• Published 8th Dec 2017
  • 6,441 Views, 1,153 Comments

The Broken Bond - TheApexSovereign



(Featured on EqD) Starlight Glimmer was always destined for greatness. But when fate isn't all it's cracked up to be, it'll take the help of some friends to change the course she set for herself. But that's not the hard part - it's letting them try.

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Interlude: Trixie and Rainbow Dash Butt Heads

"Come on! You gotta know something we don't. You're always bragging about how the two of you are such great friends."

"I'm not in the business of gossiping about Starlight with any of your lackey friends."

Once, it'd be almost impossible to resist the urge to kick such a smack-talker in the back of the head. But then Rainbow became friends with Twilight, and later, a Wonderbolt. "Don't you care about making her feel better?" She zipped around, hovering above Trixie's path. "Anything, Trixie, anything you can tell us would be a real big help. You like impressing us, right?"

Trixie barked a laugh, deliberately turning a sharp left instead of going underneath Rainbow. "As if I give a flying feather about what any of you think of me, save Twilight," she muttered in a breath. "You wanna know about her so badly? Howsabout you act like you're Starlight's friends and actually talk to her like a normal pony. 'Cause I'll tell you this much... ooh, can't forget my magic sack." Rainbow growled as Trixie whipped around, leering toward a star-spangled sack as big as a melon and equally as heavy-looking. "I can tell the suspense is killing you," she turned her head, looking over with glazed, tired eyes, "so to explain myself, Starlight was able to relax around me. I didn't treat her like this dainty little flower. And that isn't bragging, believe it or not, because even when Maud and I offered to have a slumber party she declined as though we were asking if we could meet her dad. Clearly, there's something going on with her she's not yet comfortable enough to tell me about. That is all I will tell you, Rainbow Dash. Savor it." And Trixie bit down upon the sack and carried it to her wagon, where dozens of other stage props were littered about the entryway for "re-categorization" or whatever.

Rainbow's first thought was of surprise, for Starlight actually had parents she hadn't yet told her about. And if Rainbow didn't know, the others must not either, for Rarity was a tried and true gossip hound who was terrible at keeping secrets, especially under the epic relief of Aloe's hooves when they would go on a Secret Spa Date. She and Starlight spent the most time together of the six of them, not counting Egghead, and if Rarity didn't know, then she might not have told Twilight, either.

Her second thought was more of a realization than anything really deep or critical, which she dumbly voiced aloud for Trixie to mock and use as pathetic win points.

"Wait, you and Starlight hung out?"

Trixie looked to and fro, as if trying to find something, then set her bag down and looked over her shoulder. "Yes. And so did Maud, but she entered the scene later." She snatched it back up in her mouth, violently enough to send it swinging and nearly smacking her on both sides of the face.

So Maud was in on this, apparently. Wouldn't Pinkie have said that earlier? Unless she didn't know something about her sister, for once. Revelations like this were usually kind of relieving, reminding Rainbow that Pinkie wasn't an utterly perfect friend-slash-sister, either.

Trixie placed her "magic" sack at the foot of her stairs leading into the wagon. "And, no, before you ask," she said, turning fully, "Trixie isn't sure why Starlight declined our, or rather my, generous offer. We did nothing to offend her, and she turned us down so hard that Trixie felt it upon her royal cheek." Which she demonstrated by rubbing where she was symbolically slapped.

Rainbow didn't care if she saw her roll her eyes. Then, brilliance struck (she hoped). "Any idea why?" she asked, swooping closer as Trixie went to grab her bag. "Maybe like, I dunno, something you did or talked about?" Too much, too late. She always acted before thinking it through, a habit she and Spitfire were aching to break.

With an ursa-like groan, and dropping her "magic sack" upon the grass, Trixie did a 180, glaring as if possessed by the Alicorn Amulet all over again. "It seems all those crashes and rainbooms have severely damaged your cognitive skills." She flicked her bedraggled forelock aside, clearing her view, "so let me spell it out as succinctly as I possibly can." Trixie took a breath Rainbow could barely hear over the piercing cry of a teakettle. It's been years since this mare did something to tick her off. "I am not Starlight's only friend. I don't care if Twilight and her lackeys wanna give her the keys to Canterlot, as if that'd fix all her problems! You six need to mind your own beeswax, because how you're treating this is sickening to me. Sickening! I've half a mind to tell Starlight your game here, coming to Trixie and bothering her about things you, her friends, ought to know like a sixth sense by this point."

Ouch. Really, that hit like a wall to the face, all sudden and out of nowhere when, in all honesty, it was Rainbow's fault for slamming into it. She armored herself with a well-practiced sluggish blink. "Ya done, Ms. Great and Powerful?"

"That depends if you are," Trixie challenged with a whirl, a flick of the tail and horn, tossing that "magic sack" into the darkness of her wagon. "Shoot, I needed to sort through that." Any coolness points evaporated as the dummy galloped after it, disappearing inside.

Rainbow shook her head, landing on three hooves. "Not even close," she answered under her breath.

Even so, she wondered, Why'd I have to be the one to ask Trixie? Scratch that. A better question came to mind: Why do we have to deal with her at all? Rainbow Dash had doubly half a mind to turn around, give Lulamoon the nastiest, most vulgar flight trick in her arsenal, then report back to Twilight and lie that Trixie was just as lost as they were. At least then, the girls would side with Rainbow and accept that being direct with Starlight was the only way to help her.

