Bon-Bon the Demon Slayer

by ObabScribbler

11. Selfless

Pegasus, pegasus, fly away home,
Your house is on fire and your foals are all gone.
All except one and that’s little Earthworm,
Who even knew that clouds could burn?

Unicorn, unicorn, magic off home,
Your house is on fire and your foals are all gone.
All except one and that’s little Starlight,
Who’s watching the flames dancing high, dancing bright.

Earth pony, earth pony, gallop on home,
Your house is on fire and your foals are all gone.
All except one, though we don’t know his name.
He just said that playing with fire is no game.

How many ponies can you save?
Jump until your heart gets brave!
One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight …

-- Traditional Equestria skipping song (circa 744)

---

Bon-Bon awoke to the sound of beeping. It was far, far too loud, but when she raised her hooves to block her ears she dragged on a wire of some sort and her foreleg hurt. She cracked her eyelids to see and immediately regretted it. Light had been replaced with a thousand needles that stabbed into her exposed eyeballs. She yelped, hooves flying instead to her face regardless of the wires.

“She’s awake!”

Movement. Quite a lot of it, actually. Ponies talking. It was all too loud. She whimpered, not understanding what was going on.

“Shh, it’s okay, sweetheart. You’re fine. You’re somewhere safe. It’s all going to be okay.”

“Mrrrf.” Her ability to form words hadn’t come back yet. “Whurr … mmm ... aiiii?”

“You’re in hospital,” said the soothing voice. “No, don’t try to sit up. You’ve had a bit of a nasty turn, I’m afraid. You gave everypony quite a scare.”

“Aiiii … dunn … ‘memburrr …”

“You probably won’t remember some things for a while, but it’s okay. You’ll be fine.”

“From what we can tell, you had a seizure, so it may have affected some parts of your brain,” said another, much less soothing voice. This one was male and spoke in a clipped accent she sort of recognised from posh plays she had been dragged to see in the name of ‘cultural education’ for Literature class. “You may also experience some mobility difficulties and nerve damage. Can you move anything other than your forelegs?”

“Doctor, I don’t think she needs to hear all that right now.”

“When I want your opinion, Meadow Heart, I’ll ask for it.”

“Palliative care is my remit, Doctor Ambrose.”

“And actual medicine is mine. Move aside, please.”

Bon-Bon listened without reacting. It was all she could do to lay there hearing them without her head exploding. Why was everything so loud? Even her own voice had sounded a few decibels above normal. And the smells! Even if the nurse hadn’t told her, she would have guessed she was in a hospital. The scent of antiseptic was overwhelming.

“I’ll ask again,” said the doctor. “Can you move anything other than your forelegs? Miss Sweetie-Drops? Can you hear me?”

“Uh … huh,” she replied.

Shielding her eyes with the foreleg not attached to anything, she tried opening her eyes again. The bright light was still there but the meagre shadow provided by her hoof allowed her to slowly grow accustomed to it. She blinked at the faces looking down at her. The doctor was a stern looking black unicorn while the nurse had delicate pink wings folded against her sides. The nurse stroked Bon-Bon’s other forehoof, which was anchored to a drip filled with some kind of clear liquid. Bon-Bon wiggled her hind hooves experimentally, which seemed to please the doctor. She wasn’t covered in any bedclothes and still had on her funeral dress, so she guessed she hadn’t been here long. Which really begged the question: where were her parents?

It didn’t take long for her to find out.

The doctor excused himself and the nurse busied herself winding a lever at the side of Bon-Bon’s bed so she could sit up and look around without the using her own muscles. The lever’s rhythmic squeaking was hypnotic. And loud. So very, very loud.

“Have you done a drug test yet?” Though her father’s voice came from another room, Bon-Bon could hear him as clearly as if he was standing next to her. He talked in a hushed tone, as if he didn’t want anypony to overhear him.

“Everything so far has come back negative, Mr. Sweetie-Drops,” said an apologetic pony whose voice Bon-Bon didn’t recognise. “There are still some tests we can run but I think we’re looking at a genuine medical issue, not an OD.”

“Oh great,” her father muttered. “That’s all we need on top of everything else.”

