Dull Armor

by BluejayCoolman

The Last Letter to the Princess

"Twilight! Twilight! Wake up Twilight!" the purple unicorn was waking up to the sound of a familiar voice. She opened her eyes to find Cadence who had been crying recently. "Twilight, it's an emergency! Come with me." you could hear the panic in the princess's voice as she woke the sleeping pony. "Come on, we haven't got much time!" Twilight followed her, racing up the stairs to her brother's room as quickly as she could. When they reached the top, Princess Cadence rammed into the double doors which slammed loudly as the doorknobs hit the walls. Not even bothering to close the door back she and Twilight quickly went over to Shining Armor's bed, where he was coughing and wheezing. The nurse was there with a look of desperation on her face.

"I'm afraid, I'm afraid he won't last but a few more minutes." even the nurse was beginning to cry a little, for the prince had been good to all of his subjects.

"A few MINUTES?!" Twilight exclaimed, "I thought you said that he had a few days?!"

"Well, I thought so too, but his fever started getting rapidly worse all of a sudden and, and there's not much time left." the nurse reasoned. Turning over to the bed, the mare saw how much worse he looked since the day before. He was so pale and sickly looking. She couldn't believe her eyes.

"Cadence, remember that I'll always love you. And that *cough couch* no matter what, I'll always be with you." the white stallion whispered soothingly into his wife's ear. "And Twiley," he said gently, directing his attention to his younger sister, "I love you Twiley. Never forget that." he barely got the words out of his mouth before he started having a fit of coughing, followed by a small sigh, then silence.

Twilight woke up on the floor. Apparently she had blacked out from the shock of it all. Her brother was dead now. She couldn't believe it. She got up, and immediately the nurse spoke.

"We should bury him soon. I'll talk to Princess Celestia about the funeral arrangements." she slowly walked out, glad she had found an excuse to leave the room so the others could have some privacy.

There was silence all throughout the room. Nothing but silence. Twilight rested her head on her brother's lifeless body. It was still warm. She couldn't believe it. It all happened so fast. The day after she arrives in Canterlot, her brother dies. How could something like this happen? It just didn't seem right. From the expression Cadence was making, it was obvious that she was thinking the same. How could something so horrible happen so fast, yet so quietly? It was a shock to them both. But there was nothing to do now. After a while they both got up and quietly left. Leaving the lifeless body of Shining armor alone in peace.

Going up to her room, Twilight made a decision that should never have been made. When she reached the top of the stairs, she opened the door, wrote a few things down on some paper, grabbed some rope, and tied the noose that would bring her to her brother. Twilight knew that she could be with her brother, if only she could reach him. She locked her door and slowly levitated herself to the rope, then gently put her hear through the loop in the hole, and fell.

After a little while of hanging there, she started to see a light, with shining armor there, smiling at her. She was with her brother again.

---

After a few hours, Princess Celestia went to the mare's room to comfort her. She knocked, but there was no answer. She tried again but still no answer. She tried opening the door, and finding it locked she began to worry. She charged at the door, and breaking it down she was finally able to get in. She found her pupil there, hanging by her neck with a letter under her feet.

"Dear Princess Celestia,
Today I learned that sometimes we can't always control what happens in the lives of the ones that we love. But I also learned that if you love someone enough, you should always be able to be with them. Even in death.

Your faithful student,
Twilight Sparkle"

Comments

[ChilliConCharlie]

The ending might have worked better if Twilight hadn't hung herself. That didn't really seem to string it together very well and it was a bit too morbid, it kind of made it unbelievable.

Doesn't she love others? She coped fairly well without her brother when he was off at the palace before the wedding.

[xDan]

Rated Everyone.

[ShadeTail]

Agreed with Lazy Dan. This story is definitely mislabeled. It's not for everyone.

[Axquirix]

This fic was too telling and not showing enough. To elaborate, it's very "This-happened-and-then-this-happened". Shining Armour's tragically early death at the hands of a horrendous ravaging disease takes all of a short paragraph. It has a very hard time being emotionally impacting when it's so brief. A good start would be to use more descriptive wording; *cough cough* in the middle of a sentence just makes it sound like he has a sore throat. If you want to drive the point home that this guy is really sick to the pointwhere his own body is killing itself trying to ged rid of it, that coughing is going to need padding, up to a paragraph of its own.

On a similar note, Twilight hanging herself is written as devastatingly as "Twilight hangs herself." You could've written an entire day of her trying to deal with emotional trauma, then tearfully tying herself a noose and kicking her own bucket. If you were going for a sudden shocking death, on the other hand, hanging is a bit too long-winded. Twilight's room is at the top of a tall spire built simply to give it good view, though. Maybe have her stand on the balcony, admire the view for a moment, think of Shining one last time, then trip herself over the railing.

You could also up the drama by having Twilight actually -send- the final letter to Celestia. Have a scene where Twilight seems to get over it a little, and makes peace with the fact that her brother's gone. Have her write a note to the princess, but don't tell the reader what's in it. Switch to Celestia recieving and reading the letter, and mirror the reader's horror with her own. Cue panicked rushing through the castle to stop Twilight bumping herself off, and breaking the door down with sheer terrored punches, only to find that she's too late.

At the very least, this deserves at least a "Teen" rating. It's pretty clean, though, so no need for a Gore tag.

Critisism over, that's gonna be one hell of a re-meeting conversation in the afterlife.
Shining: T-Twilight? What are you doing here? I've only been here five minutes!
Twilight: I couldn't go on without you, Shining. I had to end it.
Shining: You couldn't go five minutes knowing I was dead? I'm not even through immigration yet!
*Cadence appears*
Shining: Am I really that much of a keystone here?