered conversation from Twilight and Luna was annoying; Trixie could tell that they were talking about her. She heard the word ‘insanity’ drop from somepony’s mouth at some point, which brought about such a fierce glare from Maud that both ponies suddenly ceased conversation for nearly a whole minute. Trixie was left with only her thoughts, but now that the adrenaline was gone she was able to actually think about things.
So first of all, Luna is using a spell to make herself look different for their secret relationship. Breathe in. That’s okay though, so long as Twilight’s not cheating, or vice versa than I can accept their secret relationship. Breathe out. Secondly Twilight’s not powerful enough to take Maud and me over to Manehattan in a flash, that bites. Breathe in. Also having a panic attack in front of everypony, that wasn’t a good way to get help. Breathe out.
Maud was holding Trixie’s hoof and staring at her with gentle, loving eyes, the kind that made Trixie’s heart flutter.
I’m going to need to explain everything to them as well, because as of right now, I’m looking like a loony. Breathe in. That begs the question though, where the hay is Spike at?
“Where’s Spike?” Trixie asked, her voice came out a lot weaker and quieter than she had meant it to.
“Rarity was kind enough to take him in for the night,” Twilight replied. “I’m surprised by how happy she was to do so. Usually she hates having Spike stay the night unless she needs help with some project.”
Oh Twilight, you’re ignorance is simply astounding. I saw the way that Rarity eyed up your dragon, I’ll bet she even has something to do with him having a horde. Breathe out. Well that’s settled at least.
I am a little angry about Twilight locking me out of her palace though. I mean what if I had royal duties to attend to here. Oh sweet Celestia I’m a princess. At least I’m hiding it. I mean what if I didn’t do that. Wait. I wasn’t wearing any clothing outside. That means that somepony must’ve saw me! Oh no. my secret. It’s out. They all know. I’m an alicorn.
“Trixie!” Maud yelled. “Breathe, breathe.”
Trixie inhaled and her as her lungs filled with cold night air she felt a little better. Forgetting to breathe during a panic attack is not good, it tends to lead to me blacking out. Breathe out.
“Okay, I have some questions,” Trixie said in a slow steady voice attempting to not panic again.
Twilight and Luna both looked at her attentively. Twilight let out a silent sigh before asking, “Yes Trixie?”
“How long would it take for us to get to Manehattan?” Trixie asked.
“On hoof, about a week if you followed the railroad, flying isn’t much better, but by train it would take anywhere from a three to eight hours depending on which train you catch. So considering the distance between here and Manehattan, the shortest way would be to take the train tomorrow,” Twilight answered.
“And if I go down to Manehattan to wipe out crime and save good ponies, will there be any problems?” Trixie asked, she made sure to breath in between sentences.
“That depends,” Luna answered. “Are you going to save this filly?” Trixie nodded shakily. “Then I see no problem in it.”
“Luna, she’s probably going to get herself into some serious trouble,” Twilight said, concerned.
“I can see that, but if she brings the gray one along, I am sure that there will be no problems,” Luna said thoughtfully.
“My name is Maud,” Maud replied flatly.
“Yes, I know. You are also sister to the pink one,” Luna agreed. “I find that very odd, but Twilight assures me that this is indeed true. I will not doubt her.”
Maud stroked Trixie’s hoof, and Trixie smiled at her. She couldn’t have asked for a more perfect mare to take care of her when she pushed herself over the edge like this.
“So,” Twilight said carefully. “Can you read minds and stuff like Pinkie?”
Maud looked back at Twilight. “She can, though Trixie has it worse. She is also able to see things in her dreams, things that are true.”
“Like my sister,” Luna said solemnly. “Twilight, can you do that?”
Twilight shook her head.
“Hmm, I wonder if my sister made a mistake somewhere along the line?” Luna wondered to herself.
That got Twilight to raise an eyebrow. “What does that mean?”
“Nothing, I was just pondering,” Luna said. “Think nothing of it, it doesn’t matter. We need to help our friend here, do we not?”
Twilight let out a sigh. “Yes, we do. I can get you two onto Manehattan tomorrow, just be sure to bring your crown. Ponies will do a lot to help you once they realize you’re a princess. Sadly I can’t join you on this quest until later in the day. I have research to do.”
Luna rolled her eyes. “I will do the research for you. How hard can gathering chunks of ice be?”
“With the monsters about it can be extremely dangerous,” Twilight warned. “I need those samples to learn more about the windigo threat.”
“Yes, yes, I get it. Fight some monsters, and fill a bucket with ice. ‘Tis an easy task,” Luna said confidently. “You go with your friend and keep her safe.”
Twilight smiled, leaned up and gently pecked Luna on the cheek. “I love you.”
Luna’s face became a deep shade of red. “I love you too.”
It suddenly dawned on Trixie that Maud was staring at her intently. Trixie rolled her eyes, “I don’t want to risk moving, so come here you lovable rock you.”
Maud leaned in and pressed her lips against Trixie’s. Fire raced across Trixie’s face and she couldn’t help but to pull Maud closer. Maud climbed onto the couch and they continued kissing passionately, she could feel the fire from her face running down her spine and gathering down below.
She would’ve continued if Twilight hadn’t spoken up. “Enough of that you two. Trixie is in no condition to be doing any of that right now, not if she wants to be able to save her filly friend… er… that sounds bad. Um, to save that foal tomorrow.”
Maud pulled away, and Trixie’s heart sunk a little. Things were just getting good too. At the very least this gave her time to think and actually plan. If she was going to go into gang territory and mess them up, she’d need to be prepared first.
Thankfully, Twilight allowed Trixie and Maud to stay there for the night, when Twilight and Luna retired to a bedroom for the evening, Trixie couldn’t help but be jealous. Twilight was right though, with her panic attack, the last thing she needed to do was anything that accelerated her heart. Instead she cuddled with Maud underneath the quilt, closed her eyes, and drifted off to sleep. She’d save Valiant, and she was going to make sure the Black Hoof gang never hurt anypony ever again.