Even though his less than positive reaction did not surprise Bon-Bon, it still stung. He had assumed she had overdosed on drugs? Had he been the one to find her? She remembered crying in her room, then pain and nothing until now. A seizure sounded plausible. Couldn’t those be brought on by stress?

“We need to keep this as quiet as possible.” Her mother’s whispers rang loud and clear in Bon-Bon’s ears. “Think of the scandal if the press even got a whiff. It wouldn’t matter that none of it is true. Those vultures have made up enough stories about powerful businessponies coming a cropper in the past. They’ll lap this up.”

“And then the deal with Fragrant Fondants will go south,” her father whispered back. “I know what’s at stake, Candy. Honestly, couldn’t you control her for a single afternoon?”

“I just buried my mother, Sherbet. I think that grants me an afternoon to myself.”

“Except that you knew our daughter was acting out. You saw the way she was at your mother’s house. Couldn’t you see she was primed to do something stupid to get attention?”

“Couldn’t you? You were there as well. Besides, if this really was a seizure, I doubt she could control it enough to manipulate us just to ‘get our attention’.”

“I’m not sure how much stock I put in this seizure explanation. I’ll go with it, if that’s what the doctors say, but I’m letting you know now that I have my doubts. I saw her on the floor, Candy. My brother had epileptic seizures all the time when we were growing up. She didn’t look anything like he did.”

“Whatever you think, that deal is too important to let anything interfere with it. If we can make links with Fragrant Fondants we’ll have access to the entire east coast market through their specialty stores. It took months to set this up. We can’t let it fall through now.”

Bon-Bon’s throat constricted. She was in the hospital. She might be seriously ill. She had collapsed and been rushed here, probably in an ambulance, and her parents were discussing a business deal? Never before had she felt more like an inconvenience to them. Her impulse was to escape to Nonna’s, but that wasn’t an option anymore. Her throat tightened further, forcing her breath to come in short gulps.

“Miss Sweetie-Drops?” The nurse was back at her side, this time wearing a look of concern. Her blonde mane was coming loose from its hairnet and she pushed a few strands behind her ears as she peered down at the bed. “Are you having difficulty breathing?”

Bon-Bon shook her head. Fat tears rolled down the sides of her temples onto the standard issue pillow beneath. When she laid her ears flat the scrape of her ear-tips against the fabric was, like all things, far too loud.

“Oh dear,” said the nurse. “I know, sweetheart, it’s all a bit overwhelming, isn’t it?”

Bon-Bon couldn’t speak. If she did she was going to bawl out loud. Instead she bit down hard on her bottom lip and willed her tears away. She imagined shoving each sob back down her throat, far enough to burn up in her stomach acid.

“Shh. It’s all right, sweetheart. You’re safe. You’re going to be fine.” The nurse stroked her mane in an almost motherly way. It seemed instinctual, because when the doctor reappeared she stopped and her cheeks flamed with embarrassment.

The doctor told Bon-Bon that they had to run a few tests, just to be certain of a few things, and he was sure she understood. He spoke in a way that made it clear it didn’t matter whether she understood or not. First, however, they had to remove the drip and check out her medical records to make sure she wasn’t allergic to any kind of medical magic.

“It happens sometimes,” he said disinterestedly. “Although usually it’s unicorns and pegasi who are at risk. Earth ponies don’t tend to be allergic to magic so much as physical care; chemicals and prescription drugs and so forth. Hold out your foreleg, please. Thank you.” He removed the drip with practised hooves, not looking at her as he prepped the same leg for the allergy test. “This might sting a little.”

“How long … have I been here?” Bon-Bon asked.

“Hm? Oh, a day or so.”

“I was unconscious for a whole day?”

“More or less. Hold still now.” His horn glowed and beamed magic down at a small patch of fur he had marked out with magnetic tape. Her fur tingled right down to the roots. He consulted a piece of paper covered in numbers. “Seems all right so far. We’ll test for adverse potion reactions, crystals and gems, and then carry on to the actual tests so we can figure out why you were rendered unconscious in the first place.”

