Dead Heart

by Leila Drake

Level 9 - Realizations

Dear Princess Celestia,

strange things have happened yesterday and I feel obligated, if not as your former student, then as the Princess of Magic and your subject, to inform you about them and ask for your advice.

Priest has talked to Mara Dust, the pony your sister Luna has asked to help him with finding his place in Ponyville. However, when the two of them visited Fluttershy that afternoon, Discord momentarily turned him into a pony, revealing to Fluttershy that the human is undead. I was not there - Priest told me afterwards - but I am assuming that his state is more obvious when he is the same species as us. Now Rarity's suspicions about the human are confirmed and Applejack, Pinkie and Rainbow are intending to find out what's so strange about him. I have managed to postpone the discussion but I am afraid it has become inevitable that they will soon discover the truth.

Needless to say that Fluttershy is deeply disturbed by this and refusing to leave her house. Rarity and Rainbow Dash have talked to her but she is adamant on avoiding Priest at any cost. I really want to take away her fear of Priest but I am unsure of how to proceed. The curse of the undead should not be taken lightly and I do not want to make it seem harmless.

Priest is my friend and I do not blame him for his condition – and neither should Fluttershy. He is direct and sometimes moody but also caring, helpful and eager to learn new things. He has made friends with Rarity and they are planning on going gem searching soon.

There is something else on my mind. After his visit at Fluttershy's, Pinkie Pie threw a Welcome to Ponyville party for Priest and invited about two dozen ponies to Sugarcube Corner. During the party, there was a big ruckus and part of the shop got destroyed by, as it seems, an explosion. Mara Dust claims to have seen a pegasus ghost causing the demolition and Priest is convinced by it as well. Therefore, we have started research on the matter and I would like to ask you if you have heard of any similar occurances. We are planning on finding and vanquishing the ghost but since this is a completely new situation for me, if you could tell me anything you know about ghosts and the like, I would highly appreciate it.

The collapsing of the wall has caused severe injury to Derpy (Ditzy Doo), one of Ponyville's mailponies. She is recovering at the hospital. Priest tried to heal her but since he has arrived here, his magic does not work anymore. He is confused and shocked by it although he is trying to hide it. Is it possible that the nature of his magic is blocked somehow? I have never heard of such a thing.

I cannot make heads or tails of these events and neither can my friends. We are trying our best to get on top of things again, but so far it is not looking good.

Hoping that your sister and you are well, I am awaiting your reply,
your friend,
Twilight Sparkle

"Spike, please send this to Princess Celestia", said Twilight, floating the extraordinarily large scroll over into Spike's grasp.

"Wow, that's one big scroll", commented Spike and inhaled deeply. With a green flame, he sent the letter on its way.

The alicorn rose from her chair and looked over to the sofa.

"This is the first time I've seen Priest sleeping", she said thoughtfully. "He must be really tired after the failed healing and everything else."

Spike closed the window through which he had sent the scroll and shrugged. "There's nothing wrong with a nice and long nap", he said.

Twilight smiled and nodded. "I guess you're right. Well – now that the letter is on its way, we can have a nice breakfast."

"Yes!", hissed Spike happily and struck the air with a little fist. "I'll prepare some eggs!" He hurried to the kitchen, a wide grin on his face.

"I should have let him eat before writing the letter", mumbled Twilight. "This took longer than I thought."

She threw a glance at Priest who was snoring – actually snoring! - on the sofa, then decided to let sleeping Forsaken lie and joined Spike in the kitchen. She should probably think of a way to cheer him up.

- - -

Priest regained consciousness with a start.

Where am I?

Oh, it's the library. I'm at Twilight's.

Why am I so dizzy?

"What happened?", he asked but didn't get a reply.

Priest sat up and wiped his eyes, then stretched his arms with a repulsing crack.

Have I been asleep? It seems that way. I feel better than yesterday. Kinda refreshed.

His stomach rumbled.

And I'm hungry. Again.

He sighed and scrambled to his feet, remembering faintly that seven years ago, he had not been a morning person either.

Welcome back to the realm of grumpyness and time loss. Yay. Now I really feel like twenty-two again.

At least he could do something about the grumpyness. Priest stood up – a task that was harder than ever – and slowly made his way to the kitchen. He put the kettle on the stove and watched the water boil, letting his thoughts drift...

Wonder what Twilight and the squirt are doing.

Drip, drip, drip. The water went through the filter, passing through the powder, thus creating something that promised a waking mind and -

A small wave of panic rolled over him as the realization hit him.

I have eaten. I have slept. You could almost say that I'm...

Alive?

He grabbed the counter, trying to keep his hand from trembling.

But I died. I died and I - he felt his pulse.

Nope, still nothing.

Priest sank to the floor, leaning his head against the counter.

What the fuck is going on?

- - -

"Rainbow!", shouted Twilight at a cloud that floated lazily above the ground of Sweet Apple Acres. "Rainbow Dash!"

A multicolored tail that was hanging from the fluffy white cloud twitched and a few moments later Rainbow turned to lie on her belly and stared down at Twilight, her hooves dangling from both sides of the cloud.

