Love Heals

by OrpheusMorpheus

Life is Ephemeral

The seven of us were galloping or flying at full speed to the hospital. Rainbow Dash made it first and found us Twilight's room in advance. The rest of us burst through the doors and followed Dash into the elevator. In seconds we were racing down the Intensive Care corridor to Twilight's room. We burst into the room and ended up bursting into tears.

The sight was almost too much to bear. Twilight had broken three of her legs and her neck. Her eyes were both blackened. Her mane and tale were almost completely burnt off, and she had patches of raw burnt skin here and there. Needles and tubes sprouted out of her body like tentacles, and an electrocardiograph was blipping away next to the bed. She looked moments away from death.

My vision blurred with tears, I managed to somehow choke out a question. "What happened?" The response took at least fifteen minutes total, was spoken by all six others, and was interrupted by sobs. The Mane 6 had gone to take down the dragon. After the dragon refused to cooperate, Twilight suggested that she could try a new spell that freezes people. However, Twilight had to be face to face with the dragon for the spell to work. Rainbow Dash carried her up while the other ponies distracted the dragon. When Twilight started the spell, the dragon turned around and spewed fire at her. Rainbow Dash accidentally let go of her and she fell about six stories onto rocks. The dragon, in a final show of dominance, had spewed more fire at Twilight before flying away into the distance. Since I wasn't there to help, they had to wait for almost twenty minutes for a helicopter to arrive. Rainbow Dash had performed CPR on Twilight for the whole twenty minutes.

I suddenly realized that this was all my fault. If I had gone with the group, I could've healed Twilight faster, and her injuries maybe wouldn't be as bad. I hated myself for overreacting to rejection. If I had just gone with the group, Twilight wouldn't be at Death's doorstep. Twilight wouldn't be walking over life's horizon. Twilight would be okay. But she wasn't, and it was my fault. I felt stress building up.

I knew I had to save Twilight. I just knew it. I bolted out of the room, still teary eyed, and found Twilight's doctor. He obviously knew me, so they were surprised to see me so weak.

"Hello, doctor," I choked out, "I'm not sure if you're aware, but Twilight Sparkle is in critical condition and needs immediate help."

"Yes, I'm aware of this," said the doctor. "However, there are other patients in need if you're not aware. I will be helping Twilight very soon, rest assured. Don't worry, she'll be fine. She's just a little scratched up."

I could tell that he didn't quite grasp the gravity of the situation. If Twilight wasn't okay, the element of Magic would be lost, and Equestria would be unprotected from future attacks.

"Well, since you aren't going to help her, do I have permission to try and help her? I have healing magic and work as an intern here." I looked into the doctor's eyes, hoping to Celestia that he would allow me to help Twilight in some way.

"I'm very sorry, but you have not yet completed your internship, so you will have to wait until a doctor comes to help Twilight. I understand your concern..."

"No, you obviously do not understand my concern!" I was becoming livid. Doctors were supposed to help patients in need, and this doctor clearly had nowhere important to be. "Just let me heal Twilight. There's no possible way I could make the situation any worse." I felt stress building up.

"I'm very sorry, but I cannot allow you to do that."

"Well, I don't need your permission, then! I'm not going to let Twilight die."

I bolted back down the hallway, the doctor chasing after me. I opened the door and told the others to hold it shut. Unsure of why we were blockading the room, they all dragged themselves over to the door. The doctor, along with some security guards, rammed into the door, trying to open it, but the mares held them back.

I stood next to Twilight, focusing on her. She had so many wounds that it would take a lot of magic to heal her. I concentrated, thinking about all of the good times we had had together. I hoped that healing her would make her love me like in movies. I tried to block out all negativity, but some seeped through. I thought about Twilight dying if I failed. I thought about my weakness just hours earlier. I felt my stress levels heightening. I took deep breaths to calm myself. It started to work. I forced magic into my horn and started to see Twilight glowing red.

Suddenly, a crash resonated through the room. The doctor and security guards had broken through the blockade and were coming towards me. I kept going. I saw one of her legs mend itself. Another. Then a security guard grabbed me and my focus was broken. The spell, incomplete, reversed itself and broke both legs again, worse than before. Blood soaked the sheets, and I felt weak. My knees stopped working, I collapsed, and entered a "moment." Just before losing consciousness, I heard a flatline coming from the electrocardiograph. She was gone.

---

I awoke from the "moment" just minutes after it started. Everypony was completely still. The flatline was still going, and Twilight was surely dead. I didn't know what to think, so I thought nothing. My mind was a blank slate. I pushed back tears and remained emotionless like everypony else. We simply sat there for a few minutes until the doctor and guards awkwardly shuffled out of the room.