She had no reaction to the small amount of potion she had to swallow. It tasted vile and left an aftertaste like rancid tea. The nurse passed her a glass of orange juice while the doctor wasn’t looking, which Bon-Bon sipped gratefully. The doctor either didn’t notice or didn’t care about the juice; he just carried on with his work, looking up at her face only once to make sure her pupils hadn’t dilated.

“Hold this in your hoof, please,” he said, giving her a small gemstone that hummed a little. “Now hold it tight with both hooves flat against the sides and tell me if it starts to feel hot.”

Bon-Bon did as she was asked. She held her forehooves as if in prayer, pressing the gemstone between them. All at once, the stone seemed to disappear. She blinked in surprise, looking down at her clasped hooves.

“Does it feel hot?” the doctor asked.

“No,” she replied in confusion.

“Cold?”

“No.”

“So it feels exactly the same?”

“No.”

“Excuse me?”

“Can … can I let go of it?”

“I suppose so.” He held out his own hoof to receive the gemstone, staring in surprise when all he caught was dust and fragments. They still hummed, indicating they were the same stone, but broken as if a huge weight had crushed them. “What in Equestria …?” He looked at Bon-Bon, looked back at the fragments, shook his head and hissed air between his teeth in irritation. “Shoddy equipment. It must have had a crack in it. I’ll fetch another. Wait here.”

As if she could go anywhere else? Bon-Bon looked at her hooves as the nurse brushed dust from her bedclothes.

“Don’t bother yourself about Doctor Ambrose,” she said, half jovial, half apologetic. “He’s a very good doctor, he just doesn’t have a good bedside manner. He’s very good at his job though. Very good.”

“That’s … good,” Bon-Bon replied distractedly, still staring at her hooves.

She had barely pressed at the gemstone at all. Yet when she was brought another, exactly the same thing happened. She stared again at her hooves as the doctor huffed about incompetent colleagues and the nurse continued to make apologies for him. Eventually they decided the fragments’ reactions were sufficient to carry on and she was tested for what seemed like hours, until the doctor nodded and retreated to whatever room her parents had been in all this time.

“She’s completely clean,” he said to them. “There is no hint of any substance in her system – not even aspirin. We also tested her for malignancies and clotting issues but both results were negative.”

“Malignancies? You mean cancer?”

“Yes, Mrs. Sweetie-Drops, but as I said, fortunately that was a definite negative. Unfortunately I could find no legitimate reason for why your daughter collapsed other than … well, she just fainted. You did say she has been under some stress recently.”

“We all have,” her mother snapped. “But don’t all check out from reality for twenty hours because of it.”

“I’m afraid I don’t know what to tell you. We can monitor her progress and I’d like to keep her in overnight for observations, but other than that, she can come home tomorrow.”

“So it was a seizure?” her father insisted.

“Possibly it could have been a stress-induced seizure, yes. In which case, the best course of action to prevent a repeat of it is to make sure she isn’t put under any undue stress in the future.”

“She’s the cause of all the stress in her own life,” her mother muttered scathingly. As if she had noticed the doctor looking at her strangely, she hastily added, “She is a teenager, after all. You remember how it was when you were a teenager, don’t you? Every little thing was a major crisis and every major crisis required as much theatricality as possible.”

“We’ll do as you say, of course,” said her father. “She’ll have the best of care the moment she gets home.”

Bon-Bon stared at the ceiling of her room, wondering.

---

It felt strange to leave the Lunar Sword behind this time. Bon-Bon kept glancing over her shoulder, as if she expected to see it dodging between trees as it sneaked along behind her. The sword had put up less of a fight this evening. Though there was not the unhesitating obedience Luna promised, there had been a definite shift in their relationship and the sword was more willing to trust Bon-Bon would indeed come back for it.

Bon-Bon went about her patrol pensively, her Slayer Sense open in case of demon activity but her mind preoccupied. Luna had been so surprised at how quickly she had grasped visualisation. Was that a good thing? Was it a bad thing? Was she reading too much into the princess’s response? Perhaps Luna had just been surprised at Bon-Bon’s ability to handle a skill meant for magic-users when, as Slayer, she had so little magical ability herself. Or maybe it was something else altogether.

