Daughter(s)

by Zeck

Breaking A Promise

“Moth—” Berry caught herself and cleared her throat. “Sangria, that’s not exactly an appropriate question, is it?”

Minuette cocked her head as she stared at her wife. She wasn’t sure what was more shocking now; Sangria’s question, or the fact that Berry was scolding another pony for making a dirty joke.

Sangria pouted and slouched back in her bed. “For a pony who looks like you, you’re not very fun, are you?”

“Excuse me?” Berry asked, taking a step forward instantly. “I’m loads of fun! Isn’t that right, Collie?” She turned and looked at Minuette, her face twisted into a scowl.

“Er…” Minuette tugged at her coat and cleared her throat. “What Miss Noir does on her free time is not really up for me to say.”

Berry’s face fell, but then her eyes went wide as she realized how close she had come to blowing their cover. “Uh, right. My apologies, Doctor.”

“Fine,” Sangria said with a sigh. She closed her eyes and for a moment, Minuette thought she had fallen asleep. She looked so frail in the hospital bed, and just asking the question appeared to have taken a toll on her.

But just when Minuette was about to ask if she was still awake, the pony slowly opened her eyes. “So…what brings you two here?”

Minuette’s mind went blank. Sangria had been in control of the conversation since the moment they had entered the room, despite her frail body. Minuette had been so caught up in answering her questions and worrying about her wife’s reaction that she hadn’t thought of a good cover story.

“Doctor Colgate and I are simply walking,” Berry said after a full twenty seconds. “This room was next on our…rounds?” Berry looked at Minuette as she spoke and Minuette nodded. “Yeah, rounds.”

“Wish…you’d been my nurse…before,” Sangria whispered with a weak smile. “I bet…just seeing you makes a lot of ponies happy. Did you happen to see my husband and little girl out there?”

“Yes,” Berry answered, her body going stiff.

“Passed them on the way here,” Minuette added, glancing at her wife’s rigid form.

“Did you now?” Sangria asked, a smirk forming on her face. She closed her eyes and nodded just a bit. She opened her eyes once more, taking twice as long as before.

“You have a very cute daughter,” Minuette added. “The pigtails are adorable.”

“Mm…I don’t think she’ll keep them much longer though.” Sangria looked at Berry. “Gets too tangled with a mane like that, right?”

Berry bit her lip to stop it from quivering. She blinked several times, but her voice never came. Instead, she just nodded.

Minuette inhaled sharply as an odd sensation pricked the back of her neck. She reached up and rubbed it, thinking that it was nothing more than a bug-bite, but as she did, she felt the tingling creeping into her hooves. Two seconds later, her nose started to itch, and a second after that, a sneeze escaped her body.

As she closed her eyes from the sneeze, time froze for her. It only lasted for the length of a blink, but she felt the familiar disturbance wash over her. Afraid she had just been ripped from Berry and Sangria, she flung her eyes open, but was relieved to see that she was still in the hospital room with them.

“Are you all right, Doctor?” Sangria asked.

“Yeah,” Berry added, the terror on her face saying what she could not.

Minuette scrunched her nose a few times. “Yes, I’m fine. Just a little—achoo!”

This time, Minuette grabbed onto the time stop with all her might. She didn’t open her eyes, but she could tell that she had caught herself in its effects this time.

“Not…now!” she said through gritted teeth. She channeled magic through her body and forced it outward, trying to stabilize time around herself. If she could find a way to do it, then they could stay a bit longer and talk to—

“I…I don’t want to lose another Mom…”

Pinchy’s words tore thought Minuette mind with such clarity that she screamed. Her eyes flew open and she gasped for air, only to find herself standing in the hospital room once again, two very concerned mares staring at her.

“Doctor?” Sangria asked, strength returning to her body for a few moments as she sat up in her bed.

Minuette’s blue eyes darted between the two ponies looking at her. It was unnerving in a way, because the faster she looked between them, the more their faces looked alike.

“Collie…?” Berry asked, tears running down her face. She wiped them away quickly, but Minuette saw Sangria turn to her with a worried look. “Is it…time?”

