The Hardest Lesson

by Exodus45

Caustic Admiration

Summers in the Equestria were always slightly muggy. The air felt thick and smelt musty from the molds that developed from the increased moisture. Never the less the temperatures always remained comfortable. It was never too hot and there was just enough breeze to keep the flying bugs from sticking around. Dew had remained on the plants in the morning from the evening showers glistening in the sun of a new day. Anypony could tell that it was going to be a wonderful day.

Twilight woke up early as the sun was just coming over the horizon. Although she was now considered a princess, she preferred the familiar surroundings of the library. Among the rows of books she felt at home. With the precision of an architect she made her bed ever so quietly as not to disturb her sleeping friend Spike.

The room had not changed much over the years save for the tokens of the adventures Twilight had been on. The tokens had been placed along the shelves that lined the room. However she reserved a spot on one of the shelves for a small cage like safe where she placed her Element of Harmony. Twilight was determined never to lose the crown again. She took a brief moment to reflect on the events that transpired at the Crystal Kingdom several months ago, and shook her head to clear her thoughts. She wanted to practice a bit of flying in before the day got too busy.

Out side of the library the small town was slowly waking up. Several of the shops already had their doors open however most of the residences still had the shutters pulled on their windows. Twilight stretched out her wings to work out the cramps and with a few quick steps she began her flight.

Twilight had been receiving instructions from Rainbow Dash. They were currently working a regimented training program that, as Rainbow Dash had said, 'will have you doing sonic rainbooms by the end of a month'. Twilight was skeptical of the promised results, however if it did not work it would not be from a lack of trying. She had started with the warmup maneuvers and steadily increased the pace until she was flying the whole practice routine from start to finish.

Rainbow Dash was an intense trainer. While the routine could be easily accomplished by anypony that could fly, for a pony that had spent her whole life on the ground, Twilight found the routine far from easy. She had all but mastered high speed turns and doing loops in the air. Weaving in between trees was a bit more difficult to master as small scrapes and scratches from collisions with the trees could attest to. Outside of small cuts and bumps, Twilight had never received any grievous injuries despite the difficulty of the training regimen. She enjoyed flying and the sense of freedom it brought.

An hour had passed from the time Twilight had started until the time she landed in front of the library. The town was in full swing and the town ponies were busy bustling around their daily chores. Twilight was surprised to find Apple Jack, Rarity, Flutter Shy and Rainbow Dash waiting for her at the entrance of the library. It looks as if Spike was dragging an almost asleep Pinky Pie behind him and had just arrived himself.

“Twilight” Spike shouted, “We have a problem!” He handed over a scroll which Twilight levitated over with magic to read.

The scroll was from Princess Celestia judging from the seal, however the letters were garbled and sickly written. The message, though hard to read, was short and sent chills down Twilight's spine. She rolled up the scroll and darted into the library shoving Pinky Pie and Rainbow Dash to the side in the process. They had grumbled but Twilight had no time to make out what they had said.

Twilight retrieved her saddle bag from a storage closed on the ground floor of the library. The library was dimly lit from the sun peaking through the windows. Twilight didn't need any light to know where the books that she wanted to grab were located. Books of remedies and various magical spells were quickly crammed into the small saddle bag filling it to capacity. Rushing up the stairs to her room, Twilight chanted the self made locking spell that unlocked the bar safe that held her crown. After retrieving the crown she returned out side, slamming the library door behind her.

“What ever did the letter say”, Rarity said half yawning.

Twilight turned around slightly annoyed of Rarity's lethargic attitude with the seriousness of the situation being as it was. She unrolled the scroll and held it for them to read the garbled text. “It says 'HELP US'!”

Silence from the group was broken by a jumble of unintelligible question that Twilight could not possibly know the answers to. She rolled up the scroll and shoved it into her saddle bag. She interrupted the questioning “Get your elements and meet me at the train station. We need to hurry!” The group departed quickly to retrieve their respective elements.