She paused in the lee of a chimney to shake her head. She was overthinking things. A pony’s worst enemy on a quiet night was her own brain. It kept throwing ideas at her to see whether she would fumble, catch or completely miss them. So far she was juggling thoughts of Luna, the sword, Lyra, Zecora, plus half a dozen other things. If she wasn’t careful, she was going to burst a blood vessel trying to keep so many in the air at once.

It was when she was leaving the chimney’s shadow that she smelled the smoke. Her heightened sense of smell caught the faintest whiff and grabbed the cord to ring the great clanging alarm bell in her brain. She turned her head, testing which way the wind was blowing. When she had located the direction the smoke was coming from she lost no time. Her hooves were a blur as she raced from rooftop to rooftop, cutting her travelling time in half. When other ponies would have still been several streets away, she was already looking at a sight that made her heart lurch.

There was no mistaking New Horizons Foals’ Home. The orphanage was a large building, three stories high plus a basement and attic for storage, with an angled roof, dozens of windows and whitewashed walls onto which somepony had painted a sunrise peeking over a grassy landscape. The windows shone now in the glow from the flames leaping up from the roof, as if the painted sunbeams had come to life and set it alight. The fire was currently limited to one half of the roof but Bon-Bon could see it was spreading quickly, eating its way along the tiles and licking around the guttering. She couldn’t see whether it had started in the attic but from the screams she could hear within it was clear it hadn’t stayed up there.

She didn’t think, just acted. There was a large distance between New Horizons and the surrounding, much lower house roofs. Nonetheless, she took a running jump and launched herself at the wall, scrambling up to the part of the roof not yet burning. She could do nothing to put out the flames but her instinct was to get as many ponies out of the building as she could. Not knowing what she would find inside, she ignoring the open chimney and instead clung to the eaves to peer upside-down into one of the upstairs windows.

Smoke filled the hall but there were no ponies running about. Far below a door flung open and bodies streamed down the steps into the street. Apparently the live-in adults who cared for the colts and fillies residing here had already moved a lot downstairs and were hustling them to safety on their own.

Lights flicked on in nearby houses. More ponies opened their front doors and windows to see what the commotion was. Bon-Bon wasn’t looking at them, so she didn’t see their alarm or the way some immediately went out to help while others shrank from sight as if they were afraid they would be called to risk their own lives if they were spotted.

“Hurry now,” said a dark green mare at the top of the steps, her lime green mane a mass of tangles that fell across her eyes as she chivvied the young ponies along. “Follow Jubileena and Silverspeed. Quickly, quickly, don’t dawdle. Dapple, you turn right around this minute and follow the others. Don’t even think about going back inside.”

“But Matron –” started a beige filly.

“Not buts.” The green mare, now identified as Matron, was firm but tried to keep her tone light, presumably so she wouldn’t panic the young ponies. She shovelled the filly along, using her whole head to give her momentum. “Don’t stop until Jubileena says so. She and Silverspeed know the fire drill, even if you’re a bit too sleepy to remember it.”

“Matron?” said a skinny-legged pegasus colt whose navy blue coat would have made him blend into the shadows on an ordinary night. As it was, Bon-Bon picked him out easily and heard the worry in his voice even though he was on the ground. “Matron, not everypony’s here!”

“Don’t you worry, Rain Chaser,” Matron assured him. “Holly Dash is getting them out of bed as we speak. You just follow Jubileena and Silverspeed with the others. Everything’s going to be fine as long as we all stay calm.”

“But Matron, the Home’s on fire! All our things are in there!”

“I’m aware of that, dear, but it’s more important we get everypony out as quickly as possible than try to tackle it. Ponies are worth more than possessions.” Matron looked up, squinting, her eyes moving from window to window. There were far too many for her to be able to see into them all, especially when the brightness of the spreading flames made her look away.

“But if we don’t do something, it’ll burn down!” the colt insisted. “Can’t Holly Dash use her unicorn magic to put it out?”

“I think it’s better if she concentrates on fetching everypony out of bed at the moment, dear.”

“All by herself?” said the beige filly. “Can’t I go and help her?”

