Whisper

by Warren Hutch

Chapter 3

Twilight Sparkle looked from friend to friend as they huddled up out of earshot of the despairing unicorn pony. "So what do you all think we should do about this?"

Rainbow Dash let out a snort. "I say we leave her like that. Serves her right for wrecking Ponyville."

Fluttershy responded with a mixture of incredulity and dismay, raising her voice to almost conversational levels. "That's so cruel! How would you feel if you had to spend the rest of your life with your wings on upside down? We have to cure her of the poison joke, no matter what else we decide." At this the rainbow pegasus lost a bit of her sneer and couldn't meet the yellow mare's earnest gaze.

Applejack nodded thoughtfully. "Yeah, I'm inclined t' agree with ya, Fluttershy, but only so far as I think leavin' her all joked up ain't a fair punishment. My family lost their barn today, a barn that's been standin' since before I was even born, but it ain't worth destroyin' a pony's life over." She set her jaw as she glanced over at Trixie. "That bein' said, I do think she oughta be taken t' account fer what she did, make her pay off all th' property that got destroyed."

Rarity pursed her lips and shook her head. "With all the damage that's been done to Ponyville, the poor thing is going to be slaving away until she's older than your dear grandmare to pay it all back."

The farm pony returned her gaze with a furrowed brow. "Well, maybe she shoulda thought o' that before she went n' set them critters loose on an innocent town."

The alabaster unicorn let out a sigh. "It's all so sad and senseless, though. I lost just as much in the parasprite attack as you, Applejack. My shop is in shambles, and I watched as a whole showroom full of my original creations was devoured before my eyes. But I still can't quite bring myself around to the idea of trying to get anything back by making the poor wretch suffer any more than she already has. Not over mere objects that can be replaced."

Twilight took a grave look around the library. "Some of the books that got eaten can't be replaced, at least not easily. I can't begin to put a value in bits on what was lost. It makes me more sad than angry, though."

Rainbow Dash shook her head. "So what, you're all saying that if you do enough damage you should be let off 'cos there's no way you'll ever fully pay it back anyway?"

She ruffled her wings in irritation. "Well, you might not be angry but I am. She came here specifically to wreck the town and ruin Twilight's reputation. That makes me so mad I could just go right over there and kick her."

Fluttershy pawed at the ground, giving her fellow pegasus a pleading look. "Oh please, you mustn't... This was all the result of a terrible misunderstanding. A mistake." She hung her head and peered anxiously at her brash friend from behind the curtain of her pink mane. "You were willing to forgive me for keeping a parasprite around even after we'd struggled to get rid of the first swarm."

Rainbow Dash shook her head. "That's different. You kept that parasprite 'cos you love little animals, maybe too much for your own good. Trixie did all this out of spite. She wanted to hurt us."

Twilight Sparkle looked thoughtful. "Princess Celestia was willing to forgive Princess Luna for imprisoning her and trying to plunge the world into eternal night, and we were willing to forgive her for trying to waylay or kill us while we searched for the Elements of Harmony. Her motivations were just as malevolent if not more so."

Applejack pursed her lips. "Well, th' Princess weren't rightly herself when she tried t' pull all o' them shenanigans, Twi."

The lavender mare cast a long look over at Trixie, who laid limply on her side staring miserably back at them now, her grey cheeks dampened with tears. "Neither was Trixie, to be perfectly honest. While I don't condone it, I think I can understand how she might have been driven to do what she did."

The blond earth pony gave a soft whicker of disgust. "If'n she thought she'd been wronged, there's a whole lotta better ways to go about gettin' things set right."

Twilight gave a small, sad shake of her head. "If you thought your problems had all been caused by Princess Celestia's personal protege, how much recourse would you think you would have through proper channels?"

Applejack nodded and let out a sigh. "Not much, I reckon. I think I'm comin' round t' Fluttershy n' Rarity's point o' view. This whole business is more sad than anything else, just a big mess o' bad luck n' bad decisions."