"Huh? Hey Twilight. What up?"

"I need to talk to you."

"Okay", said Rainbow. "I should have been watching Scoots anyway." She pointed at the Cutie Mark Crusaders who were currently climbing their own clubhouse. The fillies were wearing belts with hooks and ropes attached to them and shouting slogans at each other with ridiculous enthusiasm.

"What are they doing?", wondered Twilight.

"Well, to quote Applebloom, 'Cutie Mark Crusaders Alpinists'." She grinned knowingly. "So what'cha wanna talk about?"

Twilight grinned as well, then got serious again. "It's about Priest."

The grin fell off Rainbow's face. "That human, huh? He's one strange guy but he tried to be nice to everypony, that's gotta count for something. There's still something about him I can't figure out."

"That's pretty much why I want to talk to you", explained Twilight. "I know you've been talking to Fluttershy again. Spike told me this morning. What did you say to her?"

Rainbow flew off the cloud and landed next to Twilight. "Oh, you know, that he's a good guy, she should talk to him, stuff like that... I just tried to cheer her up but maybe we should have brought Pinkie Pie for that."

Twilight tapped her chin. "And Fluttershy? How is she doing?"

"Still the same as yesterday, she's so scared she barely let us in. Rarity tried to convince her that everything is fine but... it didn't work. Did that human really look that scary as a pony? I mean, he's tall and all but that's not a reason to be so scared, not even for Fluttershy."

"So it's as bad as I thought", mumbled Twilight. "I guess I should tell you what's going on. Spike has already gone ahead to Applejack..."

Rainbow frowned and tilted her head. "You're acting like he's dangerous. What's going on, Twilight? I haven't seen you this nervous for weeks."

Twilight sighed and looked down. She inhaled deeply to gather courage, then said, "Alright, Rainbow. I'm going to tell you now but you have to Pinkie Promise you won't fly away and try to harm Priest."

Rainbow's jaw dropped, then she frowned, a slightly hurt expression creeping onto her face. "Why would I do that? He said it wasn't his fault and that Discord was the one who messed everything up."

"Please, just promise."

Rainbow groaned and made the motions of the promise. "Fine! Cross my heart, hope to fly, stick a cupcake in my eye. There. Now are you gonna tell me the Big Secret Of The Human?"

"He's dead", said Twilight.

Rainbow gasped. "Oh my gosh! What happened? I'm so sorry! Why didn't you tell me sooner?!" Her eyes filled with tears of empathy and Twilight hastily raised her hoof.

"Wait, wait, wait! Not like that!", she stammered.

The pegasus froze. "W-what? How can you be – d-dead – in another way?"

Twilight smiled wryly. "He the same kind of dead he's been when we arrived. Priest is an undead human."

Silence. Twilight closed her eyes for a moment, waiting for the bit to drop.

"W-wait... a... minute", muttered Rainbow Dash, wiping her tears off. "Are you saying that he's a zombie? And that's why he scared Fluttershy? Oh, he is so gonna regret this -!"

"Rainbow, the promise!", reminded Twilight, catching the pegasus's tail to prevent her from flying off.

Rainbow Dash hesitated, then looked back at the alicorn. "But Twilight, he's dangerous! He might do something to harm -"

"No, he's not!", insisted Twilight. "He's honest and helpful and he's been my friend for three months now. I trust him, Rainbow!"

"Wow", said the pegasus and sat down next to the fence surrounding the Acres. "You have a friend and he's a zombie. A human zombie." She repeated the words several times, trying to feed the new information to her brain. Then she looked at Twilight. "How do you mean to explain that to Fluttershy and the others?"

Twilight raised her eyebrow. "Thanks for staying here."

Rainbow nodded, still gazing at her friend.

"Well, first of all, he's undead, not a zombie. He explained the difference when we arrived in Ponyville. Just imagine a friend... without a heartbeat. But he has a kind heart", she added quickly. "Ugh, that sounded so much better in my head."

Rainbow grinned and scratched her neck. "I guess I'm getting what you're trying to say. We better join Applejack and Spike before things get out of hoof then."

- - -

After his panic attack, Priest forced himself to pull it together and drink that coffee, hoping that it wouldn't affect his mood in the wrong way. He sat down at the kitchen table, staring into his mug.

Okay, okay. Options!

I could tell Twilight... which is stupid, she already saw me sleeping. But maybe she has an idea what's going on. And there's still the ghost and all those ponies I creeped out.

Asking the Light to calm me down would be kind of counterproductive. If healing hurts that much, I don't wanna know what happens if I use it on myself.

He groaned and bent forward, banging his head onto the table.

"Kill me now", he whined.

A hysterical laugh escaped him as he realized what he had just said.

Damn... I have to talk to Twilight. She's a powerful mage. She might know. All right. Breathe. Breathe...

Surprisingly, it helped.

- - -

Rarity sewed on the last ribbon, cut off the edge and smiled happily.

"Here you go, Bon Bon, and please say hello to Lyra from me", she said, magicking the ensemble over to her.

"Thank you, Rarity", said the pale yellow earth pony. She sighed. "Lyra's still a bit edgy after yesterday. But I'll do that." She left the boutique with the dress in a bag on her back and a smile on her lips.

