"Princess Flurry Heart, Destroyer of Worlds!"

by Fluttercheer


Chapter 7: The Strangest Day

With a heavy sigh on her lips, Flurry Heart trudged through the streets of the Crystal Empire. She had just left the schoolhouse, after three hours of tantalizing detention with the worst kind of teacher a filly would never wish to meet.
Of course it went exactly as Flurry had predicted it. After she had put back the box and the pebbles into the storeroom and entered her teacher's office, he punished her with countless mathematical tasks, only to nitpick apart each and every single one of them. Flurry Heart wasn't even sure if there were actual mistakes in her calculations or if Austere Knowledge just made it look like that to her to make her feel miserable. Considering how she challenged him today, the alicorn filly assumed the latter.
Now her head was feeling all dull, numb even. It was one thing to have one math lesson a day, but four? This was a completely different matter. Especially for a filly like her to whom all these numbers felt like a prison for her mind. It was freedom what Flurry Heart enjoyed and she felt the best when she could just let her thoughts wander around without limitations. During her detention, though, she was feeling completely trapped. And the feeling she had now was like the one of a prisoner who just got released from a dungeon after years without seeing the sun. Flurry Heart felt exhausted, unchallenged and bored. Lucky for her, this was something she should be able to resolve easily.
Flurry Heart stopped and looked up into the sky. It was decorated with a dozen of white, fluffy clouds, but not enough to call it dull, which was a nice contrast to the feeling in her head. Flying should do the trick, as always, yet Flurry remembered that her right wing was still injured. She looked at it with a frown on her face, then she slowly enfolded it, the piece of paper towel Sunny had placed there falling out in the process. There was a small blood stain on it, but when she checked the wound, she found it scabbed over, no blood was dripping out of it anymore. She flapped her wing a little to see how it felt. Relieved, she found it not hurting a whole lot anymore. The spot where her feather was felt a bit numb now and only a tiny amount of pain was left, in comparison to the pain she was enduring in the morning. It was still noticeable when she flapped her wing, but Flurry decided to ignore it, for the sake of finally being able to fly again.
Without giving it a second thought, Flurry Heart spread out both of her wings, flapped them and took into the sky. She soared higher and higher until the buildings under her began to become tiny. She looked down for a moment and upon discovering how high up she already was, she stopped in the air and looked around. She was at the same altitude as the clouds now, the alicorn filly discovered surprised. It was something she never did before, flying up so high. For a moment, she pondered how her mom would think about it that she was so high up in the sky. She never forbad it to do that, not even talked about the possibility. Flurry Heart figured that her mom just never thought that she could fly so high in the first place. And she decided to not tell her and to keep it a secret, just in case. Having become injured, getting yelled at and three hours of detention were enough trouble for today, she had no intention to take the risk of having to add “Getting scolded by her mom for flying into potentially dangerous heights” to this list.
With this thought settled, Flurry Heart flew to a nearby cloud and took seat on it. She looked down to the ground where the Empire was spread out and noticed with astonishment how small and far away it looked from here. It was a sight she never had before in her life. From her position, the city-state looked like a toy city that some filly had stand in its room. There was a toy model of the Crystal Empire even, but Flurry Heart never had any desire to have it. The actual city was her playground, flying at full speed between the crystalline buildings was impossible with a small toy. And the word “flying” was the cue for Flurry Heart now.
Quickly, she got up from the cloud all of a sudden and took flight again. She stayed at her current altitude and just enjoyed her newfound freedom between the clouds. Not only did she have a lot more space up here in the open, clear skies than down in the city where she constantly had to maneuver around buildings, it was also unlikely she would meet any other pony up here. That a pegasus would fly up so high at this time of day was very unlikely, except for when a rainstorm was planned for later in the day, but nothing of the sunny sky with its scattered white clouds indicated it.
Flurry Heart kept flying for a while over the wide sky wherever her mood took her, without giving it any thoughts. Only when she approached the protection spell of the Crystal Heart and could already see the wintery landscape outside she did a conscious turn around and flew back towards the center of the empire. Her mind was so engulfed with flying that she even ignored her grumbling stomach, a result of it that she didn't have lunch yet today.
As the dull feeling in her mind had subsided, Flurry Heart stopped flying around and returned to the cloud she was sitting on earlier. All that was left now was the feeling of exhaustion. Flurry let herself fall back into the soft, white mass under her and crossed her hooves behind her head. From here, she could see the sun and so she just watched the celestial body she loved so much with fascination. While focusing her attention on it, Flurry Heart realized that she was getting tired. Her body started to relax and she felt dozy all over it. She didn't want to fall asleep now, though. As divine as she imagined it to sleep on a cloud high up in the skies, she rather wanted to fly home soon; she was hungry, there was homework to do and of course she had to ask her mom and dad why they named her “Flurry Heart”, to fulfill the assignment of her teacher. She could sleep on a cloud once all of this was done. All she wanted to do now was lying awake on the cloud while letting her thoughts go adrift for some minutes.