Pinkie Pie, who'd been shakily balancing on one hoof and then another through the whole exchange finally broke her pensive silence. "Well, my two bits is that what's in the past is done, and what's done is in the past, and we need to figure out how to make things so nopony is sad anymore."

She started to lazily pirouette on her right front hoof, casting a pitying glance over at Trixie as she rotated in the drab unicorn's direction. "I can tell just by looking at her that she's super-duper sorry with sprinkles on top for what she did, and would never, ever do anything like that ever again in a million zillion years. I've also got a tickle in my right nostril, which either confirms what my gut is telling me or it means that I've got a piece of confetti lodged up there."

She let out a sneeze that threw her off balance and tumbled into Rainbow Dash, who barely managed to catch her. Her limpid blue eyes met with the pegasus' maroon ones. "I think we'll all show who the better ponies are if we could forgive and forget, and we'll probably get a really good friend out of it too."

The cyan pegasus huffed and shifted her wings, shoving Pinkie back onto her own hooves and grumbling in reply. "Well... Fine, if the rest of you feel that way I'll go along with it."

Twilight Sparkle looked from one friend to another, receiving nods of assent from each. A businesslike expression settled on her face. "All right then, I think we've made our decision, but I think there's one thing I need to hear from Trixie before we can go about getting her cured."

***

The group walked over to stand before the couch, where the drab grey unicorn huddled, a harrowed shell of a mare trembling with fear and uncertainty. "Wh-what are you going to do with me?"

Twilight gazed at her levelly, as her horn shimmered with her distinct color of magic. The restraints holding Trixie in place vanished, causing her watery brown eyes to go wide and her jaw to drop in disbelief. The lavender unicorn spoke clearly, with an undertone of finality. "We're going to help you get rid of your poison joke problem. But before we do that, we'd like an apology for what you've done."

The drab unicorn swallowed hard, tears flowing down her face as her whole body began to tremble. She threw herself at Twilight's hooves, wrapping her forelegs around them with a barely audible wail. "Ohhhh. I'm sorry!"

She started climbing up the thoroughly nonplussed unicorn's chest, her back legs and tail dragging on the floor behind her. "I'm sorry for making foals of your friends on stage and for insulting you and for boasting about fighting giant space bears and for bringing the parasprites and for destroying Ponyville and for thinking that you were an evil sorceress and wanting you to be tarred and feathered or turned to stone or crushed by a garbage wagon or kicked in the shins."

When she climbed as high as she could she clamped Twilight's neck in a tight embrace and buried her tear stained face in the lavender mare's shoulder. "I'm sorry for everythi-hi-hinnnng."

Twilight cleared her throat uncomfortably and cast a pleading look to Applejack and Rainbow Dash, who both stepped forward and pried the sobbing unicorn off of her neck. They set Trixie down on her hooves in front of them all.

The drab grey mare stood huddled meekly, still choking back her tears with a troubled look on her face. "I... I don't get it. How... how can you even consider helping me? I've wrought such terrible destruction on Ponyville, twice if you count the... the ursa. By all rights you should be s-stringing me up by my hooves in what's left of the t-town square and hitting me with sticks until candy comes out."

Twilight Sparkle shook her head. "We've decided to forgive and forget. Taking revenge doesn't make anything better for anypony."

Trixie bit her lip, her face quivering with emotion as a new wave of tears welled around her eyes. "I... I understand..." Her voice faded even softer. "Th-thank you. Thank you all..."

With a satisfied nod, the lavender unicorn turned and sparked her horn to life, lifting a green bound volume off of the shelves and floating it over. "Okay, well the cure for poison joke is immersion in an herbal bath. I'll just refresh my memory of the recipe and then we can..."

Her face fell in horror as she opened the tome to find nothing but a few gnawed scraps of parchment clinging to the spine. With a weary sigh, she tossed the shell of the book aside and cast her friends a mournful glance. "Well... I guess we're going to Zecora's place."

