Foal

by thelittlestpony

Chapter 6: The Unbearable Lightness Of Ponies.

'Foal'

The cold tone with which the pony wielded the word like a weapon made Celestia flinch, sending a cold shiver through her incorporeal form.

Before she could get closer to the pair the colours of the forest began to merge to black and swirl around her, before a little foal appeared before her. Stooping down beside him she moved to raise a hoof.
As suddenly as the forest vanished colours began to form, beginning in smoke like patches and spreading around the two. Branching off in seemingly random directions as if the trees themselves were painting the landscape with their many limbs. Looking around once more she turned back to the foal who was resting on the ground now in a small clearing in the forest. A larger pony looked down at him as a tear left his eye landing beside the foal. Dropping himself to beside the tiny pony and placing a hoof across the child's he spoke;

“Three years ago... my life was....perfect. I shared a love with a special pony...your mommy... Everything was as it should have been...we were soon to be proud parents to a foal we could both cherish and share our love with... it's almost funny how things turned out... almost”

“I remember so much about her but time and years are taking those memories away now. She was gentle, kind, honest. She would never allow her friends and her family to go without... Not bashful and proud like most pegasii I have met in my lifetime... She had a pure white coat, white wings, white mane and the most pale blue eyes I have ever seen... those pale blue eyes..”

No..

Celestia listened in apprehensively to the pony before her, leaning in slightly to hear his almost whispered speech.

“This... thing... is the reason she is not here”

“No”

Celestia spoke with a stern voice, she knew she was simply reading memories but she was compelled to try and stop this pony in his tracks. 'How could a father blame a child for something like this!'. Her mind could not comprehend the twisted and malformed ramblings coming from this pony.

“daddy?”
“don't...don't speak... just don't speak”

“Silence you fool” she hammered back at the pony before her, swiping a ghostly limb through his face.

“Now I only see the pain you brought to me”

“SILENCE YOU HORRIBLE ABORTION OF A CREATURE!”

She screamed like a banshee with her eyes shut tight, bringing hooves to her ears, she could not listen any further. Would not listen any further. 'How. Dare. He!'

“Miss?”

Her eyes shot open and was greeted by a foal surrounded by nothing but a small circular patch of ground beneath him. All else was darkness.
She drew a none existing breath and raised a smile, stifling the tears she was so desperate to give.

“Oh little one, my special little pony.”
“HEHEHE! You talk funny!”
“...Thank you?”
“S'OK Miss”
The little foal giggled to himself while Celestia struggled to hold back a smirk at the little pony's blasphemy.

“Tell me, what is your name, little one?”

---

Before she finished her sentence the darkness turned in to a hurricane surrounding the pair of them. Standing in the eye of the storm Celestia looked for any sign of structure to the forces buffeting the little child, she moved to hold him but her ghostly limbs failed to grasp and comfort the foal. She looked back to his face, but he seemed calm. Serene.

He lay down on his side and a worn blanket formed from smoky tendrils escaping from the veil of grey cloud spinning ceaselessly around them.

As suddenly as it started it ceased and Celestia moved back taking in the surroundings. The little foal was now huddled beneath the blanket in the back of what appeared to be a trading wagon. Tatty looking trinkets hanging from hooks clanked against the shelves, percussively accenting every stone and trough the wheels hit. Outside a thick blanket of snow covered the ground as the pony powered ramshackle wagon slowly bundled down a slope.

“FOAL. OUT OF THE WAGON. HILL”
A familiar and most unwelcome voice sounded from up ahead.

Foal?

“Yes daddy!”

A younger looking pony than she had seen just a few moments ago stood, tiny saddlebags now the only warmth from the cold outside, he moved to the rear of the wagon and jumped to the snow below.
'He is too small, that wont make any difference at all!'
The tiny shivering pony started to jump through snow which was pressing tightly up to his chest, chasing the wagon which was moving much to quickly for him to keep up.

“BACK ON, FOAL!”

FOAL?

Rage was boiling in Celestia's mind now. 'How dare he! His own child!' The little pony scampered and chased after the wagon, tears beginning to form in his eyes looking at the pony drawn wagon ahead.

“WAIT FOR HIM YOU AWFUL MONSTER!”

The scene began to fade, as if washed slowly away in shimmering lines by the falling snow. Feeling a coldness washing over her very soul. Celestia kept her eyes closed tight. Hairs that were not there stuck out on the back of her neck and back. 'How could ponies be so cruel to their own flesh and blood?' repeated over and over again in her head. 'How?'

'I'm sowwy Miss'

The little foal had moved to her side and had raised a hoof to catch her attention. Looking down to the sombre looking child and forcing a reassuring smile back and giving a wink she replied in the softest tone she could muster;

“You can never be sorry for anything; my little pony.”
With a frown the foal replied, looking straight in to her eyes.
“Why you sad”
“You did not make me sad little one, your resilience gives me hope”
“But”
“Now, you must show me who hurt your horn so that it may never happen to another pony again”
“...Ohkaaaay Miss”

---

Celestia was suddenly alone.
Columns like giant stalagmites rose and spun from the ground she was now standing on. Colours grew in to focus as the columns rose and widened, joining above her head and closing the gaps between them. A colourful flower blossomed next to her hoof, and like a trail of domino's protruding spikes turned to green grass, differing shades of brown, green orange and blue washed down from the canopy meeting at the ground. Trees towered over her and grass softened under her hooves. The sweet summer smell of bark and plant-life that only a mature forest can produce surrounded her and filled her nose prompting a little smile. Birds swept overhead singing merrily.
There was no foal to be seen.
Spinning around her eyes moved to a small wooden hut hiding under the cover of a great oak tree, its aged branches drooping and leaves gently caressing the roof of the neglected structure.

