ETwilight's life: A race against time

• MLP: FiM
• Dark
• Drama
• Sad

Twilight gets bitten by a spider when she was doing a task for Zecora, then when she was experiencing the symptoms, she goes to the doctor and learns she has a fatal disease and only a week to live.

• Twilight
• Main 6

Serenity Darkmoon Raven · 8.7k words  ·  8  24 · 553 views

Twilight's Life: A Race Against time is a dark drama story about Twilight whom gets bitten by a spider by accident while helping Zecora look for potion ingredients.

Let me just say that the premise, an incurable disease due to a spider-bite, while not exactly a rare idea, can be an interesting angle to take. Sudden, violent illnesses can make for good drama stories, especially when avenues of hope become fewer and fewer as the story continues. Good premise or not, however, this story is just too broken for it to be executed properly, or executed at least half-decently. I've seen people point out that the story tells more than it shows, referring to the "show, don't tell" rule of thumb, but trust when I say that said issue is the LEAST of the story's problems.

Let's start with the main structural issues. Grammar, punctuation, and the tense of the story told is all over the place. Periods are in place of commas, leaving sentences as incomplete and choppy at best. Commas where periods should be, creating awkward sentence progression, occasional run-on sentences, and the odd problem of these issues combined with prior incomplete/choppy sentences being combined with other incomplete/choppy sentences to make a poorly written combination of two (or sometimes three) incomplete sentences that makes no sense when read, ESPECIALLY when singled out. Then there's the issue of spelling mistakes here and there (missing letters or extra letters), which doesn't happen TOO often, but is present enough to be a bit of a problem when reading. It seems like, however, the grammar is attempted to be addressed, but the entirely wrong word is present where the actual word should be. Then, there's the past tense and present tense constantly switching back and forth, making the read feel even LESS uniform and structurally sound than it already was.

Next is how the story is told/presented. The first issue is found right off the bat, when the disease is introduced quite literally in the second paragraph with very little warning. There's barely any story at that point, or room for characters to just be characters in the task at hand (help Zecora find potion ingredients). Sometimes, descriptors of characters and scenery is kept to basics, at best, or are mostly non-existent at worse (almost as if the writer is banking on the reader to already 100% know who these characters are, which is a writing faux-pas). On the other hand, there is sometimes FAR too much in terms of description, such as giving practically an entire life's backstory on Doctor Corn, whom only really has a presence in chapter 1. There's also a big problem of having the story read off like a grocery list, with many sentences starting of with "Then" just for whatever next is happening is told. The only thing that I can give it a little praise for is that it follows continuity very well, despite incredibly questionable story telling choices that are made, such as a word-for-word flashback to LITERALLY THE CHAPTER BEFORE for something we all know about already. There's also this weird structural presentation when characters talk to each other with "..." between nearly each word in the middle of the story. I THINK it's supposed to simulate crying/sobbing between words, but it really doesn't work and just makes it seem like they're taking long pauses between each word without much of a reason. There are other, better ways to simulate speech broken through intense emotions, such as the use of onomatopoeia words like "hic" or "sob" with an asterix around each word to show said onomatopoeia is interrupting the dialogue. There's also letter repetition to show a stutter or difficulty to get said word out.

Oh, and I forgot to mention this, but the story has nearly everyone handle an idiot-ball, despite how dangerous the disease is supposed to be, since everyone INSISTS on directly interacting with the infected Twilight, with Twilight herself being the worst offender KNOWING that it passes on via contact and is HIGHLY contagious. But, even that in of itself presents a plot-hole, as Twilight's own movements and teleportation mishaps to random locations due to the side-effects of the disease should have been spreading the virus around anyway and would have gotten a lot more individuals infected. It's even IMPLIED that THAT is a possibility, when Doctor Corn is shown to actually try to sterilize and wipe down things that Twilight has touched. What I'm getting at is WHY ISN'T TWILIGHT QUARANTINED?! Does this story SERIOUSLY expect me to give a crap and suspend my disbelief when one of the smartest characters of "Friendship is Magic" doesn't take steps to keep friends and loved ones safe from such a deadly illness that the story CONSTANTLY goes out of its way to explain just how bad it is?

Further, though less egregious, was the sub plot with "Green Tea" and the final chapter. Starting with the Green Tea situation, which ended on an incredibly bitter, wet fart of a note it makes me wonder what kind of relevance it even had on the story aside from just taking one last massive dump on Twilight's situation. Then there's the final chapter itself in which, shocker and spoiler, Twilight dies from the incredibly deadly and incurable disease and it's treated as a rushed footnote rather than the heartbreaking heavy moment it should be with context in mind. However, considering NO ONE was treating this whole situation with the seriousness and respect an INCURABLE AND SUPER FAST KILLING DISEASE should have, I'm not surprised that there is almost no emotional weight present in the final moments. Likewise, it makes myself, as a reader, care about the drama of the story just as much.

This is a poorly written story with a solid idea at the helm. How WOULD Twilight actually behave upon receiving word she has less than a week to live from an exceptionally contagious and incurable sickness? How WOULD her friends react to such news? How WOULD the world react in of itself, considering Twilight's status as a hero of Equestria (along with her friends)? The unfortunate truth is that this story doesn't answer any of them, and just kind of sloppily meanders upon the idea of how deadly the virus is without thinking about the repercussions and consequences.

If Twilight had actually behaved like herself, she would have instantly self quarantined after hearing the news, instructing the doctor to sanitize EVERYTHING. She could have kicked Spike out and told him to live with Rarity, while the girls try to spend as much time as they can with their dying friend, just out of reach from an erected barrier around her home. The drama could have been drawn from the pain of the loneliness and the fear of death, and how much they want to comfort their friend, but forever can't due to risking the lives of her friends, knowing how contagious it is. She would have written letters to the friends and family she doesn't normally interact with, saying her final goodbyes, getting emotional and thinking about all the good times they had, and is going to miss them all, feeling utterly heartbroken that she has to face this alone. Maybe the whole time she tries to conduct research and even tries a variety of medical spells to try to find a cure, but it all proves futile, making her become more frustrated, angry, and desperate as the time ticks away.

As it stands, however, this is a bad misery-fic that has MAJOR problems both structurally and narratively that needs an absolute do-over if this story is to be salvaged. Also, with how the spelling, grammar, and punctuation is, I have this sneaking suspicion that the story was edited by an AI. Please, if you're going to write, either learn to edit your own story, or find someone that is willing to edit for you. However, this is just assuming you were using an AI, so if you weren't... well, I still suggest you find a better way to edit.

I am not rating this fic.