***

The small herd of mares clustered close together as they made their way into the deepening gloom of the Everfree forest, warily peering at the ominous trees that loomed over the winding trail. The occasional cawing of an unseen crow or a sudden rustle in the underbrush would startle them, but mostly an oppressive silence hung in the air.

At least, it did, until Pinkie Pie started to sing in time to their hoofbeats. "She's an evil enchantress and she does evil dances, and if you look in her eyes she will put you in trances, and what will she do, she'll mix up an evil brew, and then gobble you up in a big tasty stew, sooooooo...."

Twilight rounded on the pink mare and cast her an exasperated glare. "Pinkie!"

The cotton candy colored pony looked sheepish, as she turned and saw that Trixie had begun trembling violently. "Oh! Ohhh.... sorry. It got stuck in my head while we were talking at the library."

The drab mare's faint voice quavered in the stillness as they fell back into an uneasy silence. "Um... I'm beginning to have second thoughts about this, T-t-twilight Sparkle."

The lavender unicorn responded calmly. "There's nothing to be afraid of, Trixie. We're taking you to a friend's place for the cure to your condition." She nodded down the path ahead. "In fact, we're almost there."

They entered the clearing, Applejack and Rainbow Dash pushing aside claw like branches to reveal a huge gnarled stump that crouched at it's center, it's irregular windows glowing inside with a flickering orange light. A moaning wind rattled the bottles, gourds, and grotesque masks hung from the sparse tree limbs that still twisted from beneath the thatched roof. Trixie took one look at the ominous structure and spun on her hooves to make a break for it. "Oh, buck this noise. I'm outta here."

She let out a panicked squeak as Twilight caught her tail and stopped her. The lavender unicorn dug her hooves in as the drab mare fought to break free. Applejack rolled her eyes and bit down on Trixie's tail as well, followed by Rainbow Dash, then Rarity, then Pinkie Pie, then Fluttershy. Between the six of them, they overcame her surge of adrenaline pumped strength and dragged her backwards toward the entrance to Zecora's hut.

Trixie's faint wail sounded like air escaping through a pinprick in a balloon. "No! No! Nooooooooo!"

***

"Yes! Yes! YEEESSSSS!" An exultant blue mare cried as she rose up out of the bubbling cauldron and thrust her dripping hooves skyward. "The Grreat and Powerful Trrixie has rreturned!" She collapsed back into the murky brew, hugging herself and giggling with untrammeled joy.

Zecora cast a wan glance at Twilight Sparkle and her friends. "She's certainly louder, that's for sure, now that we've given her the cure."

Trixie reared up on her hind legs again, shouting out at the top of her lungs. "Fillies and gentlecolts! Ponies of all ages! Feast your eyes on the flawless form and glittering horn of the grreatest unicorn... No..." Her face fell as she paused, settling back down on her haunches and leaning forward with her hooves on the lip of the pot.

She sniffled as she brushed her sodden silver mane out of her face.Tears were beginning to form at the corners of her violet eyes as she gazed across at Twilight and her friends. "No... not the greatest unicorn in Equestria. That... that honor goes to you, T-twilight Sparkle. The... The Great and Powerful... Trixie is humbled by the kindness and compassion you and your friends have shown her... have shown me."

With that, she climbed unsteadily out of the cauldron and dropped onto the packed earthen floor with a splat, rising to her hooves with wobbly knees. She shook herself, the remains of the herbal bath glistening on her slicked down coat as Zecora came forward with a large towel and started to gently dry her.

Trixie kept her earnest gaze on Twilight as she let out a slightly giddy laugh. "I feel like a newborn foal right now. Like I've just started out on a whole new life."