Flurry Heart blinked a few times to chase away the sleep. All of a sudden, she felt something getting placed on her belly. Flurry felt confused by that, she was alone up here, after all. Yawning, she rubbed one of her eyes and opened them slowly, only to find her sight blurry. She rubbed over both eyes and eventually, she could see the sky above her as well as before. The sun wasn't exactly at the same position anymore, did she fall asleep anyway?
Flurry Heart was thrown out of her thoughts as she felt somepony moving to her right. Her view was still a bit obscured, so she couldn't see who was lying down at her side. All she could say right now was that the pony definitely wasn't shy, as the body of it touched against hers. There was literally no space between her and the other pony. Still sleepy, Flurry Heart averted her gaze from the sun and looked ahead. With disbelief, she found herself looking at a sandwich that rested on her belly. Peanut butter with tomatoes even, her favourite. It was at this point that she began to wonder if this was a weird dream, caused by her being hungry.
Dizzy, she turned her head to the right to see who had joined her. And instinctively started to squirm away as she saw that it was Magnolia Sunshine of all ponies! Unfortunately, the pegasus filly was faster.
“No!” she yelled and, turning over, she grabbed Flurry Heart with both hooves and kept her in place. Flurry Heart continued to struggle and tried to fight herself out of the forceful grasp, feeling panic rising in her. Magnolia proofed herself to be unexpectedly strong, though, her grip became even tighter the more Flurry tried to get away. Eventually, she realized that it was useless and gave up. Her heart beating faster and a fearful expression on her face, she eyed Magnolia. She tried to say something as well, but no word managed it to escape her mouth.
“Hey, I'm just here to talk, don't worry!” Magnolia did an attempt to calm her, an attempt that failed.
At least Flurry found her speech again due to it. “Why should I believe you?” she said in a low voice, trying to hide the fear in it.
“Because–“ the other filly promptly began, but then stopped suddenly. Yes, why? Why should she believe her? This was something Magnolia didn't consider yet. “Well..... I don't know,” she admitted as she continued again. “I guess it doesn't matter. I'm not here to ask for forgiveness. Your friend Sunny told me you have decided to not forgive me, so I thought you were still upset over what I did today and wanted to compensate you for it.”
The sudden friendliness of the bully just increased Flurry's scepsis and she lifted an eyebrow. Before she could say anything, Magnolia pointed at Flurry's belly. Still wanting to make sure that Flurry wouldn't just fly away she was using a wing for it.
“I even brought you a sandwich!” she chimed. “I figured you would be hungry after your long detention.”
“That was your fault,” Flurry countered grimly, but then immediately bit on her tongue as she realized that provoking the bully while being at her mercy like this wasn't a good idea.
She bit her lips while awaiting Magnolia's reaction, but the bully stayed nice. With an expression like she felt deeply hurt by that statement, she looked to the side. “I know,” she whispered.
Eyes full of suspicion, Flurry Heart turned her attention to the sandwich in front of her. She took it into her hooves as her stomach grumbled once more, but didn't bite into it. Dark thoughts caused by her distrust in Magnolia and the bully's former activities soared through her head and she sniffed at the sandwich. Then she opened it, carefully inspected the inside and sniffed at it again.
Magnolia had found her speech back in the meanwhile. “I didn't poison it, I promise,” she assured, seemingly able to read Flurry's mind.
Flurry Heart closed the sandwich and just looked at it, clueless about what to do. As her stomach grumbled again, louder than before, she gave in to the temptation and took a bite. Carefully, she chewed on it and rolled it around in her mouth, paying attention to it if any weird tastes came up. Only as the piece in her mouth was a complete mush and she still couldn't detect anything suspicious, she reluctantly swallowed it. She waited for a few seconds, then she took another bite and repeated the procedure. As she had eaten the whole sandwich that way, Magnolia gave her a smile.
Following up that smile, Magnolia suddenly snuggled against her, which made Flurry feel uncomfortable. The fact that the sandwich wasn't poisoned apparently – she would have noticed something by now if it were – let her trust in it that the bully wasn't trying to do her harm, at least not right now, increase a little, but she still felt weirded out by what Magnolia did. The whole situation seemed incredibly absurd to Flurry Heart.
“Why are you so clingy?” she asked Magnolia then, calmer than when she made that statement before, which was partially owed to it that the grumbling in her stomach had stopped.
“Well, I hurt you today, so I thought doing the opposite of it would be a good idea”, Magnolia explained.