“No, dear, you stay out here. She can handle the rest. Look, we’ve got mostly everyone out of E1, E2, P1 and P2 dormitories already out here. There’s nothing to worry about –”

The rest of her reassurance was cut off at a terrible wrenching sound. She stepped back, staring in unmasked horror as the burning section of roof collapsed inwards like a deflating soufflé. Tiles cracked and tumbled. Guttering squealed as it came loose and swung out over the street. Exposed roof beams burned all the more as fresh oxygen reached them. Bon-Bon cursed and leaped backwards, prepared to use the chimney as a jumping off point when an even worse sound reached her ears from the new hole.

It was the sound of young ponies crying.

“I can’t get the door open, Holly!” coughed one. “What do we do now? Holly? Holly!”

Again, instinct took over. Bon-Bon didn’t consciously register that she needed to get to the owner of that panicky voice. Her body moved of its own accord, dismissing the windows as foolish since they would introduce even more oxygen and cause the fire to spread faster. Instead, wrapping her cloak around herself, she spotted a patch of floorboard not yet ablaze and leaped into the hole. She hit the floorboards running, covering her mouth with her cloak so she wouldn’t breath in too much smoke. Her Slayer toughness lent her an edge but she still didn’t want to sear her throat and lungs if she could help it. She would be little use to whoever was trapped if she incapacitated herself through her own stupidity.

The attic door was set into the floor, just like hers. It had also been left open. As the attic and its contents burned around her, she didn’t stop to wonder why it had been left that way in a building full of inquisitive colts and fillies. She just jumped through and took off along the corridor of the third floor, listening for voices over the crackling of flames. Since heat rises, she kept low, adopting a hunkered gait with all legs bent, like a running scorpion minus claws and stinger.

“Where are you?” she called. “Whoever’s in here, yell when you hear my voice! Let me know where you are!”

“Here! Here! Oh please, we’re here in the dormitory and we can’t get out!”

“Keep yelling!”

“This way!” the voice continued to yell like a mantra. “This way! This way! This way!”

Bon-Bon soon located the voice, or at least the door it was behind, and found what had caused the problem. A portion of attic floor had fallen into the corridor, propelled there by a roof beam that now stood on its end, the other resting against the wall. It and the debris had blocked a door labelled ‘U1’. The placement of hinges indicated the door swung outward in normal circumstances, effectively trapping anypony unlucky enough to be inside.

“Hello?” she called, her voice slightly muffled by her cloak. Heat beat at her from all sides, making her blink as it dried out her eyes and singed her lashes. “Are you still there?”

“Hello?” cried a frightened, far too young voice. “I-Is someone out there? Please help! We can’t get the door open and Holly hit her head and she won’t wake up and …” It dissolved into tears.

“Don’t worry,” Bon-Bon called back. “I’m going to get you out. Is your window open?”

“No.”

“How many of you are in there?”

“S-Six of us and Holly, but she hit her head and … a-and –”

“It’ll be okay.” Bon-Bon mimicked Matron’s words, though she couldn’t match the false brightness of her tone. Her own came out grim and determined. “Get everyone into the middle of the room and huddle flat on the floor. Get as low as you can and cover yourself with bedclothes if they’re not on fire.”

“It’s … it’s not on f-fire in here yet,” the voice replied.”

“Okay, so make sure you cover yourselves up. I’m going to break the door down.”

“You … you are?”

“Do as I say and it’ll all be fine, okay? Yell when you’re in the middle.”

It was possible the windows would blow out when she kicked in the door. She didn’t want anypony blinded or cut up by glass, sucked out or blasted with flames. If they kept low to the floor with something to protect them they’d be better off, though that was no certainty. The fire was a doozy and spreading all the time. Already it had snaked down the staircase to the second floor, preventing anypony from getting out that way. Assuming she could get anypony out of their dormitory first, of course.

“O-Okay,” said the frightened voice. A minute later it yelled, “Ready!”

Bon-Bon turned. Her cloak smoldered at the edges but she ignored that to concentrate on the door and her own hind hooves. She had kept herself out of direct contact with the flames so far with her cloak, which was made from a fabric that didn’t melt onto her like some would have, but wasn’t complete fireproof either. Now, however, she had to come out from under it to get at the trapped ponies. Slayer or not, pain was pain and this was going to hurt.

