Thirty Days, Thirty Twilights

by Esle Ynopemos

6: This Will Sting [Romance] [Sad] [Slice of Life]

((Prompt: Character A has done or is going to do something which will hurt Character B, and A knows they’re going to hurt B, but A is going to do it anyway.))

“This is going to sting a bit,” Twilight said, holding a pair of tweezers in her magic. “But you're going to feel a lot better when it's done.”

Spike bit his lip and nodded. His claw gripped her hoof tightly, tensing in the anticipation of the pain. That anticipation, so often, was so much worse than the pain itself. She knew she would reach in, pull out the ingrown scale, and be done before he even felt it. But until she did, he would grimace and squirm and try to act brave.

Twilight frowned, her tweezers hovering over the infected scale. He was too tense; she couldn't get at it. She needed him to relax.

There was the temptation to tell him that Rarity would be proud of how brave he was being. That would definitely serve to make him unclench. But Twilight banished the thought from her mind. She couldn't keep using his crush like that. Not now that she and Rarity...

“Done,” she said, smiling at him.

Spike slowly opened one eye. “You are? I didn't feel a—ow!”

Twilight darted in, taking advantage of his distraction to pluck the scale out. Grinning, she held it in the pair of tweezers. The light glittered off its edges, and one end of it had a tiny red speck of blood stuck to the corner. “I am now,” she said, dropping the scale in his claws. “Good job, Spike.”

Spike turned the scale over in his claws. It was a little, tiny thing, but because it had grown in the wrong way, it had caused him no end of suffering over the past week. He held it up to the light. “I'm gonna give it to Rarity,” he declared.

Twilight's eyes flickered. “You're not going to put it under your pillow for the Scale Fairy?” she asked, wiping the tweezers clean and putting them away.

“Come on, Twilight, the Scale Fairy isn't real.” Spike rolled his eyes. “If she was, she'd get in the way of the Molted Spines Fairy!”

Twilight kept her face level. “Oh, of course. My mistake. But still, I'll bet the Molted Spines Fairy has a bit with your name on it somewhere.”

Spike scratched his jaw. “Maybe. But Rarity is making a new dress today, and I bet she could sew a dragonscale into it just like she usually does with jewels!”

Twilight shifted uncomfortably on her hooves. “That's very generous of you, Spike, but maybe—”

“And then she could have a little piece of me with her wherever she goes!”

Twilight's ears flattened. Her gaze shifted to her saddlebags, which, unlike the ones Rarity had made for all the others, was sewn with special thread, containing a strand from the seamstress's mane.

She glanced back at Spike, who clutched the scale to his chest with a dreamy expression on his face.

This was going to sting a bit.

“Spike,” Twilight said, motioning for him to sit down on the couch beside her, “There's something I should tell you. It's something Rarity and I both should tell you...”

Author's Note:

Conveniently, the title doubles as a warning to Sparity fans.

Comments

[Periphery]

"Damn, Twilight, couldn't you have just yanked out some more of my scales instead of my heart?"

Poor Spike. Sparkity works pretty well as a pairing, but it's the cruelest possible one for how it affects Spike.

Anyway, kind of a clever approach to the prompt, distracting us with the minor bit of physical pain before suddenly dropping in the real ouch moment between these two.

[Esle Ynopemos]

3369496 Sparkity. Now there's a variation on the portmanteau that I haven't seen before. More than any other ship, it seems, Twilight x Rarity has the hardest time producing a single agreed-upon portmanteau.

Also, it emotionally destroys Spike, but the portmanteau issue is clearly the bigger drawback.

[JetstreamGW]

3371555 I honeslty think the only reason people have trouble with the portmanteau of Twilight x Rarity is that they can't handle Rarity's name being first in it. Cuz RariLight works pretty much perfectly, but some people are oddly resistant to it.

Course I kinda avoid the portmanteaus anyway. I just say Twi x Rarity or something, because it's unambiguous.

[Esle Ynopemos]

3371745 Perhaps the issue with "Rarilight" is that the '-light' part of it isn't immediately clear it refers to Twilight? I mean, lots of ponies have got to have 'light' in their names, right? It could refer to shipping Rarity with... um... okay, Twilight's father, Night Light, is the only example that springs to mind at the moment.

