A Family Matter.

by Thait

The Hospital

Ponyville Hospital

The beep of the heart monitor filled the room as the nurses bustled out to begin their rounds to other patients. Twilight found herself simply standing and staring at the pony who was now occupying the hospital bed. She had honestly never expected to see Trixie again, not after her actions with the Alicorn Amulet. She had simply assumed that Trixie was off doing...well, whatever Trixie did when she wasn't bothering ponies or trying to conquer towns. Of course in the condition she was in right now Twilight doubted that Trixie would be causing anypony any trouble anytime soon. But she also found herself wondering where Trixie had come from, and why she had stumbled into Ponyville of all places. Rainbow Dash had taken off to find the others and tell them what had happened, which left Twilight with Pokey in the hospital waiting for the doctor to return and tell them how bad Trixie's injuries were. The door to the room opened and Doctor Stable hurried in only to be accosted by Pokey nearly immediately. "How is my sister?"

"Malnourished, dehydrated and extremely exhausted both physically and magically. The markings on her body appear to be some form of magic but no spell we know has told us anything about them other than that they are seeping some kind of base energy into the air around her. We had to remove the armor she was wearing." He looked worriedly at the x-rays held before him "As you can see we needed access to her left rear leg and her right foreleg to cast them."

"How in the world could she walk on broken legs!" The idea of any pony stumbling along on broken legs was almost impossible for Twilight to believe.

"She's using a simple medical spell that's used to hold bones in place and keep them from shifting around. We use the same spell when we have to put a cast on broken limbs, even though she is currently unconscious she's maintaining the spell somehow. She's currently maintaining six different holds dealing with two breaks in her rear left leg, one in her right foreleg and three broken ribs. I am impressed she even made it to town from wherever she was as it must have been agony to even walk." Turning to Pokey he nodded to the unconscious Trixie. "Since she was already maintaining it we allowed her to continue and just put the casts into place. As soon as she wakes up we can tell her to release the spell. There is...something else I think you should see." Moving to the bed he drew the sheets back to allow them to see Trixie's left foreleg revealing that It was now a solid black from hoof to knee, the normal blue color was missing entirely.

"The armor covered it completely but all four legs bear the same blackness to them. It only reaches from hoof to knee on the forelegs and hoof to ankle on the rear but we have no idea what it is." Doctor Stable levitated a chart to Pokey who began to look it over quickly. "At first we thought it might be the same as the lines on her body but it isn't showing any activity at all that we can register as magical. In fact the only difference in those areas from the rest of her body is that they appear to be slightly colder than her normal body temperature. It's not some kind of dye or discoloration of just the fur either, it appears that any new fur growth there will also be black."

Twilight found herself staring at the black for several moments while her mind ran through every single injury and disease she could think of and came up empty. 'If I don't have a name for it why does it look familiar?' It was as if she had seen it somewhere before but so long ago that she couldn't remember when. Maybe she could find information in the library about whatever it was that would cause such a reaction in a pony.

"I highly doubt she will wake for quite some time, she's going to need quite a bit of rest even after she..." The doctor's words were cut off by a soft moan from Trixie as she began to stir. "That's not...there is no way she should even be awake for another day at the least." The doctor hurried to the bedside.

"My sister has never let others set her timetable for her." Pokey watched carefully as Trixie began to wake.

'Irritating beep! Trixie should crush you.' A feeble attempt to grab onto her magic and destroy the offending beeping object failed spectacularly as no magic came to her call. Deciding that this meant she would have to do something physical she debated if it was worth it or if it would be better to just pull the covers up and go back to sleep. 'Wait, covers? When did Trixie get to a hotel?' A quick attempt to open her eyes ended up nearly blinding her and she clamped them shut again immediately. Giving herself a few seconds she cracked her eyes open and slowly began to get them accustomed to the shining light above her. "Stupid light." Her throat felt like she had just tried to run sandpaper through it, which set her to coughing which only made it hurt worse.

"You always did know how to make an entrance Beatrix."