Her cobalt blue features became very serious. "I want the new Trixie to be a better mare, to live up to the example you all have set. If I could ask you all for one more boon, I would ask that you help me learn how to be that better mare, to teach me about kindness, and generosity, and loyalty, and honesty, and laughter, and especially the magic that comes from all of those qualities being shared by good friends. I want to stay in Ponyville and help rebuild, to make amends for what I've done. Will... will you accept me here and let me start that new life off right?"

In answer, the six mares drew in close and embraced the seventh, surrounding her with a new sense of belonging.

Twilight's voice sounded out faintly in the warm silence, overcome with such joy that it was barely a whisper. "Of course..."

Comments

[Green_Lightning]

Love your work, all of it.

[Warren Hutch]

794123

[CTVulpin]

Oh, oh, I remember reading this somewhere before! I liked it.

[Comma-Kazie]

I wondered where this one got off to. This is one of the better "what if?" stories regarding Trixie.

Nice job!

[RTStephens]

A very nice take on a Trixie redemption story. I quite enjoyed it!

I've seen a few interpretations of what would happen if Trixie was exposed to Poison Joke, but this one here seems the most devastating. It's almost like she became Discorded.

It definitely left me with a warm and fuzzy feeling at the end as well. Good job!

[Trinary]

A very interesting and believable story. Handles the matter of Trixie much better than some other stories I've seen. And having her be responsible for the parasprites, that's clever. Ditto the effects of poison joke.

Love it!

[TrebleBass]

That was a cute little story! Fun read!

[CoastalSarv]

Cute!

[gapaot]

Okay, i FUCKING HATE YOU

Trixie DID NOT bring Ursa in Ponyville. It was Snips and Snails. She tried to fight it , by the way, knowing she can't win.

Trixie DID NOT started humiliating AJ and others. THEY started interrupting her show first. They are wrong ones. And do notice, that Pinkie, Fluttershy and Twilight never gone on stage, or boasted that they can do something better than Trixie. So, she didn't do anything to them. AJ, Dash and Rarity? They were as arrogant as she there. RD even said that she's already better than the rest.

And about the ending... "YOu may have vanquised Ursa Minor but you'll never have amazing show-stopping abilities of the Great and Powerful Tirxie!" - it's TRUE. Twilight can't perform to save her life.

So, you as all authors, get your kicks humiliating Trixie and making her apologize and making everything her fault and making manecast all saints.

FUCK YOU. Redemption my ass. Trixie does not need any 'redemption'

Read "Trixcord" or "Great and Powerful" from fenwolf2003, or "Boast Busted". Some, you know, good fanfics where Trixie is not OOC.

[Warren Hutch]

796163

Whatever problems you may be experiencing in your life that drive you to direct such anger and vitriol towards a complete stranger over a cartoon horse, I hope they rest lightly on your shoulders and get better with time and patience.

[gapaot]

796527

My problem is authors like you, who write about Trixie OOC and without any thought. I dislike thoughtless idiots who write about characters black-and-white like and turn manecast into some sort of always-right angels. Damn, RD is more annoying, boastful and irritating than Trixie.

[Warren Hutch]

797303
If that is your only problem, rather than, say, petulance, poor impulse control, general immaturity, and a tendency to throw insult spewing tantrums about fictional characters in people's comment streams, then you really ought to count yourself fortunate. Those of us with more complex issues to deal with have reason to envy you.

Perhaps you should go bask in your life's copious blessings elsewhere, far away from authors like me.

[gapaot]

797426
Oh, you want to insult me and have only positive feedback and never become better author, writing same bad fics forever? Okay, so be it. Enjoy your good reviews.
Gosh, I'm so sick of same plots in 99% of Trixie stories... redemption. blame always on Trixie, manecast is right, she's wrong, but they forgive her, bla bla bla.

[Warren Hutch]

797488

I fail to see how being told "FUCK YOU" and "I FUCKING HATE YOU", or being called a thoughtless idiot constitute much in the way of useful feedback.

