Heavenly Virtues

by Doctor Song MD

Kindness: Fluttershy

The kind and gentle Fluttershy loved animals so much that she even had a butterfly cutie mark. Nopony would have thought that she could get into trouble of any kind with her gentle personality.

---

Somehow, everypony in town knew Fluttershy, even though she should have been so quite for most ponies to even notice. Sometimes ponies would bring her their pets for her to babysit while they were on vacation, not that she didn't already have enough animals on her hooves. Because of her great capacity for kindness, she would take in animals under her wing that she found in the woods, and invite them into her home. Sometimes the animals would go back to the wild after they healed, but sometimes they would stay because they loved Fluttershy so much. Fluttershy loved them, too.

"Angel, where are you? I made your favorite!" called Fluttershy.

When Angel heard this he came scampering out into the kitchen. He was the most stubborn, grumpy, picky animal out of all of Fluttershy's pets, but he would do anything for his favorite meal. When his face showed up in front of his owner (not that he would admit anypony owned him) he was grinning. He dug into the meal that Fluttershy made especially for him.

"Good boy," said Fluttershy. She then said to every animal in the room, "Now, you all behave while I'm gone, okay?" She then fluttered outside, and shut the door behind her ever so gently, so she didn't wake up anypony who might have still been sleeping at that time in the morning.

Just as she had started walking outside, Fluttershy was approached by a young filly with a blue coat and white mane. She was carrying a box on her back, and crying. "Oh, Fluttershy," she whined, "Won't you take care of her for me?"

And, of course, Fluttershy couldn't say no to a helpless animal. "Sure. Um, what kind of animal is it?"

"It's a white kitten," said the little filly. "I found her in the alley, and she was being tormented by some mean colts!"

"Oh my, that's just terrible," said Fluttershy. She took the box from the pony's back, and put it on her own.

"Thanks a bunch," said the pony, who then trotted off, relieved.

Who knew I would have gotten another animal to take care of so soon in the day thought Fluttershy. And it's a kitten, too. How adorable. She brought the kitten back to her house.

"Hello, everypony. I mean, every animal." Fluttershy giggled at herself for calling the animals ponies. "We have a new resident. And her name is," Fluttershy paused dramatically, not only for the suspense, but also because she had to come up with a name. "Opalescence!" She put the box containing the cat on the floor, and opened it to reveal the small white persian kitten.

"Oh, how adorable," said Fluttershy, admiring the approximately three month old kitten. "How could those colts be so mean to you?"

The kitten looked up helplessly, with those big wide kitten eyes, trembling in fear. It mewed. Fluttershy couldn't resist stroking her a few times. After her urge was relieved, she went into the kitchen, and came back to her huge living room with a bowl of Magical Mama brand milk and set in on the floor for Opal.

With reluctance, Fluttershy said to the kitten, "I'm sorry I have to leave you so soon, but I really have to get some work done." For the second time that morning, she went out the front exit of her home to check on some woodland critters. Over the course of the day, she found an injured robin, a tortoise flipped over on its shell, a bear cub with a thorn stuck in his paw, and a squirrel that ate just one too many acorns, all of which she brought into her home to care for. That brought her total up to about, oh, I don't know, one hundred and fifty-four? Most of them were quite small, but animals are such a hassle to take care of all of the time. You have to feed them, bath them, and depending on the species, trim their claws and empty their litter box.

Fluttershy was so busy with all of her animals, that she never had time to clean her house. She asked her animals sweetly to clean up after themselves, but they never would listen. Fluttershy didn't have any money to hire somepony to clean her house either. Almost her entire budget was spent towards animals supplies. She could barely find supplies for some of her animals, like monkeys and anteaters, so she had to order them from Canterlot, or even Phillydelphia. The pet stores never seemed to give out enough coupons. Fluttershy had to work two jobs just to keep up.

Fluttershy's animals grew in number by the day. She couldn't find it in her heart to let go of them. She wouldn't let her friends come over to her house anymore, because she was too embarrassed of the mess. It seemed that the only time she got to see them anymore was at pet day. She eventually had so many animals that she had to stay home all day taking caring of them.

---

Soon, Fluttershy's friends became very worried about her. They knew she was usually quiet, but she hadn't been speaking to them at all lately. Twilight came up with a plan: the five of the mane six would meet at Fluttershy's house to confront her. They were afraid that if they told her about their plans, she would deny that anything was going wrong.