It took about a half hour for Rainbow Dash to choke out, "Well, I guess that's it then. She's gone." She lay down flat on the linoleum floor and started silently sobbing. Nopony else did anything.

After another ten minutes or so, Applejack left the room silently. Rarity and Spike left after another five minutes, and Fluttershy after five more. Pinkie Pie just sat on the ground, her color faded and her hair flat. She, Rainbow Dash, and I stayed in the room until a nurse came by to shut off the machines. She offered her condolences, but nopony heard her.

When all the equipment was wheeled out of the room, Pinkie Pie stood up stiffly and walked out, her movements very mechanical. I stayed in the room with Rainbow Dash for at least another hour, not really thinking about anything for the entire time. I finally realized that Twilight had passed on about three hours after she entered Death's realm. Still in the denial stage, I stood up and started shaking Twilight. I whispered her name into her ear, hoping for a response. When I got none, I started lightly shaking her. No response. I was violently shaking her and yelling her name, trying to wake her up, but nothing happened. Tears streamed from my eyes and wet the dead face. I started screaming, frantically trying to bring her back. Finally, I gave up and fell back onto the floor, sobbing loudly. When I realized that the last time I had seen her I had proclaimed my love and simply left after being rejected, I wailed even more.

Rainbow Dash was still sprawled on the floor weeping. She was still there when I left the room in a fit. After all, she is the element of Loyalty.

---

I woke up the next morning on the floor of the library. Open books were scattered around the room, and I could barely open my eyes. I couldn't stop reading. I needed to read to stay sane. Without books, I would lose my mind. I couldn't handle losing another pony. It was just much.

Spike had been up in his room the entire time I read, apparently indifferent about my presence. He'd simply shuffled downstairs the night before, acknowledged my presence, and gone back upstairs.

I levitated another book from the shelf. It had something to do with rare flowers. I read about fifteen pages of it before throwing it across the room. I cried for a few minutes, then regained my composure and continued to read. I picked a book on the stars, looked at some pictures, and pitched it.

It's all your fault.

No, it's not.

She's dead because of you!

Keep reading.

I continued this vicious cycle for the next few hours, staying on the borderline of sanity throughout the ordeal. Around noon, I decided to get something to eat. I walked about as slowly as possible to the nearest fast food joint, hanging my head as I walked. I saw people turn and look at me as I walked. I heard rumors being whispered. Apparently, Dash was still in the hospital. This persisted until I reached the fast food place. I ordered a medium salad to go and waited while it was prepared. The lady at the desk handed me the salad, gave me a look of concern, offered her condolences, and said the meal was free. I thanked her and left.

I returned to the library and continued reading. I never really ate the salad, but knowing that food was available comforted me. I would look over at it from time to time and consider eating it, but I didn't the salad to start a chain of binge eating from my depression.

Books were my only comfort. Nopony came to the library as most ponies in Ponyville already knew of Twilight's death. By this time, the news was beginning to spread to other towns. About midday, Spike threw a recently received scroll down the staircase. It was a tear-stained letter from Celestia offering commiseration for Twilight's passing. I crumpled up the scroll and threw it behind me before I finished reading it. I needed to read something else to stay sane.

It's your fault!

No, it's not!

You killed Twilight Sparkle. You could've saved her, but you didn't.

I was beginning to cry now. I collapsed on the floor and just cried. No "moment," no passing out, just tears. I wept until it felt like I'd run out of tears, and then I continued to weep. It was too much. Twilight couldn't be gone, she just couldn't be.

---

It had been about a week since Twilight left the world. The funeral was the next day, and the funeral had to be held in an open field because of the sheer number of people attending. Obviously, the Mane 5, Spike, Twilight's family, Princesses Celestia and Luna, and I would be in the front row, but ponies would be standing almost a mile away to witness this. All words spoken would be spoken into a microphone attached to a huge speaker system so everypony could hear every word. Other funerals had even been put on hold so that people could come to grieve over the death of the element of Magic.

When the funeral started, everypony tried to keep their cool. Twilight's parents, Shining Armor, and Cadance wept through the entire service, but they were the only ones crying for a large part of the funeral. Everypony else started crying around the same time about halfway through the funeral. I don't remember what prompted the sudden explosion of tears, but whatever the announcer said must've been pretty depressing. People of all ages, backgrounds, and from all areas of Equestria were crying over the loss of Twilight.

After about two hours, the Equestrian tradition of letting family and close friends speak about the deceased started. Each person in the front row went up to say something special about Twilight. Twilight's parents, of course, talked about Twilight's birth and childhood up until magic school. Princess Celestia talked about Twilight as a pupil, and Princess Luna talked about Twilight sticking up for her when nopony else did. Shining Armor and Cadance were too unstable to go up alone, so they went up together, taking turns talking about Twilight as a friend and sister between fits of sobbing. Spike talked about how Twilight was like a sister to him. The Mane 5 all went up and talked about how Twilight had helped them in the past, how Twilight was an amazing friend, and how the group would never be the same without her. Pinkie Pie added in a conversation with a rock while she was at the microphone, her mental instability coming out.