Otherwise, thank you, I will continue to be grateful to the kind folks who stop in to read my stuff and are capable of leaving civil comments and observations.

Farewell.

[SuperChaosKG]

796163>>797303>>797488

You know sir, I was contemplating watching you. I thought about making you a Trixster. I thought that since we both love Trixie we would get along.

Then I realized that you're a hater and a troll.

Your first comment

Reason 1.) Okay, I agree with that.

Reason 2.) I agree also

Reason 3.) However, here, you're just bashing on Twilight for no reason.

Add that to the fact that you cursed at the author and insulted an entire group of writers, of which I am apart of. Dude, chillax. I loved this story BECAUSE I love Trixie so you don't have to hate like that.

Comment 2:

Trixie is not OOC. I hate to admit it, but my waifu's entire personality seemed to be "Bitch" so OOC doesn't really apply here because it is QUITE Possible that The real Trixie would act like this, especially after a humbling. Trixie Is NOT black-and-white in this because she is not shown as directly good or evil since she did bad things for what she saw as justice, a common "gray" area.

You like Trixie so you hate on the mane six and the author? Not okay, dude. And this is a fellow Trixie-lover telling you this so you best listen.
Maybe the mane 6 WOULD react like this because they are generally good ponies, and need I remind you, that they represent the qualities that make a good friend. As such, they are not "always-right angels" as they do have their flaws. Evidence is in the canon like in "Party of One" and "Lesson Zero" To each their own opinion on who brags more, but don't hate on RD because of it WHEN YOUR FAVORITE CHARACTER DOES IT HERSELF!!

Comment 3

You insulted the author. In none of the author's comments did they insult you. This is a great fanfic and a great author and after reading your stuff, I don't think that applies to you. If you don't like the plots then so be it. Don't read them. Trixie DOES need redemption because, as much as I still hate to say it, Trixie was an antagonist. The roles would be flipped if it was Trixie's POV but it doesn't change the fact that she is an antagonist. As such, the mane 6 wouldn't be that quick to trust her, as seen in the fanfic. Due to this, redemption stories work because we finally see Trixie as NOT hated by the Ponyvillians, which i'm guessing that you want to see.

General

You seem to forget that this is a fandom. We have our own continuities and do with characters as we please. Such as making a mistake in a background pony a fleshed out character, making another Doctor Who, and do I even have to say clop? I don't care if you think Trixie is OOC because this is the author's world, the author's take on ponyville and THE AUTHOR'S STORY!! Not your's. They can write whatever they want and you don't have to like it. Fine. Don't read it. Why torture yourself through 3 chapters just to hate at the end? It's pointless.

If you excuse me, I'm gonna un-watch you now. Lay off the haterade and

Check Yourself., Before You Wreck Yourself.

I'm Super Soni-Chaos Kinesis Gaia and I remember it so YOU don't have to, hater. Peace.

[SuperChaosKG]

797568

Sorry for the wall of text. I just couldn't let that go. Anyway, it was a good, cute story. I'm gonna like and favorite it.

[gapaot]

800253

You know, I can argue with you but... why bother? You apparently think that I can't express my opinion here, and need to quetly ignore shitty stories with stupid overused plots and two-dimensional characters that insult and belittle Trxiie. Well, so be it. I'll rather re-read "Substitute Harmony".

[djthomp]

One more excellent story, and at this point I believe I have read everything (posted here) that you have written and I loved it all.

*reads the comments* OK, wasn't expecting that...

[Warren Hutch]

927051
I suppose you're referring to certain folks' taking umbrage to my little tale.
Yeah, here on the interwub y'never know when someone's jimmies are gonna get rustled. Can't please everyone, I guess.
Glad you enjoyed it, tho.

[TickleGremlin]

I read this again out of grief over Earth&Sky finishing.

You sir, you are awesome.

[j-grizz]

Been reading through your other works on Fimfiction. Neat Story. Loves me a good Trixie fic.

[Warren Hutch]

2001849