Flying made the trip to the train station quick for Twilight. The ponies that populated the station walked around blissfully ignorant of the cry for help of the princess. Twilight suspected that is what Princess Celestia would have preferred; not burdening her subjects with whatever ailed her. She was strong, pure, and dedicated to her subjects well being; Twilight admired her for these traits.

Twilight had been flagged down by a guard standing at the entrance to the ticket booths. The white pony was clad in golden armor indicating he was from the royal guard. He had a squad of his men clearing a path to the speed train that was for official and emergency use only.

“Use of the speed train has been authorized for you and your party Twilight”, the guard said.

“What is going on”, Twilight asked with consideration not to alert the other ponies in the station of any dire situation.

“You will be briefed in Canterlot. Please hurry, time is of the essence”, the guard replied.

The single car train had been designed from the ground up for quick travel. The thin single row body of the train widened out at the base to allow for a wider wheelbase aiding the stability while taking fast turns. There were no seats in the car to cut down on weight leaving only a thin floor to stand on. Twilight walked to the back of the car to allow room for her friends when they arrived.

The small porthole style windows allowed a small amount of sun light into the train car. Twilight wasted no time in retrieving her book of magic spells. As her friends arrived she did not acknowledge their presence as she poured over the words in the book to make sure she knew every spell in the book. The train would reach Canterlot in a quarter of the time as a normal train would. Time was not something Twilight had to waste on idle chatter.

Canterlot was surrounded by Shining Armor's protection spell. The pink orb engulfed the entire city with the hopes to bar enemies from entering the city. As the train passed through the protection field the ponies received a small jolt. They were to focused on the task ahead to comment on the tickling feeling.

The train station in Canterlot was packed with royal guards. They had cordoned off a large portion of the station from the general public. The guards had prepared a carriage for the ponies to take them directly to the castle. The carriage was pulled by pegssus guards as not to waste time with a less direct path. Shining Armor greeted the ponies as the exited the train.

“Twilight, thank you for arriving so quickly on short notice. There is a disastrous problem” He said as he and the other ponies got on the carriage. “Both the princesses have fallen ill. What we know is it was a planned attack. We have an intruder in custody however the intruder has died. No one knew how he entered the castle but based on the letter we found we know he was the one who infected the Princesses.”

“A letter”, Twilight interjected. The carriage's flight was well underway at this point.

“Yes, it is being studied at the castle. Oddly enough it was addressed to you.”

The short carriage ride ended when they landed outside of the throne room. The guard presence was heaver than usual but that was to be expected given the circumstances. Shining Armor escorted them into the castle.

The air in the throne room smelled of vomit and feces. Curtains were drawn across the windows toning the light down to nothing more than a hazy shadow. Even in the dim light a blood stain could easily be seen in the middle of the carpet that led to the throne. Judging from the streaks of blood leading to a door on the side of the room, what ever had been bleeding had been drug off. From the end of the room continual cries of pain and agony filled the ears of everypony in the room. The sound made Twilight sick.

A medical pony rushed over before any of the ponies could react to the situation. She stood in front of Shining Armor preventing him from from leading the group further into the throne room. “They are not allowed to be here.”

“TWILIGHT” a tortured scream cracked from a cross the room broken up by sobs “Twi...”

Twilight rushed by the medical pony and ran to the side of Princess Celestia. The princess was writhing around in pain on the floor. She was covered in deification and vomit that she had rolled around in during her convulsions. Princess Celestia strained to keep herself stationary while she addressed Twilight.

“I..”, Princess Celestia gurgled out while chocking on saliva and snot running down the back of her throat, “I need you... to get the cure...” Her command ended with a stained groan of pain. Frothy saliva made pink with blood drained out of her mouth as she continued to writhe in pain.

“I will! I promise”, Twilight said tears streaming down her face. The medical pony had returned to Twilight and started forcefully removing her from the room. Twilight directed her attention to the medical pony pushing her out of the room, “Do something! Stop pushing me and do something!”