Trixie winced as she turned her head and found herself staring at her brother. "Pokey?" She nearly started coughing again but Pokey levitated a glass to her and helped her get a drink. It didn't fix her throat but it at least made it feel a little better, even if her voice was still weak. "What are you doing here? You are supposed to be watching mother." She tried to grab the glass of water only too notice the cast on her foreleg. "Why is Trixie wearing a cast?"

"I am watching mother, where do you think you are?" Pokey had to admit that he didn't know where his sister had gone, she had practically dropped off the face of the planet two years ago with only a handful of letters sent to him. All of said letters spent far too much time reassuring him that she was doing great and to not look for her because everything was fine. That had told him that everything was not fine and that she had needed help, unfortunately he had never been able to spend the time to find her and keep an eye on their mother at the same time. And he certainly didn't have the money to pay somepony to look for his sister.

"Trixie is in the Crystal Empire of course, where else would she be? She was tracking down..." She noticed the minute shake of his head and clamed up upon realizing they weren't alone in the room. "Why, where is Trixie?" With another wince she turned her head to look the other way and spotted a certain lavender unicorn she had hoped never to see again standing near the door to the room.

"Ponyville." Pokey had expected some response, mostly one based on how far from the empire Ponyville was, but the sheer hatred that suddenly flared on his sisters face as she saw Twilight surprised him.

"YOU!" Trixie struggled to push herself up and failed. "Why is Trixie in Ponyville! Did you do this? Wasn't destroying Trixie's life enough for you? Did you decide you needed to take this from Trixie as well!" By the end of her attempted shouting her voice was barely more than a hoarse whisper but it still carried enough for Twilight to hear.

"I-I had nothing to do with any of this." Twilight was surprised by the anger directed at her, she had honestly thought that she and Trixie had ended on a somewhat upward note after the amulet incident. "You stumbled into town on your own Trixie, I didn't do anything. I helped bring you to the hospital, I was worried about you." To Twilight's surprise Trixie's rage only seemed to grow worse, the blue mare shuddered and the eyes glaring at Twilight took on a shockingly feral look as the injured unicorn let out a deep growl and bared her teeth at Twilight.

"Beatrix!" The panic in Pokey's voice seemed to shock Trixie out of whatever was happening to her and her expression changed to one of horror before she turned her head and buried her face in the pillow with a whimper.

"Please leave Trixie alone." There was fear in Trixie's voice now and Twilight could only stare in confusion at her. Even more confusing was the knowing look that Doctor Stable wore as he looked to Pokey.

"I think we should leave for awhile, it would do Trixie well to have some rest." The doctor led them out of the room and into the hallway. "Pokey do you wish to check on your mother while you're here?"

"Yes." Pokey sent one more worried look back at the room his sister occupied before speaking to Twilight. "Please don't hold this against my sister, she didn't mean anything by it."

"What was..." Twilight stopped for a moment to try and collect her thoughts, one of which was trying to process Trixie suddenly acting like a cornered wild animal. In the end though her mind focused on one thing above all others. "She hates me. I thought that after the amulet, and she apologized and..." Twilight found it nearly impossible to even understand the idea of somepony actually hating her, hating her so much that Trixie had looked like she wanted to attack her. Even when Trixie had worn the Alicorn Amulet Twilight hadn't seen hatred in the other pony's eyes, there had been anger and injured pride but there had not been true hatred.

"Beatrix has been under a lot of strain." And he knew almost none of what had happened as he hadn't been in Ponyville during either her first arrival or during her return with that damned amulet, everything he knew had come second hoof from ponies around town. 'Why would she even use that thing? She couldn't possibly have believed that the family bloodline would protect her, could she?'

"I just wish there was something I could do to change her mind." Twilight didn't see the calculating gleam appear in the other pony's eyes.

"In that Endeavour I'm afraid I can't help much, my sister has always been very finicky over who she likes and dislikes." And she was as stubborn as could be when it came to ponies she disliked. He had thought to say more but Twilight's face lit up and she smiled in excitement.