“No,” Minuette said. She looked down at her front hooves, the tingling sensation slowly spreading up her forelegs. This wasn’t like before with Berry on the couch. This was different. This was something pulling her somewhere, like a current, instead of a wave crashing over her.

Pinchy’s in trouble!

As the thought formed in Minuette mind, the sensation of being pulled grew stronger. She had to anchor herself in the room mentally to keep from vanishing.

She looked up at her wife and the frail pony she had been robbed off much too early in life. This was going to be the only chance Berry would get to see her again. The only chance she would get to say things she had never gotten a chance to say, or tell her all about her life, or just sit and talk about nothing like they should have been able to when the Earth pony was young.

And Minuette knew Berry would throw all of that away in a heartbeat for Pinchy.

So Minuette decided she needed to break her promise to Berry.

“Um…Nurse Noir?” she said. “May I have a word with you?”

“Sure, Doctor…” Berry replied with a look. She looked back at Sangria for a moment, and then walked out of the room.

“Excuse us for just a moment, please,” Minuette said with a forced smile. She then followed Berry out of the room and closed the door behind them. She didn’t even get a chance to turn around before her Earth pony was in her face.

“You have to make this last longer!” Berry almost shouted her demand in Minuette’s face. “Please, Collie! I…I haven’t…I just need more time!”

Minuette reached out and wrapped her wife in the tightest hug she could manage. “Of course,” she whispered as she inhaled the mare’s scent. She knew Berry’s limit for public hugging was no more than five seconds—real, emotional hugs like this one—but she held her close for an extra three before finally pulling away.

And immediately regretted the extension.

“What’s wrong?” Berry said as her raspberry-shaded eyes glared at Minuette.

“Nothing…?” Minuette tried to worm her way out of Berry’s gaze, but she had no where to go. The door was right behind her, and all that was in front of her was Berry’s form struggling not to burst out of her nurse’s outfit.

“You’re lying,” Berry said darkly. “You only do that when something serious is bothering you.”

Minuette took a deep breath through her nose. “I have to leave for a bit.”

The color drained from Berry’s face and Minuette had to lean forward to stop her from collapsing.

“But…” the Earth pony whispered as she steadied herself on Minuette’s shoulder. “You…I can’t…Collie, I need you here! Please!”

“Berry, I have to go and fix something in the time stream. And” Minuette put her hoof on her wife’s mouth to stop her from protesting “if I do this, it should give you more time with her.”

Minuette could see the gears turning in her wife’s mind. It took her a full minute before she finally sighed and nodded. “You’ll be back, right? I…I want to…I want her to know you.”

Minuette smiled in an effort to keep a tear from her blue eye. “Of course. And if I do this right, I’ll only be gone for a few minutes. After all, I’m a pro at this time stuff. Kind of.”

“I’m holding you to that.”

Minuette stepped aside and Berry went toward the door. She pushed it open a bit before Minuette whipped the Earth pony’s plump flank with her tail.

“Besides, I’m not about to leave that stranded in the past where I can’t get it.”

Beryy shot the Unicorn a look that made her weak in all four of her knees. “True. You’d go insane without it.”

With that, Berry went back into the room and closed the door. Minuette counted to six before she looked around. The hallway she was standing in was completely deserted. Confident that no pony would see what was about to happen, she took a deep breath and opened her body to the strange magic that had been tugging at her moments before.

At first there was nothing, not even darkness, but a moment later Minuette heard in her mind that familiar sound of a gushing river. Her eyes snapped open and she found herself engulfed in the rushing, thrashing tides of the familiar stream of time. Panic threatened to overtake her once more, but she knew she had a lifetime to calm her nerves, and she immediately found herself casually treading water. Without having to worry about Berry, she found navigating the strange disturbance much easier.

Where do I go?

“Leave Mom alone!”

Pinchy!

The filly’s terrified and defiant voice screeched through the vastness. It was as bright as Princess Celestia raising the sun on clear morning, and it drowned the area in a darkness that shamed Princess Luna’s night. It warped the river around the Unicorn, flipping it over her heard before making it crash down on her left side.