The pony stopped pushing her for a second and looked into Twilight's eyes, “Don't you think if I could, I already would have”, Twilight began sobbing on the shoulder of the medical pony, “Now I need you to leave the room so I can attend to the Princess.”

Twilight nodded and rejoined the group still by the entrance to the room. The other ponies, with the exception of Shining Armor, were also crying. He nuzzled Twilight and whispered to her “You need to be strong Twiley. The other ponies are going to look to you for strength.”, Twilight whimpered a soft agreement to her brother. She magically retrieved a cloth from her bag to wipe her face and blow her nose with. Shining Armor faced the entire group, “Princess Luna's condition is no better.”

“I want to see the letter”, Twilight said with a quiver in her voice. Shining Armor nodded and escorted the group out of the throne room.

The seven ponies traveled a short distance down the hall to a meeting room. Compared to the throne room it was brightly lit. The cluttered voices of twenty ponies filled the room with a mild droning sound as they discussed the situation. The walls were covered with tapestries that depicted previous generals and captains in heroic stances. The group gathered around a table surrounded by higher ranking guards. In the middle of the table was a piece of parchment stained with blood. The paper itself looked different then what was usually used in Equestria leading Twilight to assume that who ever had done this was not in Equestria. Some of the ponies in Twilight's group of friends were still whimpering from the sight of Princess Celestia.

Twilight did not waste anytime with introduction or chatting with the military officials. She levitated the note off the table and read it aloud.

“My dearest Twilight Sparkle,

By now you and your group of harmonious friends have witnessed the plague that I have bestowed unto Princess Celestia and Princess Luna. It is a fascinating sickness that I constructed to infest the spinal column tricking the brain to receive every in-comming and out-going signal as pain. Do not fret my dear, the sickness is nonlethal and is gene-coded to work only with in the two Princesses. However, it is incurable with magic or herbal remedies and will only continue to get worse as time progresses.

I had always admired their stoic demeanor. The way they can just take it on the chin time and time again for the sake of their subjects. That is why I made this sickness the way I did. To attack their strengths, to cripple their best quality. When I used a similar sickness on test subjects the results where exhilarating. The strongest of the test subjects lasted five days before scumming to madness and running a knife into his head. I could not have hoped a better outcome.

I developed Mr. Shaky, your intruder, to deliver this message to you (as well as the sickness to your princesses). I would not bother asking him questions. I am sure that he has he has degraded at this point to no more than a pile of useless organic tissue. I tried to get him to trow vials of red and blue liquid at the princesses however in trial runs he ended up losing an arm. They were just colored sugar water anyway. Science just looks cooler if you have vials filled with colorful liquid. Ah, well he was 'loosely put together' if you know what I mean.

Anyway let me introduce myself. My equals call me Professor. My subjects call me King. My creations call me God. You can call me by my name, Stalic, since all of these title are better than you deserve and I would ask that you not sully the titles by calling me by them.

I would like to extend an invitation to you and your friends to spend a lovely all experience paid weekend with me at my lovely estate. I have drawn a map on the back of this letter. I am sure you are looking forward to meeting me as I posses the only cure for the sickness that plagues your princesses. Remember I only have enough punch and cookies for the six of you. I would hate to have to pour out the cure because I needed an extra cup for punch for some uninvited guest.

I have a lot of fun things planned!

Yours truly,

Stalic”

“That egotistical jerk”, Shouted Apple Jack her southern draw enhanced with a twinge of rage.

Twilight continued reading the letter, “PS, Tell Rarity that it is not egotistical to acknowledge when you are greater than someone if you really are greater than them (also when we meet tell me if I was right with that guess. I would like to add it to my paper on Statistical Probability under the subject of Coin Flipping).” Twilight flipped the letter over and examined the map. The eloquent map's black ink showed through the blood stains carving a path through the Everfree Forest. “We leave today.”