Legends Of Ponyville

by mechafone

2 - Coming Home Part 2

Lyra let out a little groan as the pounding at her door woke her up. The nerve! She was in no mood to deal with anypony, not after what she'd been through. After a few more minutes of trying to ignore the knocking that refused to be ignored, Lyra dragged herself from her bed, then from her sheets. It had been a long, restless night, full of tossing and turning. She crept down the hall and opened the door, bleary-eyed as Pinkie Pie gave Lyra a gentle smile. Spark Storm's wasn't the only heart that had been broken in the last two days.

"Pinkie? What is it, it's too early," the unicorn said with a light frown. Pinkie Pie held out a card for her, and backed away slowly as Lyra took it with her magic to examine it. She let out a gasp at the information stated on the card. She looked up to see Pinkie had gone. Lyra scowled angrily as she closed the door. Just what had happened at the party last night to make Spark leave? The whole party had gone without a hitch. Sapphire looked like she had fallen in love with Spark all over again, so what happened?

Lyra turned the card over and noticed the time for the meeting at the library, in just over an hour. You can bet your ass I'll be there, Spark, you'd better have a good explanation, Lyra thought as she burned the card to ashes with her natural magic. She turned and slipped down her hallway to her bathroom to shower.

---

Rainbow Dash laid in her bed, snoozing the morning away as she usually did. It was a Saturday, so there was no school. If she wasn't in school or practicing her continuously awesome flying, Rainbow was sleeping. It was one of those kinds of mornings where sleep was more likely to be had, it was getting quite cold. Hardly an incentive to get out of bed.

Rainbow suddenly shot awake when something tried to ram itself straight down her ear. She let out a yell and fell out of bed, legs flailing as she found herself on her cloud floor. She reached up and grabbed a paper airplane that had sailed through her partially open window and wedged itself halfway into her furry ears. "What...the..." she trailed off as she saw print. She unfolded the paper to read it. While the news of Spark's departure from Celestia's service was indeed a shock, she recognized this writing as Pinkie's. She shot out of her window to see Pinkie Pie, dozens of feet below her home, hopping merrily away. "Pinkie Pie! How do you do that?!"

Receiving no more answer than a distant giggle, Rainbow rolled her eyes, crumpled up the message, and tossed it onto her bed for later use. She immediately shot out of her window, giving no thought whatsoever to the fact that her aunt and her family had come to visit for the weekend. So it should've come as no surprise when Spark Storm's 10 year old brother, Chrome Spectrum, snuck into Rainbow's room a few minutes later.

Chrome was a healthy young colt, already starting to shape into a strong young pegasus. His coloring and marking almost matched his brother's, save for where Spark had black in his mane, Chrome had a thick metallic color, and his eyes were a dark purple, like his mother's. It didn't take him long to find Pinkie's note. Chrome's eyes went wide. He had seen his brother once before, though he barely remembered that time. He had been only two.

His brother was here? In Ponyville? And he was in trouble? Well, this was the perfect time to get to know the brother that his mother always denied existed. He knew she'd been lying to him about it, and now he could prove it. He checked to make sure that nopony was watching, then slipped out of Rainbow's window and took to the skies, following the unmistakable rainbow streak that followed in his cousin's wake.

---

Emerald Skies opened the door to see Pinkie Pie with a basket in her mouth. The basket was full of hoof-crafted cards, one of which she held out for him. He took it from her with a questioning look. Flipping the made-with-love card open, he read, "Sparky is coming home, bad fallout with the Princess, meeting at the library in two hours, don't miss it."

"Don't forget!" Pinkie called in a sing-song tone as she hopped away down the street.

"Pinkie, I'm here all day, every day, you know I'll be here!" Emerald called, slightly annoyed. Still, Pinkie's antics made him smile. Had that been her only mission today, it was a success. He sighed and closed the door, then made his way to the work desk in the center of the room. He looked over the card one more time, a frown on his face. He had been there to hear about what happened directly after the dance just yesterday evening, and it had made him lose a great deal of respect for the royal house.

Emerald had spent a great deal of time with Spark Storm, both growing older with him, and going on adventures and hearing everything there was to hear about Spark and Sapphire's relationship from Lemon Pop on their trip to Neippon. To hear that Spark had been chosen over Sapphire, after all the time apart, after all the blood, sweat and tears that had been put into their own personal goals.

There were other things beside Spark's troubles on Emerald's mind. The green pegasus closed his eyes, and thought back to the previous night and what he found.

The previous day, 11p.m.

Emerald Skies tried not to turn back and see the look of hurt he knew would be on Twilight's face. The two of them had getting along since being reunited just two days earlier. At the time he'd had no concrete plans to go back to the library. His aunt worked there as well, and she had things pretty well under control. He could've stayed and gotten to know Twilight Sparkle a little better. But then the incident in the ballroom. After hearing everything from Frostbite, Emerald hadn't wanted to stay at the castle anymore. It just seemed like a bad place to be.

Through the darkness and the rain, Emerald quickly discovered that trying to get home at at a time like this was just a little insane. However, he was almost halfway to Ponyville thanks to the downhill flight.

