Chapter 1
Remembrance
“I watched her fade away. Her very essence drained from her body. I was with her through thick and thin. I stayed with her through to the very end, yet I could do nothing to prevent it... and the pain is still very much there.”
****
The blue pegasus sighed mournfully when his eyes turned skyward, and at the same moment, the sun slowly descended the horizon and basked the clear-blue sky in a tint of red, and purple light as the twilight came ever closer. He cast a look back at the quaint town in the distance. Most of the ponies there was sleeping by now, and had left Ponyville quiet.
He slowly paraded forwards, and with each step the old grass crumbled under his hooves, and the sound echoed through his ears. The dark-blue mane drooped in front of his eyes, and stray grey hairs getting in in the way as he walked through the large metallic and stilted gate of the cemetery; the chilly wind tore at his face, but he pushed onwards.
The pegasus walked by several grey tombstones, some more elaborate than others, but all of them were abandoned. In the forewarning decades the cemetery had been overgrown, and many of the tombstones couldn't even be reached any-more, but the stallion’s mind wandered away from that as he focused his eyes on a stone in the distance.
It was shaped as a normal tombstone, but had a pair of wings on top and several keepsakes were scattered around it. Left there by other visitors and families wishing to pay a visit, in order to remember lost things and lost memories.
The pegasus stopped as he reached the tombstone, and he clenched his eyes tight as a bouquet of red, white, and yellow roses dropped to the grass in front of the stone. “I'm here... again,” Soarin said dourly as he slumped to his haunches in front of the grave.
Soarin removed his saddlebags and sat them down next to himself as he hoofed out a metallic lunch-box from one of the bags. “I got this... for old time's sake,” he spoke softly as he pushed the box forwards. It was coloured dark-blue with edges of yellow with an image of a pair of wings stencilled on top.
Soarin sighed. “Another year? Has it really been that long?” He craned his neck towards the sky as a pair of love-birds flew past him, and perched themselves on a tree-branch in an apple tree close by. They snuggled in close together as Soarin smiled. “Time moves fast...” his voice faded as he turned back towards the tombstone.
“I wish you were here, it's not the same without you...” – Soarin reached a hoof forwards and touched the cold surface as it sent shivers down his back. – “I miss you, and I know I say that every year, but... but it's true.”
A tear trickled down his cheek and splashed against the grass, colouring it dark-green as Soarin removed his hoof. “I miss your voice, I miss your playful nature, but most of all... I miss you... Gold...” A sniffle escaped Soarin as he used a hoof to wipe his cheeks.
“Listen to me... it's been twelve years, and still I'm a sappy stallion.” Soarin chuckled as he pushed a hoof to open the lunch-box, pulling out a pin with the Wonderbolts insignia. “I still remember when we first met.... How could I forget?”
<-oOo->
“Seriously, the security on your stage needs to be reinforced...” a mare's voice caught Soarin's attention as he walked out of the locker room, and towards the reception desk. He nudged the yellow mare managing it.
“What's uh... what's going on, Spits?” Soarin asked as he peeked out across the table, trying to see what the ponies were arguing about.
“Hmpf,” Spitfire grumbled. “This mare says that our security precautions are not good enough,” Spitfire added as a grey pegasus mare with lime-green mane and tail walked forward from the crowd of ponies there.
“Here!” The mare hoofed out a paper from her saddlebags, and onto the table. “Don't attack me, I'm just the messenger.” Soarin could hear Spitfire grumble faintly in the background, but had otherwise zoned out as he focused his eyes on the mare as she walked towards the exit; Her fragrant mane flowed in the wind behind her as she walked.
“Soarin... Soarin... “ – Spitfire's intrepid poking snapped Soarin back into reality – “Still with me, Soarin? I need to get this filed, can you man the desk?”
“Huh? Wha?” Soarin shook his head. “Wait, Spitfire,” he mumbled out as he scrambled around the desk. “Wait! Wait!” Soarin kept yelling to the mare to catch her attention.
“What?” The mare turned as Soarin caught up to her.
“Hey, I'm Soarin!” he said with a smile as he reached out a hoof to hoof-shake with the mare. She just looked at his hoof, and frowned. Soarin's smile faded as he retracted his hoof. “Want to go o-out with m-me?” he added as he clumsily stepped over his own words.
“Sorry, fly-boy...” – The mare turned to walk, but craned her neck around as she stood in the doorway – “You're not my type,” she added with a giggle as she stepped outside and took off into the air.
“No, just wait!” Soarin interrupted and stopped the mare mid-air.
“Yes?” she asked as she arched an eyebrow, and looked down at Soarin who stood in the doorway.