Twilight knocked on Fluttershy's door, with her friends waiting patiently behind her. "Fluttershy, are you home?" she said loudly enough for the pegasus to hear. She didn't answer immediately, but then they all heard something come crashing down. They were worried that she was hurt, so Rainbow Dash used her street smarts to pick the lock to her door.

The mares hurried inside, only to find Fluttershy buried under an assortment of animal care-taking supplies.

"Dear, are you okay?" called out Rarity.

No response. Just a groan from their winged friend.

"I'll take care of this," said AppleJack. She began digging out Fluttershy from the pile of stuff. Rarity and Twilight used their magic to help clean up. Rainbow picked up things with her mouth and began tossing them across the room. Pinkie Pie just hopped up and down frantically, trying to get a response out of Fluttershy.

After five minutes, they uncovered their friend. "Are you alright, sugarcube?" asked AppleJack.

"Y-yeah," Fluttershy managed to say.

"Why the heck do you have so much stuff?" asked Rainbow Dash.

"And so many animals!" added Pinkie Pie.

"And so much, ugh, filth," Rarity said, spitting out the last word.

Twilight helped Fluttershy to her hooves. "Why didn't you tell us you were an animal hoarder, Fluttershy?" inquired Twilight. "We could have helped you sooner."

Fluttershy made an uneasy facial expression. "I, uh, didn't want you all to worry." She didn't think that would suffice, so she added, "And I'm not a hoarder. I just love animals."

Rarity took a couple steps in Fluttershy's direction. "Sweetie, I believe that is called being in denial. All of us can see the situation you are in here. Just look around."

Fluttershy did as she said. "Yeah? All I see are animals. What's you point?" She was getting defensive.

"Can't you see?" asked Rainbow. "There are feces on the floor! And it reeks."

Fluttershy hadn't really paid much attention to that before. She had never even acknowledged the fact that her animals were defecating on the floor all over her house. She had been living in these conditions for so long, she didn't even realized that it stunk like decaying bodies. Maybe...

Before Fluttershy could respond to Rainbow's comment, Pinkie pushed the sofa away from the wall. "Eep!" squealed Pinkie.

Everypony froze. Fluttershy decided to be brave, and asked, "W-what is it?"

Pinkie was paralyzed with fear. All of the ponies, excluding Fluttershy, walked over to stand behind Pinkie. Though none of them really wanted to do that, they felt like they had to because of Pinkie's state of shock. Slowly, they craned their necks to see behind the couch.

"By golly, a bunny!" cried AppleJack.

Twilight corrected her, "Not just any bunny, AppleJack, it's--" Dare she say it? "It's Angel. And she's..."

Fluttershy gasped. No. No! screamed the voice inside of the mare's head. She ran over to see her beloved Angel. She fell to the floor. Her body started to tremble, and tears soon came streaming down her face, one by one.

"...dead," Twilight whispered, as if she thought whispering would keep Fluttershy from becoming anymore upset.

Fluttershy reached out her shaky hooves, and carefully picked up the corpse. A single tear fell on the rabbit's face, and came down off his eye, just as if he was crying. Fluttershy ran her hoof across the rabbit's body a couple times, then set him back down. She was thinking of saying "I'm so sorry, Angel," but that didn't amount to anything.

The other ponies in the room looked like they were about to start crying, too. Twilight broke the silence by saying, "We'll give her a proper burial. I promise."

Instinctively, everypony embraced Fluttershy at that moment.

---

The next day, everypony in Ponyville had gathered behind Fluttershy's house to pay their respects to Angel. Fluttershy put a gravestone in the ground next to Angel's grave. It said:

Here lies Angel the Rabbit.
He truly was sent from Heaven, and now he has gone back.
He will always be in our hearts, and in our memories.
His spirit will be with us during pet day from now on, and even after all of us have passed.

After the burial, Fluttershy gave many animals away to the townsponies. She gave the white kitten, Opalescence, to her friend Rarity. Ponies left bouquets of flowers and carrots at the grave.

Fluttershy claimed that she loved her animals. The truth was, all she really wanted was to feel loved by surrounding herself with her furry friends. She could have just reached out to her friends, if only she had known how to express her feelings. She learned her lesson from that tragic event, and never again would she hoard animals in her home. Of course, she would still take care of animals, but she would release them to the wild after they had recovered, with no exceptions.

After all, that's what Angel would have wanted.

Author's Note:

If anyone would like to volunteer to be a proofreader, that would be great.