Red Like Roses

by AustralianSenior

Thus Kindly I Scatter

Taiyang –

It’s me. It’s Summer.

And I’m sorry, for everything.

I am so, so sorry for everything I put you and the girls through eleven years ago, for everything that happened since I disappeared. Had I been a stronger person, none of this would have ever happened. We’d just be a happy family, just like good old times.

I think back, and I know how it must’ve hurt so much more for you, Taiyang, and Yang and Ruby too. I’d left you with no answers, nothing but grief.

But I need to explain myself. When a Grimm kills, they leave nothing behind but blood and memories. It must’ve been a storm, blizzard, something of the sort, and Qrow and I got separated. It would’ve been so easy to guess the worst, and he would never have left without looking for me.

Even after all these years, I still have no idea how I got to this place. After learning all I could, I can only conclude that it’d been through a portal, a gateway, or something of the sort. It’d been covered by the storm.

‘Equestria’, Taiyang… The people here are ponies. It’s funny, I know, that’s what I had thought at first. And I became one of them. A human-turned-pony. It was magic. I’d never seen anything like it. The closest thing would be our Dust and Semblances.

My first impression is that this world has no Grimm. It was an unprecedented era of peace, with nothing to fight against. I couldn’t ever fathom a world where we could not only survive, but also thrive.

The thought sickened me. I never wanted to be thought a deserter, and that’s exactly what I became. How could I stay here when we were on the brink of being wiped out?

Of course, I was wrong. The Grimm were present, but under a different name, a different form. They weren’t the endless, unconscious beasts that we had sworn to fight against, Taiyang, but intelligent, powerful beings that even alone could lay waste to the world! It wouldn’t have been so farfetched to call them gods.

I wanted to get home. But I refused to turn my back on the ponies - the people - that needed me. It was evident that I had power that they did not. Why should I have a horn and wings when they had only one of the two, or neither? Why did I have the power I have?

They feared me, but I proved myself to them. I defeated the Grimm that was as god, and they came to respect me. They came to accept me.

But I never stopped searching for a way home. Going through mirror after mirror, finding gateways to countless worlds. But no gateway led to Remnant, and I tried so hard to find the path I had taken to get here. Maybe these worlds are simply ‘incompatible’, as I have read. Maybe it was by pure chance that I wandered here, hurt and alone.

It tears me apart to say that after all those years of searching for a way back, a way home to you, I gave up. I gave up.

I’ve worked it out. It’s been eleven years for you and the girls, Taiyang. But it’s been eleven hundred for me. These people come and go like the seasons, and me… It’s as if I’m still at home. I feel like I’m forty, the tests I’ve had run all confirm that I’m aging at the rate that I should be.

When it’s a century for me, it’s just a single year for you. Time ticks so much faster for these ponies, but to me it’s as if I’m still playing by Remnant’s rules.

You need to understand why I can’t come back. The people here depend on me as their protector. I can’t turn my back on them now. I need you, Taiyang, and Yang and Ruby as well, more than I can ever tell you. But they need me, too.

I have long met a pony that I can easily, and do, call a sister. I have adopted a niece, I have taken many students over the years. I have made countless friends, Taiyang, many that I have loved, and lost.

But never, in all my eleven hundred years of being trapped here, have I ever taken in a husband or children. I stayed loyal, Taiyang. No one here could ever replace you. No one here could ever replace my girls.

Taiyang, if you ever get this letter, please find it in your heart to forgive me for being too weak to find my way home. Tell Yang and Ruby that I love them, and that no matter what they do with their lives, I will always be proud of them. I love them, and I can’t say enough how sorry I am that I abandoned them, and you.

I don’t know what you’ve done for the past eleven years. But please, if you blame anyone, blame me. I was the one who left Yang, doing exactly as Raven did. I was the one who left Ruby without a mother. And what a mother I was! What happened to that promise that I would always protect them? What happened to the promise that everything would always be okay?

What kind of mother am I, to leave my beautiful daughters when it’s the exact thing I swore I would never do?

I can’t follow this letter to you; I can’t leave my sister, niece, student, and country behind. I can’t, when I’m the only one holding these Grimm back. My Semblance was always heat manipulation, Taiyang. Here, it's as if my power had been increased a hundred-fold. Here, I'm needed, because I'm the only one who can do what I do.

But I promise, my love, I promise that we will meet again.

– Summer Rose

---

She had lowered her quill just as the door knocked, tearing her out of the melancholy haze that had settled over her. Flicking back a loose lock of mane with a slight shake of her head, she glanced at the letter, before turning to the door behind her.

“Ma’am?” a timid voice called, somewhat muffled through the thick oak door. “The meeting is about to start. They- They told me to remind you…”

“Thank you. I’ll be out in just a moment.”

She returned her attention to the letter, a soft corona of golden magic lifting it as gently as a mother would a foal. Carefully, slowly, she curled the parchment, wrapping it within a crimson ribbon.

And then she paused.

Eleven years or eleven hundred? Could a single letter possibly alleviate some of the pain? Or would it just add to it? Sending it would be almost cruel; how could she taunt the love of her life with the prospects that she was still alive, still in love? It had been eleven years. A lot could've happened. Making up her mind, she exhaled, closing her rose-pink eyes.

The edge of the paper burst into golden flames, enveloping the letter until there was nothing left. On its way to the world she abandoned. She could only hope that everything could turn out for the best, yet experience had taught her that fairy-tale endings were just that; fantasy.

Sighing, she pushed herself to her gold-shod hooves, and pulled open the door with a small burst of her magic. The maid backed up, evidently having been pressing her ear against the door, her expression changing from one of nervous guilt to that of concern.

“Ma’am… Have you been crying?”

The mare brushed away the tears with a rose-white feather, watching the little beads of moisture coalesce along the vanes. Idly, she wondered why she hadn't noticed them earlier. They hadn't been unexpected. Setting aside that she would process the thought later, she folded her wings back along her side with a dainty flick.

“I suppose I have.”

Seemingly forgetting her position in the face of her mistress' possible sadness, the maid pressed on nervously with another question, “Are you- are you all right?”

“No,” she smiled, in spite of herself. Even after all these years, her little ponies still found it so hard to speak freely in her presence, no matter how many times she had to assure them that she was no better than them. Maybe, in time, they would come to realise that her words were truer than they thought. “but I'll be fine. Thank you, Miss Antares.”

Leaving the maid behind to return to her duties, Princess Celestia set off down the brightly lit hallway alone, a smile still lingering upon her muzzle. The faint smell of roses seemed to hang on the air, as fresh as the last rose of summer.

Thus kindly I scatter.

Author's Note:

A little idea for a one shot I had on Friday. Enjoy!

Comments

[AkemiTheSunbro]

Aw...

[Feo Takahari]

What . . . How . . .

*Adds to group*

[NightshimmerEclipse]

This is a Cool idea, Oh how I wish this was cannon

[Novalis14]

Amazing, I really want more.

[CryoKing96]

Gorgeous and Heartrending all in one. And such a brilliant idea, too!

[Script Singer]

Not bad.