Another whirlpool opened to Minuette’s right. A pillar of light lanced out of it, the same shade of pink as her daughter’s coat, and the Unicorn wasted no time. She swam, flew, and fell toward the whirlpool as fast as the distortion allowed her to. She reached out for it with her hoof and barely managed to touch it—

Minuette screamed in pain. Something was biting into her neck. No, something was tearing into her neck. It ripped through her fur and she felt it gouge into her flesh and then sink into her blood. She screamed even louder and then countless more things dug into her flesh just below to original points. She had the brief sensation of fluid pouring, and even being sucked, out of her gaping neck wound as she screamed, writhing in the dirt—

Dirt?

As soon as the thought crossed her mind, the pain in her neck vanished. Minuette’s blue eyes snapped open and she gasped for breath, her throat raw from screaming. It took her a long time—she didn’t know how long exactly, and that unnerved her—before her brain was stable enough to begin figuring out where she was.

“The Everfree Forest…?” she whispered as she looked around. Why in Princess Celestia’s good name would Pinchy be here? Minuette, and especially Berry, had told her time and time again never to venture into this place without at least one of them, and yet she was positive that she was now laying in its murky depths.

Oh, she is getting such a talking to when I find her!

Confused, Minuette started to stand and then something akin to a hammer slammed into her mind. She gasped, just as much from shock as from pain, as memories flooded into her crowded mind.

Changelings. Attacking Canterlot. Trapped. Berry and Pinchy have to escape. Do something! Draw them away!

Pieces of thoughts plunged into the Unicorn’s mind, driving her back to the ground. She gritted her teeth, silently begging for it all to stop, but it kept coming.

Run! It’s working! Berry! Protect her! Dead end! No! Tell me they got away! No, no, stay back! STAY BA—!

The pain in her neck flashed again, this time more like a dull ember than a searing flame, and Minuette realized what she had just gone through.

For three and a half minutes, she lay in the dirt, shivering in the comforting darkness of the cursed forest. What had happened in this timeline? How had the Changelings managed to invade Canterlot? How had they managed to defeat both Princess Celestia and Princess Luna? How had any of this come—?

A scream of pain echoed through the forest, along with what sounded like miniature fireworks. Minuette turned her head in the direction and saw flashes of light in the distance. A moment later, she saw a dazzling green light that she recognized all too well as Changeling magic, and then she heard a sound that drove every other thought from her mind:

Pinchy’s terrified squeaking.

Minuette was on her hooves and running before her heart had a chance to pump the blood she needed to move. She tore through the forest toward the lights. As they grew brighter, a single thought slowly burned in her mind:

Death.

She was coming, and whatever was frightening her precious daughter was going to experience death in ways that, until just moments ago, Minuette didn’t think were possible.

Author's Note:

Sweet Royal Sisters, I haven't updated this in forever. Truth be told, I got kind of stuck, and then more stuff happened that sapped my will to write for...quite a while. But! I'm back, and while this chapter is short, it's because this is Berry's story, and next chapter we'll get back to her.

For those of you that are curious what Minuette is involved in, you can go read The Great and Powerful Trixie's Greatest Show to find out. She doesn't show up until the end, but I think you'll like it.

Comments

[Sphinx_Herald]

She looked up at her wife and the frail pony she had been robbed off much too early in life.

robbed of

“Nothing…?” Minuette tried to worm her way out of Berry’s gaze, but she had no where to go.

Nowhere

Beryy shot the Unicorn a look that made her weak in all four of her knees.

While that's an interesting way to spell it, I don't think that's her name.

It warped the river around the Unicorn, flipping it over her heard before making it crash down on her left side.

Head?

Oh my goodness, a chapter! And a great chapter at that, and nice way of linking it to one of your previous ones. And poor Berry, hopefully Collie makes it back in time to get to know Berry's mother more. Anyways, looking forward to the next chapter, of which ever of your stories gets updated next. Well, until next time, which hopefully isn't going to be in too long,
-Sphinx

[Zeck]

7945520 Bonus points awarded!!!