When it was finally my turn to go up, I really didn't know what to say. I had known Twilight the least of all the people, and anything to say about her had already been said. The only thing I could think of at that moment was how much I had loved Twilight when she was still alive, but I knew that I couldn't say that to everypony if I could barely tell Twilight. I slowly walked up to the platform, looking at the massive number of ponies that had shown up for the event. The announcer was still telling the crowd about me, so I had time to think. I looked behind me and saw Twilight's final resting place, and I knew that I had to tell everypony. I was probably the only person that had ever loved Twilight in the way I had, and I felt that it was my duty to tell everypony of my love. It wouldn't matter what happened anyway because Twilight would never be able to love me back.

The announcer finished talking and passed the microphone to me. I took a deep breath, calmed myself, and began to speak.

"Hello, everypony. As you already know, my name is Red. There isn't really that much left to say about Twilight. I'd only known Twilight for about six months before she...left, but I can say that she was an amazing pony, one of the best mares I've ever met in my life. She was brilliant, kind, funny, and she always knew just what to say. However, I didn't think of Twilight as just a friend. To tell the truth, I was in deep, inescapable love with Twilight ever since I bumped into her on the street." I looked up and saw that I had everypony's attention. Twilight's family looked up at me through blurry eyes, and I continued. "It's kind of funny how we met, actually. It was complete chance that I crashed into her on the street that fateful day, but it feels as if it were meant to happen. Ever since that day six months ago, I've thought about nothing but Twilight. She meant the world to me. She was my heart, my soul, my existence. She began to mean even more to me after we became close friends. When I told her of my love, she respectfully rejected me. This is the reason that I didn't accompany her on her...last mission." I looked down again and saw the Mane 5 looking at each other in shock. "I blame myself fully for Twilight's passing. If I had been there, I could have saved her, healed her, saved her life. But it's never good to dwell on the 'what ifs.' Either way, Twilight has left us forever and we'll just have to accept that. But no matter what, no matter how good of a healer I am, I will never be able to..." I broke off for a second to sob. "I will never be able to heal my broken heart." I broke down on the floor and began to bawl.

As I cried, I could hear ponies in the crowd clapping. Ponies were cheering for me through tears. I felt a strong pair of arms lifting me off the ground and heard a strong Southern drawl comforting me as I was transported off stage. When I finally opened my eyes, the teary eyed Mane 5 were smiling at me. We all embraced each other and cried together.

---

When everypony in the audience had calmed down a little, the viewing process began. According to Equestrian tradition, the body of the deceased was to be healed completely before being buried. The mortician also put a powerful temporary spell on the body to prevent decay for about ten days. When everypony walked up to see Twilight before the burial, she looked as if she were sleeping.

Twilight's immediate family went up first. They all crowded around the coffin and slowly said their goodbyes. They all sat down to share a good weep before walking away. The two princesses went up next. Princess Celestia seemed ready to kill everypony there out of pure rage, while Princess Luna simply looked down at Twilight silently. After they were finished, the rest of us went up. Spike went up the coffin and whispered some words into Twilight's ear. The Mane 5 all went up together. Pinkie Pie threw some confetti in the coffin, Rarity smoothed Twilight's mane, Applejack put her hat in the box, and Fluttershy sang Twilight a lullaby. Rainbow Dash simply sat weeping, hugging the coffin as if to warm it up. When the other ponies left, Rainbow Dash stayed there, weeping over the loss of her friend.

When Rainbow Dash finally let go of the coffin, I went up as the last person. I kissed my hoof and placed it on her forehead, then hugged her the best I could while she was still in the box. I shed a few tears, pulled myself together, and left the coffin on stage.

After a few other ponies that were close to Twilight went up, the coffin was sealed. I watched as they lowered the coffin into a shallow ditch in the ground. The ditch was filled in with dirt, and a life-size statue of Twilight was placed on top. The statue seemed happy.

As everypony slowly filed out of the field, everypony in the front row stayed put. When there was nopony else but us, we finally left. Eventually, nopony else remained in the empty field except for the deceased body of Twilight, still perfectly preserved as if she had just fallen asleep.

Comments

[Longshot]

4 updates in one day! Crap that's fast. All of it is quality too. Keep up the good work I am interested to see what is going to happen next.

586702 I am glad that I am not the only mythology nerd that caught that reference.

[Hearthfire]

Dear god that was fast...