Something caught his eye, a light in the darkness of the woods. Emerald banked back around and down through the trees towards the odd, mint-green light, and soon began to guess it's source, and he was right. It was Lyra, walking alone through the woods and soaked to the bone, her horn lit up to light her way, and she looked miserable. He landed right in front of her, appearing right out of the darkness. Lyra let out a single yelp of fright and fell back onto her butt. Instead of getting angry, she looked away and was silent.

Emerald frowned and stepped closer, offering Lyra a hoof up. "Lyra? Why are you alone out here? We're still a good twenty miles to Ponyville! You'll catch your death out here." The unicorn got to her feet slowly, her eyes unfocused. Not bothering to respond to Emerald's question, she continued on her way downhill. "Wait...Lyra? Wait!" Emerald cantered to keep up with her, a concerned look burning in his eyes. "Please. Tell me what happened." When Emerald didn't get a response, he asked quietly, "Lyra, why isn't Bon Bon with you?"

That did it. Lyra stopped in her tracks and turned around, tears in her eyes, an angry expression on her face. She really didn't want to talk about it, but Emerald wasn't leaving it alone. She sighed heavily and walked over to him, taking a seat on the cold, wet ground. "Bon Bon and I...we're not together right now, Emerald. I kept too many things from her. S'all right," she said as she noticed Emerald's saddened face. "It's nothing I didn't do to myself. I'm the one that kept the book from her. I'm the one that kept flirting with you."

Emerald stared sadly at Lyra. He didn't know what to say. Lyra sighed quietly and started on her way again through the bone-chilling rain. Neither pony really felt the chill, both of them were uncomfortably numb at this point. After a moment, Emerald went after her. This was all his fault, and now he was going to make it right. Well..try, anyway. The first thing that needed to happen was to get the both of them home. "All right, Lyra, hop on. It's time to take you home." Lyra turned her head to glare at Emerald. The last thing she wanted now was to touch him.

Emerald glared back at her. "Look, I realize that things are pretty messed up right now. But if we're going to set it straight eventually, the first thing we have to do is take care of ourselves. You're not walking twenty miles home in the rain." When Lyra started walking away from Emerald again, he hopped over her and got in her way, his wings flared. "Look! I don't care if you hate me for the rest of your life, I am not letting you walk all the way home, alone, out here in the rain. Now get on, and let's go home!"

Emerald stared Lyra down for a moment, then turned around and sat down, wings still flared out to the side. He closed his eyes and waited. After a moment of silence, he felt Lyra climbing onto his back, her forelegs wrapping around his neck. Without a moment's hesitation or a word to her, Emerald stood and grunted lightly. He talked big, but the truth was, he wasn't very strong, and suddenly found himself wondering if he could actually do this. With a mental shrug, he took off down the hill, his wings spread wide and began flapping. After nearly falling twice, he lifted off the ground and finally took off into the air. His wings burned with the extra efford of carrying a passenger, but he got himself into this and he wasn't about to back out now.

The flight was a bit slower than it would have been just by himself, but they were still moving much, much faster than if it had just been walking. The air was chill, and the rain was getting lighter, colder. Lyra clung tightly against Emerald, making for a very warm back. Nice thoughts of the feminine form weren't on Emerald's mind tonight, though. Lyra's heart had been broken, now was not a time to be thinking of her in inappropriate ways.

It took twenty five more minutes to get to Ponyville, and by then Emerald's wings were screaming in pain. He pushed through it, just until he made it to Lyra's home. It was midnight, or around there, and the lights in her parents' home were off. As soon as Lyra climbed off his back, he fell onto his belly. His wings cramped, twitching from too much work. He pressed his head down against the ground, panting and groaning in the terrible pain he put his wings through.

Tears of pain had begun forming in his eyes when he felt Lyra's mint light on his face. He turned to look at her as she touched her horn to his wings, whispering, "Reficite." Emerald let out a sigh of relief as he felt his wings relax, the pain quickly dying. Reficite, that's...that's refresh, he thought, recalling the text of the book. He still had to talk to her about that. Lyra seemed to know the book far too well to have simply borrowed it for a week. For now, though, it was enough just to see her home.

He stood and shook out his wings before giving Lyra a light bow of the head. "Thank you, Lyra. Goodbye." He turned to leave, only to feel a hoof at his back. He paused and looked back at her. Lyra gave him a small smile before stepping back to give him his space.

"It's not 'goodbye'. It's 'see you later'."

Emerald felt his heart soar, but he gave Lyra the smallest, most genuine smile he could muster. "As you wish." With that, he took off into the air and made his way home.

Back to the present

Emerald Skies sighed quietly as his memories subsided. Poor Lyra. Poor Spark. ...Poor Emerald. Friend-zoned. He sighed and shook his head at his poor choice of self-analysis. Suddenly remembering the card that Pinkie Pie had given him, he looked around the library. It would need to be straightened out before...how many ponies did Pinky invite? Emerald sighed and stepped over to the door. As long as he was expecting company, he'd better ask Pinky Pie just how many ponies she'd invited to the library. He opened the door and immediately wished he hadn't.

"Watch out!" came a panicked voice. He was immediately bowled into as Rainbow Dash crashed straight into the library, taking Emerald Skies with her. His last thoughts before he blacked out was, "That's it, I'm adding a safety net."

Comments

[Jacensolo43]

Bahaha!! Rainbow's all too famous crash landing can make for great laughter material.

[Melody Brush]

"That's it, I'm adding a safety net." s for Rainbow's crash!