She raised an apprehensive hoof.

“MOMMY! DADDY!”

And bolted as fast as her seraphic limbs could take her to the open doorway, just as in the corner under the table a little, tiny, pony stirred.
The slightest nudge of the table and an axe quivered from where he gazed.

“no..”

The foal raised hooves and with a strength his body should not be capable the axe toppled and fell to the ground.

“please, please not like this”

Her begging went unanswered.

The little foal dropped his head, placing his horn on the blade of the axe, gently at first so as to not push it over. With a determined look he started to shift his weight back and forth. Tiny sparks trailing his movements as he changed his weight one way then the next, and began sawing the horn from his own head.

“Oh, please stop!”

The child's movements increased, moving faster from one end of the blade to another, ignoring the pleas from the princess. She felt trapped. Powerless for the first time in her long life. Her spectral body would not produce the tears she needed, no release from the mental anguish she was subjecting herself to, yet, she could not end it. She could not leave the foal alone, it was a memory of course, she had no power in dreams but staying by the child's side was the small comfort she could provide.

What seemed like hours passed in moments and the foal's job was complete with a small click from the final sinew of horn giving way.
The foal looked up to the princess and smiled warmly.

“Hewwo miss!”
“I... I-I'm so sorry”
“Hehe silly!”
“I was not there little one.. was not here!”
“Nnnope!”
“You have been through so, so much”
“Silly miss! How can I find mommy and daddy with this!”

The little foal pointed to the horn on the ground by the axe with a hoof. Celestia looked down upon it then moved her eyes to meet the foals, holding back her emotions she raised her head.

“Come now little one, wake up! I have someone for you to meet”

---

“Princess are you OK! What happened!”

Celestia opened her eyes to a concerned looking group of friends.

“I am... fine”

Celestia had not needed to lie in a long time but she had to be strong. Be the noble Princess she was meant to be. Her heart beat a little too fast, her brow was a little too hot, her breaths were a little too shallow.

“Little one, wake up!”

As the group moved their eyes to the little foal Celestia wrapped a wing around a trembling Fluttershy. Slowly the little foals eyes began to twitch, then blink, then look up to a smiling Princess sitting by the bed, yellow and pink Pegasus by her side.

“hewwo miss” he croaked through a dry voice.
“Hello my little stallion!. I would like you to meet a dear friend of mine”
The little foals eyes moved around everypony in the room.
“This...” gesturing with her head to Fluttershy
“...Is your mommy, little one”

“mommy?”
Fluttershy looked to her hooves as if waiting for reassurance from those around her, but before anyone spoke she looked in to the foals eyes with a profound sincerity.

“Yes. And I am so proud of you for being so brave”

The foal jerked and leapt out of the bed to a startled Fluttershy, tears already streaming down his face he pressed hard with his exhausted limbs into her neck, muzzling and failing to get his forelimbs even half way around the little mares neck as she gently wrapped her silken wings around him.

“Oh, my”

“MOMMY!”

---

Celestia shrank away from the hastily arranged union many months in the making. Turning her back to the sobbing Zebra, Dragon and Ponies she enveloped her body in her magical aura and placed herself back in her chamber.
An anger like no other she experienced before built up in her.
'how could a father be so cruel!'
'why did I not protect him!'

With tears streaking down her face she took off her crown with her magic and forced it through the air to the mirror.
With an anguished scream she began throwing furniture against walls, smashing windows. Forcefully destroying all the useless items she surrounded herself with.
Luxuries.
They disgusted her. Mocked her.

“sister?”

Flinging portraits she did not want to see, paying no heed to the voice from the doorway she lashed every possession in her sight in to a maelstrom of fury, compacting and throwing in random directions anything she could.

“sister?”

“...I failed him Luna”

Stepping closer Princess Luna moved to her sister and raised a hoof to her shoulder.

“Come, sister. It is almost time to raise your Sun and set my Moon.”

“How can I do that now?”

“Like you always have my sister. For eon's passed and ages to come”

“How?”

“Come now, I know how much raising the Sun means to you. A new day beckons.”

Author's Note:

Coz every story gotta have a dream sequence yeh?

Comments

[jreidsma]

Once again I bring a few proof reading tips, I guess hope they help in some way

“Hello little my stallion!. I would like you to meet a dear friend of mine”
I think you meant "my little" instead of "little my"?

With a anguished scream she began throwing furniture against walls, smashing windows. Forcefully destroying all the useless items she surrounded herself with.

Should be "an anguished" I think, instead of "a anguished"

[thelittlestpony]

2407792

Thanks again! appreciate you ironing out all the little errors for me!
Of course you are correct!

[thelittlestpony]

Been a little busy this week with work and stuff, should be able to get a couple chapters done over the weekend fyi