Probably a good policy, avoiding portmanteaus altogether, but some of them (Apple Pie) are just too darn cute for me to resist.

I think I shall henceforth refer to the pairing of Twilight and Rarity as "Raritwi-spark-lightity."

[JetstreamGW]

3371788 Maybe but it strikes me that this seems to be an issue in lots of situations. Like Cheerilee x Twilight. The bigger group? Insists on "Twirilee" which sounds amazingly lame. Cheerilight makes sense, but...

Honestly I really do think it has more to do with "Twilight should be first!" even though I have no evidence other than my gut impression.

[Periphery]

3371555

Heh, indeed. After years of being stuck behind at the library while the ponies go off on most of their adventures without him, Spike has probably just accepted by now that his concerns are always a step or two down on the priority scale. One more reason to say poor, poor Spike.

So on that note, I actually try to avoid all portmanteaus that put Rarity's name first, even the commonly accepted ones like Rarijack. Personally, I just find "Rari" to be an extremely clumsy and unpleasant half of a word for anything but her actual name, not at all befitting her elegance, so I much prefer to use the "ity" portion, as it makes for words that roll off the tongue so much more pleasantly. Hard to start a word with that, though, so she ends up being the 2nd half every time. Pinkity or Pie-ity, Jackity, and yes, Sparkity, etc, just sound so much nicer. RariLight, RariTwi, RariPie, and so on? Bleh. Well, except perhaps for Rarity x Rainbow Dash, since "Dashity" ends up sounding rather crude, "Bowity" sounds like Rarity as an archer, and "Rainity" is just...weird. Fluttershy x Rarity is a tough call. "Flarity" is slightly iffy, and "RariShy" is better than the other Rari- names, but I still think I prefer to use the "ity" half.

And then for Spike x Rarity, I say "Spikity", because "Sparity" sounds vaguely dismissive, like it's a "spare" pairing that doesn't count as much.

Also, kind of amused by the theory that I'm belittling Rarity's significance, seeing how I have a Rarity avatar and all.

[Olpert]

Yeowch. Yeah, Rarilight or whatever we call it now is pretty much one of the hardest things to write because no matter what you do, you end up making Spike miserable, and the little guy has it tough enough as it is.

[Midnight herald]

Ouch, my heart...

[Runoratsu]

While we're at portmanteaus, I'm all for Rarikle.

[Themaskedferret]

I'm not sure what i enjoyed more, the fic itself or the discussion of ship names in the comments. This requires thinking..

[Esle Ynopemos]

3512472 It did manage to strike up a very interesting discussion of portmanteaus, didn't it?

[Shipper107]

“Done,” she said, smiling at him.

Spike slowly opened one eye. “You are? I didn't feel a—ow!”

Twilight darted in, taking advantage of his distraction to pluck the scale out. Grinning, she held it in the pair of tweezers. The light glittered off its edges, and one end of it had a tiny red speck of blood stuck to the corner. “I am now,” she said, dropping the scale in his claws. “Good job, Spike.”

Spike turned the scale over in his claws. It was a little, tiny thing, but because it had grown in the wrong way, it had caused him no end of suffering over the past week. He held it up to the light. “I'm gonna give it to Rarity,” he declared.

Twilight's eyes flickered. “You're not going to put it under your pillow for the Scale Fairy?” she asked, wiping the tweezers clean and putting them away.

“Come on, Twilight, the Scale Fairy isn't real.” Spike rolled his eyes. “If she was, she'd get in the way of the Molted Spines Fairy!”

Twilight kept her face level. “Oh, of course. My mistake. But still, I'll bet the Molted Spines Fairy has a bit with your name on it somewhere.”

I´ll remember this everytime people say Spike and Twilight aren´t family.

also, you stopped at the frikin´rigth moment, didn´t you??

[PresentPerfect]

Sparity-breaking with Twility: You are doing God's work. :V

[Octavia4ever]

When you gotta admit the ur lesbo to somebody and ur like