"Now, that went quite well", mumbled Rarity. "With this order done, I think I can relax for a while..."

The doorbell rang as a pink pony bounced inside.

"Oh, hello Pinkie Pie."

"Hiya Rares!", chirped Pinkie, a wide smile on her face. "What'cha doing?"

"Oh, I just finished an ensemble for Bon Bon."

"I see, well, if you want to you could come and visit Twilight with me, I wanted to see how everypony's doing after the party, I'm not sure how Fluttershy's doing either and then there was that accident and everything went totally crazy so I thought it would be safer to check up on everypony, especially Priest, he looked super-duper-sad when he left, what do you think?"

"Hm", said Rarity thoughtfully, "I suppose I will join you. Sweetie Belle told me about the explosion, do you have any idea what that was?"

"Oh, Mara says it's a ghoooost!", Pinkie replied cheerfully, rolling her eyes around and waving her front hooves in a futile atempt to look scary. "Which is completely fine by be, it's totally in the spirit of Nightmare Night, by the way, do you have a costume already? I wondered whether I should go as a crazy manticore but I couldn't figure out a way to make the scorpion tail work so I think I'm gonna settle for a cockatrice, I already have the upper part of a chicken anyway so it's easier to make, right? And I wouldn't want to miss the night at the library for the world, it's been sooo much fun the last time and I'm sure Twilight is going to agree with that and we can eat s'mores and drink pumpkin juice and let Priest tell really scary ghost stories to get the whole thing back into perspective!"

Rarity's eyes widened as she realized where Pinkie Pie's rant was headed.

"Pinkie, are you saying that ghosts really do exist?!"

Pinkie smiled and nodded wildly. "Yep! Twilight thinks so, too!"

"Oh dear Celestia! I wonder... have you figured out Priest's condition as well?"

"Duh!" The earth pony rolled her eyes.

Rarity sighed heavily. "I thought as much. It was probably inevitable."

Pinkie tilted her head. "Soooo... do you wanna come?"

"Ah! Yes, of course!"

Rarity flipped the sign at the door – she wasn't expecting any customers since it was one of those Thursdays – and followed her energetic friend as the she bounced to Golden Oaks Library.

- - -

"Mana cupcakes!" Spike and Fluttershy jumped as Twilight rose to her hooves, a determined look on her face and wings flared triumphantly.

"Sorry, what?", asked Applejack.

"It's perfect!", beamed Twilight.

Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy looked at each other in confusion. They were sitting on Fluttershy's sofa. Applejack sat on the windowsill, chewing on a single blade of grass.

With the help of her friends, Twilight had finally managed to talk the timid pony into giving Priest another chance. Fluttershy still seemed very upset, shuddering now and then, but if Twilight, Spike and even the watchful Rainbow Dash gave their word that the undead human was harmless and a nice guy, Fluttershy would give him a chance as well.

"What's 'mana'?", asked Rainbow lazily.

"It's a term that describes one's capability of performing powerful magic", explained Twilight, getting even more confused glances.

"Slow down, sugarcube", said Applejack, "we have no idea what'cha goin' on about. The whole undead and ghosts thing still sounds way ta much like a scary story of Nightmare Night ta me. And here ya go and suddenly change the subject. Ya shouldn't be surprised if we can't follow."

Twilight smiled apologetically. "Right, sorry. I've been thinking about something to cheer Priest up. Mara brought him a cupcake and it turned out he loves them. He already bought some more from Pinkie Pie."

"So that's what this is about!", sighed Rainbow. "You want to buy him some cupcakes."

"No", said Twilight, "I am going to conjure them. It's a spell I learned on Azeroth – actually, I still have the book! I am sure he will appreciate the gesture."

Fluttershy smiled. "That's... nice."

"Blimey, Twi", chimed Applejack in. "I didn't know ya could actually conjure food. Dont'cha dare force me outta business!", she scolded with a stern voice but winking at the same time.

"I wouldn't dream of it. So who's going to come to the library with me?"

Applejack sighed. "Ah'm sorry, I'll have ta get back to the farm. Looking after Fluttershy was really important to me but work is work. Those apples don't harvest themselves, ya know."

"I'm gonna practice some moves for my next trick. It's waaay from being perfectly awesome yet", said Rainbow, sliding off the sofa in a fluent movement and getting back on her hooves.

Fluttershy mumbled, "I still haven't fed most of my animals. I'm sorry, Twilight..."

Spike rolled his eyes and shrugged. "I'm with you", he declared, throwing an accusing glance at the ponies. They shuffled uncomfortably, not daring to look at their alicorn friend.

Another quiet "sorry" escaped Fluttershy's lips.

"I see. Well, see you around, then. Come on, Spike", said Twilight, unable to hide her disappointment as she almost slammed the door shut.

Author's Note:

Disappointed Princess is worst Princess. :P

Comments

[CoastalSarv]

I really like the "Is Priest becoming alive, and how?" plot.

[Neratur]

I can't help it. This is in my head for a few chapters now and I need to let it out: Yeah I was dead. But now I feel better.