Putting the full strength of the Slayer behind it, she bucked, breaking clean through the burning roof beam. She dodged aside as the top half toppled over and kicked out again, sending it over the bannister to the second floor where it wouldn’t be in her way. The door was still shut, so she backed up once again, ignoring the stabbing sensation in the soles of her hooves when she stepped on small bits of burning debris. One more powerful buck splintered the wooden door, caving it inward. As she had expected, the aperture caused the fire from the corridor to enter the room. A chorus of screams heralded its arrival – and then her own when she leaped through the gap to land inside. Her cloak now ablaze, she finally shed it, tossing it back into the corridor so it wouldn’t cause a fresh fire in here. The vials of banishing powder in her belt pouches clinked as she turned to look at the huddle of bodies and blankets in the centre of the room.

Bunk-beds stripped of their sheets lined the walls, the old iron frames standing tall against the fire determined to consume them. Six colts huddled over the prone form of a unicorn mare with a strawberry cutie mark and rainbow mane and tail. Bon-Bon vaguely remembered Holly Dash but didn’t know much about her other than her name and appearance. She hadn’t known she worked here at New Horizons. Her breathing was raspy and her pale coat blackened with soot. She must have passed out from smoke inhalation before she could empty out these colts like she had the other residents.

Something else became apparent when the young ponies raised their heads to look at Bon-Bon. Each one had a horn in the middle of his forehead. Suddenly the codes of the dormitory doors made more sense: E for earth ponies, P for pegasi and U for unicorns. New Horizons roomed ponies according to type and gender, apparently. That meant that somewhere else on this floor was another dormitory for unicorn fillies. Bon-Bon prayed they had already got out but resolved to find out as soon as she had got these six plus Holly to safety.

Speaking of which …

“So the window did blow out,” she said aloud. “Good. That’s how we’re getting you guys out of here.”

“Through the window?” said one colt. “But we’re three floors up!”

“I can’t use magic good enough to levitate myself yet!” said another.

“Neither can I!”

“Me neither!”

“Or me!”

“I can try but … b-but I don’t know if I could …”

Bon-Bon shook her head. “C’mon, help get Holly on my back.” She bent for them to hoist the mare up and they followed her to the window, trailing blankets like they were playing dress-up. Flames crackled loudly outside, making them cower away, but Bon-Bon stepped up and yelled as loud as she could, trying not to cough. “Hey! Is there a pegasus out there? Hey, up here! Hey! Hey!” She waved. “Up here!”

“Sweet Celestia, look up there!”

“Oh my …”

Bon-Bon breathed in as deep as she dared. “I’ve got six foals and an unconscious mare up here! Can somepony help me get them down?”

A silver-blue pegasus flew up from the street. Bon-Bon recognised her as one of the live-in ponies who had been helping Matron before. She tried to get nearer but wobbled and backed off again. “I can’t get close. The heat creates air currents that mess with my flying.”

“This is good enough. How are you at catching?”

“What?”

“If I threw a foal, could you catch it?”

“I … what?”

Bon-Bon spotted another pegasus flying towards them over the rooftops. Evidently she had only just arrived but headed over without hesitation. Her pale yellow coat and extremely long pink mane identified her in a heartbeat. “If you can’t, use a sheet or something. Hold it between you and Fluttershy. I’ve got good aim.”

“You can’t be serious!”

A gust of flames behind Bon-Bon and the screams that it provoked from the colts made her scowl. “Do I look like I’m joking? Don’t ask, just do it!”

Fluttershy had already turned and bolted through the window of a nearby house. She re-emerged carrying a flowery bed sheet. The silver-blue pegasus grabbed one side and they stretched it out, looking at her with expectancy and not a little apprehension.

Bon-Bon didn’t have time to waste. She rolled Holly Dash into her forelegs and threw her mightily. She hadn’t been exaggerating; after hundreds of hours of target practise her aim was very good. The two pegasi dipped when Holly Dash landed to keep her from bouncing off like a trampoline. Then they quickly flew down to the street and unloaded her onto the waiting ponies there. A cheer went up, as if this one rescue indicated the rest would go just as well.