Flurry Heart couldn't deny it, this reasoning didn't go without a certain amount of logic behind it, yet she still felt weird by the sudden physical intimacy that came from one of her worst enemies. She wanted to tell Magnolia exactly that, though her fear that she could get angry and do something to her again still persisted in her mind. Instead, she tried it with a less provocative approach.
Flurry Heart made her voice sound as friendly as possible. “Yeah, it's a good idea, but I don't really like it to get wrapped up like that. Can you please stop?” There was a slight shiver in her voice.
Unfortunately, Magnolia didn't budge. “Just enjoy it,” she said, an answer that gave Flurry Heart chills. “I know you need the comfort right now.”
Not knowing what else to say to get the bully away from her, Flurry Heart gave it up for now and decided to be content with the situation. There wasn't anything she could do at the moment, except for hoping that the unusually clingy pegasus would let go of her on her own. At least she wasn't hurting her right now.
For a few minutes, none of the fillies said anything. Flurry Heart spent the time with pondering how she could tell Magnolia that she didn't really enjoy what she was doing here without becoming the victim of a possible wrath by the bully. It was Magnolia who spoke next, though.
“Are you mad at me still?” she asked her with regret in her voice, while burying her nose into the pit between Flurry's chin and chest. Flurry Heart didn't give her an answer, which surprisingly led to another question by Magnolia, a question that made everything really weird then. “C-Can you..... I mean..... Would you spread your right wing over me like a blanket?”
Now Flurry Heart turned her head around abruptly and glared at Magnolia, completely forgetting her fear. “What? Why would I want to do that?! After all you did with it today?” Flurry's patience was used up now.
Magnolia twitched a little at the painful reminder, but answered. “I-I would just..... like to proof that I won't hurt it again. I want to show you that it's safe with me now.” A slight sob was audible in her voice as she addressed the last words.
There were a lot of different feelings Flurry Heart had over this awkward request. She felt weird, afraid because she didn't know what Magnolia would do if she denied this to her or, for that matter, what she could do to her wing if she decided to do it, and a little compassionate because of the sob. Playing it safe, Flurry decided to fulfill the request, but at the same time, she also saw a chance to finally get away from Magnolia.
“I do it,” she said to her, then paused a moment to achieve the intended effect. Only as she heard a relieved sigh from Magnolia, she continued. “But only if you let me go then.”
“I will, I promise!” the answer came faster than Flurry expected.
Sighing and trembling, Flurry Heart carefully stretched out her wing until it came to lie on Magnolia's body. Without hesitation, Magnolia removed her hooves from Flurry Heart's body and instead, aimed for her wing with them. Flurry Heart twitched and was already attempting to pull it away again, but Magnolia just peacefully placed her hooves on it. She even thought on it to only place them where it wasn't painful to touch it, much to Flurry's surprise. “Does it still hurt?” Magnolia asked her.
“A little,” Flurry Heart answered taut.
Apparently content with this answer, Magnolia closed her eyes and let out another relieved sigh.
Flurry decided to give Magnolia a few minutes. While the two of them were lying on the cloud like this, Flurry Heart thought about the school day that lied behind her.
She was tortured more than ever by the filly that bullied her, got detention for arriving late to school, stood up to her cruel teacher, faced a breakdown by the bully who just tortured her a few hours earlier, built up the confidence of a timid classmate and now she was lying on a cloud with the mentioned bully snuggled up to her. If it wouldn't be for the fact that she had fallen asleep a little just a few moments earlier, Flurry Heart would now deny the hours since she woke up this morning and be convinced of it that all was just a dream and that she would wake up for real soon. But since she knew it wasn't, all she could do was accepting what was the most strange day of her young life. At least, she thought, it was impossible for it to get even stranger from here.
After the minutes Flurry had given Magnolia had passed, she remembered her on her promise. “I did what you wanted. Now let me go.” No answer came from the filly, so Flurry Heart repeated her words. As she didn't get an answer again, she noticed that the breath of the bully under her wing had become more steady. Magnolia had fallen asleep. Flurry Heart couldn't believe her luck. She wasn't exactly sure if the pegasus would keep her word, but now that she was asleep it didn't matter.
Carefully, Flurry Heart retracted her wing and got up. With quick, but quiet, movements, she approached the edge of the cloud, where she spread her wings, ready to fly down again. She was about to take off as she got unexpectedly interrupted by Magnolia's voice.
“You are leaving? Can we talk again tomorrow? Please?” Magnolia's voice sounded strangely pleading.
For a moment, Flurry Heart didn't know what to say. Even though she didn't want to admit it in front of the bully, she felt emotionally conflicted now. The fear she still felt around Magnolia and compassion for it that she seemed to genuinely regret her actions were fighting with each other.
“Maybe,” Flurry Heart reluctantly said after a few moments. Then she finally took off of the cloud and flew down, towards the Crystal Castle, leaving the white pegasus filly behind.