Mini-Shelf: A Collection of Bite Size Stories

by Tavi n Scratch

Clear (Tragedy)

I stare intently at the wilted flower, searching for something, I'm unsure what. It’s as if I’d just forgotten something very important. I feel myself shudder and I turn away from the bloom.

“Rosie, we should get out of here, it’s not safe.” A voice speaks from behind me, her tone is very nervous. “All the fire, the smoke, the broken buildings, it’s dangerous.” I just stood there, frozen, the world around me just stopped. “You okay Rose?”

“No.”

I look up from the ground to see the ashen remains of my old home town. This place used to be so beautiful, full of colors and sounds and sights and smells. Full of life. Parts of the town were still smoldering, giving off heat and smoke. This glorious place used to be beautiful, now it’s a graveyard.

And it’s all her fault. Twilight Sparkle, the mare who played with fire, and we were burned. Daisy and I were looking for precious flowers in the Everfree Forest when the sky filled with orange and red and yellow, the hues of a blaze. We reached the edge of the forest and we saw our home, we saw it burn.

Kinda funny that it’s Twilight’s fault, she was always so careful with her magic. Then one day she comes across a tome, reads the words, it turned out to be an incantation. A firestorm engulfed the town, it all burned in seconds. She was still alive, at the epicenter of it all, the eye of the storm. We found her shambling through the street, yelling out to no one.

“I didn't know! I'm so sorry!" It was heartbreaking, a little mistake on her part and then all of this. I tried to talk to her as she walked in the wreckage of her home, but she just wasn't there, she didn't respond in the slightest, just kept walking, yelling to the sky. The weight of the death of her friends, the pain that all of it was her fault. She killed them, her dearest friend. This is just...

I look at the flower again. "This should never have happened." I pick up the rose and it crumbles to dust.

If the clearest memories are born of tragedy, this will forever be a flawless crystal in my mind forever.

Author's Note:

Prompt submitted by Uncr3at1ve: The clearest memories are born from tragedy