Don’t count your chickens, whispered a traitorous voice in Bon-Bon’s head. They might collapse from smoke inhalation of heat exposure before they hatch.

“Who’s next?” she asked throatily, turning to the colts. She no longer had anything to cover her mouth and her voice sounded scratchy to her own ears. “C’mon, c’mon, I know you’re scared but would you really rather stay up here and be barbequed?”

“I’ll g-go.” She recognised the voice that had spoken to her through the door. It belonged to a chubby brown colt with a spiked yellow mane like he had lightning running down his head and neck. His amber eyes were terrified but resolute. He was clearly the oldest of the group and had taken it upon himself to set an example for the others. “I’m n-not afraid.”

Bon-Bon smiled despite herself. His gumption impressed her. “Okay. Come here.”

He bit down on a squeal as he flew through the air and hit the bed-sheet with a faint ‘whoomph’. As Fluttershy and the silver-blue pegasus carried him away, another pair of pegasi appeared with the same idea, another bed-sheet between them. Bon-Bon turned to ask who was next, only to find the next colt already at her side. They each allowed her to toss them out of the window, putting their lives literally in her hooves and trusting her to make sure they were okay.

When the last colt was gone she coughed into her hoof, her lungs and throat aching and eyes watering. Even Slayer durability only went so far. The air was thick as stew with smoke, reducing visibility to a hoofspan in front of her nose. Nonetheless, she refused to jump into the waiting sheet Fluttershy and the silver-blue pegasus offered.

“Did … the … fillies … get out … okay?” she asked, her words punctuated by coughing. She couldn’t leave until she knew the other dormitory Holly Dash had been emptying had escaped down the stairs before they became unusable.

“What?” Evidently her voice was not audible over the roar of flames now consuming the room around her. The silver-blue pegasus shook her head and waggled her half of the sheet. “Jump! We’ll catch you too!”

“Did they … get … ou–” Bon-Bon was cut off by a small bang that knocked her sideways. One of the pouches on her belt burst into blue flames as the contents of the vial within heated to such a temperature that it exploded. “Ponyfeathers!” she cried. Without the banishing words it would not transport her anywhere but the flames would still burn. Already pain rocketed up her side. She ignored the buckle, instead tearing through the belt with her bare hooves and flinging it away as another pouch detonated. When it hit the floor she barely had time to curse herself for not thinking thins might happen before several exploded at once and the resultant blast of super-heated air hit her.

“Sweet Celestia!” yelled the silver-blue pegasus.

“Oh no!” Fluttershy said at the same time as Bon-Bon shot over their heads and began her descent without the air of the bed sheet. “Quick!”

They flew after her. Ears ringing and head whirling, Bon-Bon saw them as if in a dream. The rushing night air was cool against her side and legs where she had been burned. It felt nice, actually. She was aware of yelling but sudden tinnitus stopped her from understanding what was being said.

Then, just as suddenly as she had begun her flight, it came to an end – not with a messy splat, as she might have expected, but with a wonderful cushion of purple magic that cradled her. It slowed her descent until she reached the ground, where it held her a few inches off the floor so she wouldn’t have to stand on her injured hooves. She cracked open her eyes to see an all too familiar face looking at her.

“Twi … light …” she mumbled. “Sparrrr …” It was hard to talk when you could barely hear yourself.

Twilight said … something. Her lips moved, at any rate, so Bon-Bon assumed she was talking to her. A few seconds later Bon-Bon found herself being cradled by forelegs instead of magic. She watched as Twilight’s lips moved again and the magic shot instead towards the burning building. A gigantic purple bubble encased the place, slowly shrinking inwards like someone was sucking the air out to vacuum pack it. Twilight leaned forward, strain evident on her face as she squeezed her magic to stick to the walls and roof, cutting off the oxygen that was helping the fire to blaze.

Someone got in Bon-Bon’s way. She leaned sideways, the whole world reduced to muffled thumps and baying that might have been voices, and the vision of Twilight putting out a raging fire by herself in a matter of minutes.

