The Spotted Alicorn

by Tartpelt dah Poneh

Chapter 4: Spells, Spills, Stitches and Scars

"TWILIGHT!!!" Pinkie Pie hollered, burst down Twilight's front door.

"What is it Pinkie," Twilight asked, alarmed and worried at her panicking friend.

"I NEED YOUR HELP SUPER DUPER BADLY!"

"What?! What happened?!"

"Remember that speckly unicorn mare, I told you about?"

"...And?"

"SHE AND DASHIE GOT IN A FIGHT WITH SOME REALLY MEAN PONIES! Dashie took it easy no problem, but Poppytart was to weak for them! Wowie she sure isn't the best fighter I've seen. Anyway, her horn got broken! And we can't get Nurse Redheart out fast enough 'cause she's too busy! Do you have some sort of magic healing spell thingy that can help her?"

"Oh my goodness! How bad is it?"

"Her horn is literally broken in half! The pointy end to just dangling by a tiny piece of horn skin and it's gushing blood!"

"OH MY CELESTIA! I don't think I have anything on short notice --" Twilight began searching in the book shelves for a book that could possibly help with such a predicament. She didn't take any down, and she gave up almost as fast as she started, knowing there wouldn't be enough time to search before it was too late.

"Oh don't worry girls," another voice sounded from behind Pinkie. Behind Pinkie was Rarity holding a first aid kit with her magic. "I heard all about it from Fluttershy! The poor thing looked like she just saw all of Ponyville drop dead in front of her! Come on now, we must hurry!"

Rarity broke into a run and the other two mares ran after her. They twisted and turned through the streets of Ponyville until they found themselves at Poppy's school. Outside was a large commotion of ponies huddled in a crowd watching to see what was going on. They pushed their way through, and Twilight got a glimpse of the horrific scene. There were school items scattered among the ground; lunch trays, books, pencils, pens, and plastic knives; each one stained with blood. There were little drops and splatters of blood everywhere on the ground, too. Two mares and a stallion, beaten up and with huge, bleeding "goose-eggs" on their heads, lay unconsious nearby RainbowDash, who was bruised, cut, dirtied and scratched real badly. She had a black-eye and was holding a hing leg up, which was a little twisted awkwardly. In the middle of it all lay Poppytart, curled up crying and cowering in fear and trauma, Applejack crouching at her side with small amounts of nose and head blood on her hind hooves. She must've come in and knocked out Poppy and Rainbow's opponents to stop the fight. Poppy's face and body were scoured with bruises and cuts, a front leg was broken, and blood poured from her horn where it dangled, snapped in half just as Pinkie Pie described. When Twilight layed her eyes on it, it looked even worse than how she reinvisioned the graphicly described scene! She cringed trying to keep in vomit.

"POPPY," Pinkie pie called loudly to the badly injured pony, running toawards her. "DON'T WORRY WE'RE GONNA GET YOU BET --" Her hollering was inturrupted by a bloody math book that had thrown her off her balance, sending her tumbling to the ground, face first into a very small puddle of blood.

"Oh dear," Rarity began to frett. "I hope her face doesn't get stained! We'll have to clean her up later. Pinkie, let me take care of this. I'm the one with the first aid kit."

"Ah'll help, too," Applejack offered.

When the other ponies that Applejack knocked out woke up, RainbowDash scared them off again. Finally, Nurse Redheart had shown up, and guided Rainbow and Poppy to the ambulance for better treatment, as Rarity's first aid kit treatment was just temporary to last them to the hospital. Twilght, Rarity, and Pinkie climbed in with them to accompany them on the trip.

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They waited for at least 45 minutes until the doctor said they could come in to visit their injured friends. When they came in, Twilight immediately asked what happened.

"You should've seen me," RainbowDash started in a tone like she's ready to tell an adventure tale. "I popped this bitch right in the nose so hard, it half soaked my hoof in blood! And Poppy picked up these books and got swingy with'em and boy she was doing good for the first bit of it, but then - "

"RainbowDash," Twilight interrupted sternly. "I meant how did the fight start. Not how it went."

"Yer no fun," she pouted.

"So what exactly happened Poppy? I could write a report about it for the Princess."

"Well," she began, her voice croaking from the aching left over from the pain killers. "I was walking to my school carriage with RainbowDash and she was just about to leave when that bitch came with those other two assholes and started clicking. I started tellin'em off...they just laughed...and kept going. Then I got all scary-lookin' and we started fighting. Next thing I knew, my front leg was broken again just like in kindergarten, but the pain was a little worse than I remembered...and a book flew and hit my horn. First migraine I've ever had." In the middle of the story she was telling, she began to shed tears. Pinkie Pie walked over to comfort her, then suddenly, Poppy's parents entered and she was "attacked" by a panic-stricken mother. They stayed for a while, then left the room when Poppy asked them if she could be alone with the others in there.

"There's another thing I've been meaning to share," Poppy began.

"Should I add it to the report," Twilight asked.

Poppy had to think about it for a bit, but she replied, "I guess that's up to you if you want."

"Ok. What is it?"

"...I had this dream last night. For once, I found myself in the metaphor I made to describe my feelings toward my life." She told them all about the spirit-like stallion, how sad he looked, the chains and scars, and the figures behind her she didn't recognize until she'd woken up from that dream.

"I was happy to see him and dispaired when he vanished because...sniff, sob...because I don't feel like I belong here...and I believe that I was born somepony else. He's supposed to be my brother, and I was hoping that that was the moment he was gonna take me home." She covered her face with her hooves and began crying.

"That's such a s-sad story," Pinkie Pie replied, still next to Poppy, as she took a tissue from a nearby tissue box and blew her nose.