"Thats it! I know what to do." Twilight waved a quick goodbye to Pokey and hurried off down the hallway with plans to head to the school hoping that she could get there in time to talk to Snips and Snails. The two had cleaned up Trixie's wagon and Twilight wanted to know if there was anything they had managed to salvage from the wreckage. It had been two years ago but she held out hope that they still had at least something of Trixie's that could be returned. It might not make Trixie her friend but it at least would show her that she wasn't her enemy.

'This should be interesting.' Pokey turned and strode down the hallway towards the room his mother occupied. On the way he couldn't help but think about Twilight and her friends and everything they had done for Ponyville and Equestria in general. He didn't dislike them, and they had been chosen by the elements of Harmony so they had to be good ponies. But Twilight was the personal student of Celestia and if it came down to it he had no doubt she'd choose her mentor over his family. If he had been a bit more vicious and cold hearted he would have done something to Twilight just to teach Celestia a lesson. But if he did so he'd be no different than those who had harmed his family for so long, and there was no way in Tartarus that he would ever by like them. His steps slowed and he came to a stop before a thick door that bore several locks and had a large plaque on the front of it reading 'Patient: Screw Loose'. Locks clicked as they opened and Pokey slipped inside and closed the door behind him.

A soft growl from near the bed greeted him as he walked into the room and he stopped not far from the door. "It's me mother." The pony that popped out from behind the bed gave a happy bark as she dashed across the room to Pokey and gave the larger pony an affectionate nuzzle. Pokey rested his head against his mothers neck, as she did the same to him, and closed his eyes. "Beatrix is back mother." The doctors would tell him that his mother didn't understand much of what he said but the fact that she seemed to lose some of her jittery tension at those words told him that they didn't know what they were talking about. "She's...hurt, but she'll be fine." For a few moments they simply stood and Pokey remembered a time when they had went on picnics and Beatrix would practice her magic while their mother prepared the food. As much as he wanted those times back he knew there was no chance of picnics in the fields near Manehattan anymore. The only reason they even still had their mother was because of Beatrix and her magic, she had defended Pokey as he ran and took their mother with him the day the guards had come for her.

"We're close...Beatrix found it. You just have to wait a little longer and everything will be fine." He had been telling himself that for years, but this was the first time where he was truly beginning to believe.

000000000000

Pokey's Classified info.

You're getting the minimum here Pokey, I'm not digging deeply into the lives of national heroes just so you can try and find some tidbit to exploit and use. My friendship only goes so far.

Elements of Harmony.

Fluttershy: Element of Kindness

Birthplace: Cloudsdale

Education: Cloudsdale Flight School. Cloudsdale public school. Hurricane Combat Academy.

Power Level: Variable (minor to high). Extremely shy and timid most of the time unless friends or innocents are endangered. Capable of using mental domination techniques. Ranked 1rst in her class in close combat techniques. Weak flight abilities normally, but certainly capable of high speed when she wants truly wants to.

Parents: Hotshot and Snowy Day. Currently working as Weather Operations Lead for cloud city Aurora. Aurora is currently in position near Diamond City and working weather control duty for the diamond dog kingdom.

Addendum to parents: Weather Operations Leads my feathers! You wanted information Pokey and I'm happy to do a little investigation for a friend. But these two are certainly not weather operations leads, they have Nova Guard written all over them. Don't even ask me what they are doing running weather control as I am not going to dig into Nova Guard operations.

Siblings: None

Author's Note:

Yes Fluttershy is combat capable, though she doesn't seem to want to use it for fighting, just watch Lesson Zero. Will probably put one element of Harmony info at the bottom of each chapter.

Comments

[Mooncalf]

This story looks really interesting! I'll definitely follow it. Pokey as Trixie's brother or relative has been mentioned a few times in other fics. It will be interesting to find out more about the exploits of the Lulamoon clan. Keep up the good work!

[Quiznak]

Hm..intestine concept here, like the underground infighting thing....