The flames died down and then doused completely, though by that time the magic encasement was so full of smoke it was impossible to see anything inside it. Twilight’s magic scraped upwards, dragging the smoke along like a spider inside a glass as you slid a piece of card between it and the wall. She gathered up the smoke and, like a batter in the biggest baseball match in the world, propelled the bubble upwards through the cloud layer. After a few seconds she sagged, having released the smoke where it could do no further damage.

A whirling dervish swooped onto the scene in the wake of the magic bubble. Several dozen pegasi broke cyclone formation, dumping the water that had been transporting between them right on top of the building to prevent the flames from reigniting. One pegasi swooped lower than the rest, pumping a hoof.

“Woohoo … ilight …!” Rainbow Dash’s triumphant shout faded in and out, though Bon-Bon got the gist of it.

As if on cue, the crowd of ponies who had gathered in the streets started cheering and stamping their hooves. Twilight looked around at them like she wished they would stop, awkwardly smiling and nodding thanks for their thanks. Her smile faded when she spotted Bon-Bon on the ground. She trotted over, her lips moving but her voice too muffled for Bon-Bon to tell one word from another.

Direct contact, thought that traitorous part of her brain. That’s a big no-no. You’re supposed to keep your distance from her. She’s not supposed to think you’re anything special.

Too bad nopony had told Twilight that. She brought her worried face close to Bon-Bon’s until a white hoof shooed her away and a mare with a red cross cutie mark inserted herself between them. The white mare had caught her pink mane into a messy ponytail that bespoke sleep but her eyes were alert and she pressed something over Bon-Bon’s snout. Bon-Bon realised a second later that it was a breathing mask.

“… inhaled a… ot of … moke,” the white mare said. “Take … easy now …”

Bon-Bon blinked. Her eyes still felt far too dry. The world was blurring at the edges. She struggled to hear properly, as if she would will away the tinnitus from the explosion. Needless to say, it didn’t work. However, she did hear bits of another all-too-familiar voice.

“... et me through!” it yelled.

Bon-Bon blinked even more rapidly. The world wasn’t just blurry now, it was fading completely. Was she passing out? She tried to sit upright but the white mare forced her back down and the ponies holding her helped. She craned her neck to give whoever it was a piece of her mind and was surprised to see Rarity’s father, his moustache sticking out in all directions. Beyond him she spotted ponies gathering frightened fillies and colts into blankets. He smiled and said something but she only caught one word.

“… hero …”

Oh no! I’m supposed to stay low profile. This wasn’t supposed to happen.

Something somewhere was screaming. She reached for her mouth, since the ringing in her ears was so loud she couldn’t tell if it was her. No, it was too faint for that, as if she was hearing it from far away. The more she concentrated on it, the louder it became, and the louder is became, the more curls of magic she could feel unfurling in her mind – blue as a terrified cry would taste. Her senses fizzled and switched around as the sound echoed in her mind after first bypassing her ears.

“…at’s my best frien…” yelled that all-too-familiar voice again, sounding like … well, actual sound. It yanked her back to herself. Sight was sight and smell was smell – and both were filled with burning orphanage. She shifted her gaze to the crowd, where mint green hooves waved above the heads of other ponies as someone jumped up and down behind them.

Bon-Bon’s world faded to black.

Very black.

Comments

[Stitchwolf]

Well now things are heating up...

I'm eagerly awaiting the next chapter!

[Luna-my-favorite-pony]

Let’s see it!

(The next chapter I mean.) Can’t wait!

[DavisSentoV5]

I'm glad Bon-Bon was there to save the day, but anyone else is getting more & more pissed off and disgusted with how selfish and heartless her parents were to her?

[ObabScribbler]

10385957
If they're inspiring that kind of reaction, then I'm doing my job right as their writer. ;)

[DavisSentoV5]

10386412
lol shame on you

[PonyofEntropy]

Great story. Added to my read list. I enjoy the YouTube channel as well.

[Stellar_]

Damn, just read through the whole thing just to be left on a cliffhanger XD

[Solar_flare_6535]

I can't wait for the next chapter