"Sniff sniffle I'm not done yet," Poppy continued. "I've always felt that I was orignally an alicorn, too. That I was really born an angel; a princess even...and that my real family rule a kingdom of alicorns untouchable, unreachable, and unseeable by mortals because we're from the same world as the world of the deceased. Y'know, those in the afterlife. I believe that when I was born, I'd fallen from the sky and was forced to life here...where my life has been more of a living hell than any good. sniff sniff But I know why I've gotten this sort of life. It's because they always want me back...and I think the only way for that to happen is suicide. I'd end it all easy peasy at the right time but...the only thing keeping me from that is my coltfriend. sniff sob I'm just afraid that he's gonna move on from me and run off with somepony else, or worse, Silverglitter. It's possible because she's the closest thing to me he'll have left but it's also not possible because she's way more innocent minded than me and him...he's the total opposite. So i'm not sure if he would but I'm still scared that he might. And I'm also not sure if that'll happen or if he'll join me. But if he doesn't and moves on, I don't know what to do."

"...Ok," Twilght began when she finished writing. "that was a very sad story."

"Wait a minute," RainbowDash intervened. "the figures from your dream. They were us? How are we supposed to help you?"

"That's the thing," Poppy replied. "The only thing he said in the dream was 'Only they can help you'."

Twilight pondered this for a minute and thought, what would we be able to do to help her? Wait how are we supposed to help her?

"If there's anyway you guys can help me," Poppy started to plead. "please...help me...and whatever you do, don't tell anypony else what I just told you. You're the only ones that know. Ok? That goes for you, too, Pinkie." Poppy gave Pinkie Pie a stern look, intending to get the point across to the pink mare who'd probably be likely to blurt it out to ponies and then the rumor would spread. Nopony else needs to know Poppytart's deep, depressing feelings or secrets. She's known Pinkie Pie long enough to learn her nature of things.

"Don't you worry Poppy, my lips are sealed," Pinkie Pie reassured her as she made a lip-zipped motion after the sentence.

"Thanks Pinkie."

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A nice relaxing evening with a good book and a cup of tea. A great way to end the evening after all this stress from earlier today, Twilight thought. She'd been reading on her bed for about only 20 minutes when a scroll dropped at her feet. She dropped the book and the teacup and opened the scroll. When she unraveled it, another scroll came out. but this one had no special ribbon on it. It was whiter and it had a faint glow and magical sparkle eminating off of it. Before opening the whiter scroll, she read the first one:

Dear Twilight,

That was a rather interesting report you sent me. As for that other poor pony, I feel so sorry for her. And what really unsettled me was that the story she told you included in the report I found out is actually true! I've sent you these photos this other alicorn sent me. He looked about Poppy's age and looked a lot like her, too. Perhaps they're frateral twins.

Twilight opened the shining scroll, and out fell three more, each opening by itself as they tumbled out. They were all photos of windows from an unfamiliar castle.

"Huh," Twilight uttered, bewildered at the images. "What's this? A prophecy?!"

The first picture showed a sad King and Queen; the king reminded her of a piece of buttered french toast and the queen like a leopard or like a chocolate waffle. They were looking down from a cloud. In the middle of this window was a small, brown, newborn foal, falling from the sky. Below it was Canterlot.

"That newborn foal must be Poppy," Twilight exclaimed softly to herself in astonishment.

The second picture showed the same foal as a miserable adolescent chained up in a dungeon, covered in scars. She looked exactly like Poppytart and the image was just like how Poppy described the dream she had. The third picture showed what looked like somepony pulling off a sonic rainboom three times in a row, the next one bigger than the last. Yet, each rainboom wasn't like the kind only RainbowDash can do, but they were shaped like flowers and the colors reminded Twilight of chocolate toaster pastries with white frosting and red sprinkles, being brown and white with red sparkles glimmering everywhere...POPPYTART! The pony performing these rainbooms was Poppytart! She somehow had huge wings and she looked almost like Celestia raising the sun in the morning. It was the way she had her wings spread out and forelegs outstretched above her head, flying right in front of the sun. And the final and biggest rainboom had created a huge rainstorm of poppies flurrying down to the ground out of thin air. And not to Twilight's surprise, she and her friends were watching and cheering as their friend pulled off what only a certain cyan pegasus could do. And that's actually a fact, because by the looks of it, Poppytart's sonic rainboom might be meant to literally kill her.

Finally, in the last picture was an image that almost brought tears to Twilight's eyes the image was so touching. In this window, Poppy was in the middle, and she looked bigger and happier. She wore a golden neck-piece that looked a lot like Celestia's, except instead of a sun, it was a simple flower, the petals being beautiful golden gems and the center a glimmering ruby. A matching princess tiara and slippers were also added with the shining necklace. She was surrounded by 5 other alicorns each beaming her with their magical auras, creating one, big, magical "flower" to bring Poppy back to her true state. The top and left alicorns were the King and Queen from one of the previous photos. The two bottom ones were a brown mare and a tan-flowery-patterned mare with a white mane and hooves. And the right one matched exactly to the description of the sad stallion from Poppy's dream. That last picture was like a happy ending to a sad fairytale. Twilight had to rub her eyes to keep the tears from escaping her eyes. She thought about these pictures for a bit and then it hit her. If Poppy is so miserable with at least most of her life and this prophecy fortells of it being turned around like this, then it must be up to her and the others to help her.

Twilight rolled up the pictures and the scroll, set them aside, and took out a quill and another sheet of paper and wrote,

Dear Princess Celestia,

Don't you or anypony else worry about this. I am determined to make sure we figure out this puzzle and that all in the prophecy goes as planned.

Your faithful student,

Twilight Sparkle

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