That was all out the window once Trixie said revealed sh did, in fact, have contact with their friend. After failing twice, once to keep Twilight and Spike away from Starlight before Pinkie returned with Princess Celestia, and again for choosing not to fly her the message herself, Rainbow vowed for all to hear that she wouldn't return without something that could help.

With that, her honor and virtue as a friend was on the line.

She'd revoke her place in the Wonderbolts if it meant getting Starlight to feel better. And if Twilight thought Trixie knew "something" that could help achieve this, as the egghead put it, then Rainbow had no issue with basically grovelling before the showmare. Not that she would actually do that, as as if Rainbow would ever grovel to anypony, much less Trixie Lulamoon.

Said mare exited her wagon, floating an assortment of halfhearted props like stuffed rabbits and paper bouquets, and made a throaty sound upon locking eyes with her. "You're still here?"

"I'll ignore the fact that you called me stupid before," said Rainbow Dash. "But if you think I'm gonna leave without your help, you got another thing comin'!"

A slimy smile cross Trixie's lips. "Ooh, 'help' is what we're calling it now. You girls want my help?"

Sweet Celestia. Rainbow thanked the many hours Spitfire yelled derogatory insults at her teammates. Not the same, but Trixie was still somepony spewing garbage that really ticked her off. "Obviously," she cried like it was so. "Look Trixie, whatever gripe you have with us, just drop it already. I'm not saying we didn't mess up that day, because," she swallowed a lump threatening to solidify, "because we all did that day." Trixie's expression softened, though an edge lingered. "But if we wanna help Starlight, then we gotta both get over ourselves and work together to give her the help she needs!"

Trixie's gaze lowered, searching, her brows pushing together. Rainbow flew over, turning and craning her head down beside her, even hugging her close. Because like it or not, despite her obnoxious behavior, this dummy was Starlight's friend and therefore Rainbow's, too. Sort of.

"So come on!" she urged. Every second they wasted was another Starlight was suffering. "If we don't help her soon, Starlight could be in real trouble! Just come back to the castle with me, please? Come back, and just tell Twilight what you know, so that we can help Starlight correctly. And I promise," she said with a hoof upon her slamming heart, "I promise, on my wings, my Element, and my honor as a Wonderbolt, that we'll help Starlight get better, together."

Rainbow bit the inside of her cheek, held her breath, stilled her entire being save the wings that carried her so far. A breeze picked up, pulling their manes in a way much like she always did her father at a Wonderbolts show.

Finally Trixie's mouth staggered open. "When you put it..."

A loud, otherworldly womp sound yanked both their attention toward Trixie's "saw a pony in two" prop, where the grass bowed toward a sphere of teal light that shuddered, slowly at first, then faster, more frantic. The air around it became charged with cloudless thunderbolts, snaking around it at impossible speeds. In the second it began it expanded, a wave of light and balmy wind, like something out of the Bad Lands outside Klugetown. Acting quickly Rainbow covered her eyes, but returned immediately as soon as a ghastly whine boomed and faded, where Trixie suffocated in a way she never thought to hear from her.

And all Rainbow could utter was a breathless, "Woah."

Within a circle of charred grass sat Starlight Glimmer, that crazy-awesome unicorn. Her back was to them as she struggled to rise on tremulous forelegs, as though she'd finished her first ever marathon. Electric-blue bolts snaked around her in spurts, vanishing and appearing within the instant of appearing. A single strip of smoke curled from what was obviously her horn stump.

She wasn't making a sound. Probably in awe as well.

"You... are... a beast, Starlight!" she cried, swooping over as her friend continued trying to comprehend her surroundings, clearly in a daze. "Is this what you've been working on? Not even a week without your horn, and you're already back to doing crazy magic." It'd better be the case. Twilight would be relieved if that was the answer behind her cold shoulder these last few days.

But she still hadn't moved. Or answered. "Eh?" Rainbow flew toward her. "Yo, Equestria to Starlight!" A cackle burst from Rainbow's lips, still reeling from the gravity of what happened. "Can I just tell you how awesome that was? Because it totally was!"

"M'wuh?" Starlight turned her head, rubbing her forehead. And Rainbow screeched to a stop, her gut plummeting faster than she could ever hope to fly. "My head hurts," she mumbled, not even seeing the crimson on her hoof as she used it for support, painting the blackened grass around it.

Trixie stepped underneath Rainbow, jostling her aside. "Oh, gosh, Starlight. Y-you're bleeding. You're bleeding from your horn!"

"Yeah." Rainbow nodded, swallowed. Her mouth was dry. "Let's get you to the hospital."

Starlight waved them off with the finesse of a newborn foal. "No, no'm... f-f'hi..." Her eyes rolled to the back of her head.

Rainbow zipped, caught her before she hit the ground, uncaring of the warm blood tracing underneath her eye, down her cheek, trickling on her foreleg. Her friend was bleeding. Starlight was bleeding, she was actually bleeding from her horn, and...!

Rainbow exhaled. This was fine. She had it under control. "I gotta get her to the..." Trixie fired up her horn and poofed them to Ponyville General before Rainbow could finish.

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