“I just want one date, that's all.”
The mare came swooping down to the cloud-floor, and prodded a hoof into Soarin's chest. “Look, fly-boy! I've seen my fair share of Wonderbolts, and you're all just the same. Obnoxious, flying beasts that do nothing more than promote yourself! I hate it!”
Soarin backed away slowly, but held out his hoof. “No, I'm not the same and I can prove it.”
“How?” the mare asked as she poked Soarin in the chest one final time.
Soarin stood befuddled for a few seconds before he leapt back into the locker room and opened his locker. He threw out several uniforms, socks, pictures, buttons, and all kind of things he had kept in there. His eyes lit up as he found it.
He came back out to the mare and hoofed her a golden pin with the Wonderbolts insignia. “This is mine, and we all get one. Just look at it, it's signed with my name on the back,” Soarin said to her as she turned the pin around to see 'Soarin' inscribed in black swooping letters on the back of the pin.
“Very nice, but how does this prove anything?” she asked as she held the pin in her hooves.
“'Cause I won't get a new one, and therefore I need to get a date with you to get it back,” he said with a smile, and a faint chuckle as the mare frowned at him.
“Keep it, because you'll never get that date.” – She hoofed him the pin and turned around to leave, but Soarin stuck the pin back into her saddlebags without her knowing before she took off.
“Wow...” Soarin's mind blanketed as he saw her green shape flapping in the sky, and vanish in the horizon.
<-oOo->
****
“Who could have known,” Soarin said with a chuckle as he placed the pin on top of the tombstone. It wobbled slightly before it settled halfway onto its side. He sighed as he turned his head to look at the sun, and as it dipped below the horizon, rays of light shone over the hills, but the cemetery itself was shrouded in darkness. A few lights lit up and bathed it in golden light, but for the most part it was dark.
A few leaves started to fall off the trees as the coldness crept across the hill, and gave Soarin chills. “Looks like fall is coming early this year,” Soarin said to himself as he watched the two birds take off into the air again and fly off into the distance.
“I don't regret a thing, Gold. I want you to know that,” Soarin said melancholy as he touched the stone with a hoof, but withdrew it quickly.
Soarin sighed as he hoofed out another object from the lunch-box. “Heh, how could I forget this one?” – He smiled as he held a piece of paper in his hooves. It was faded and coloured yellow by age, but it could still be seen that it was a petition.
<-oOo->
Soarin stood turned to Spitfire as she entered the locker room. “Come on, can't I go?” he asked her with a wry smile across his muzzle.
Spitfire turned and glanced at him, arching an eyebrow. “You just want to talk to that mare again, so I even doubt that you'll remember to get that petition in quickly enough,”
“Oh come on, Spits. I'm not that bad,” Soarin said with a grin.
Spitfire shrugged and shook her head as she hoofed out a piece of paper from her locker, and tossed it across the room to Soarin who caught it in his mouth. Before she could turn her head to talk to him again, he was out of the room.
“Darn stallion, his priorities are in the wrong place.”
****
Soarin flew as fast as he could towards Cloudsdale mail office, the petition letter stuck nicely into his saddlebags, but his mind was centred around one thing. The grey pegasus mare. He had to shake his head and swerve in the air several times to not hit something.
After a few minutes he arrived at the tightly packed mail office and stepped inside. Soarin smiled as he saw her lime-green mane behind the crowd of ponies.
It took a few hours of boring waiting before Soarin managed to arrive at the desk. He made sure that the line he picked would make him arrive at the booth with the grey mare, and he put the petition paper down onto the desk as he arrived.
“D-do you want to go out with me?” Soarin asked as his voice faltered slightly, and he stammered.
The mare looked up and away from the paper at Soarin's smiling face. “Ugh... not you again,” – she tapped a hoof against the table. – “Look, I'm not interested, so can you please not bother me?”
“One date won't hurt, will it?”
“I'm not interested. Now, please move!”
“Come on,” Soarin pleaded and got a giggle out of the mare.
“I-I said no.”
“Can't you at least think about it?”
The mare kept looking at Soarin for several minutes not saying a word. “Fine... I'll think about it,” she said as Soarin headed for the way out. “Fly-boy!” the mare added with a giggle, and Soarin stopped a few feet away from the booth.
The grey pegasus mare threw the Wonderbolts golden pin at him, and hit him square in the nose. “Don't put things in my saddlebags again!” she said with a smile as Soarin dumbfounded took the pin from the ground, and rubbed his sore nose as he exited the office.
She looked on as he took off into the air, and the rest of the world faded away into nothingness.
“Hey! We're waiting here!” A voice said as a stallion's hoof knocked against the glass. The mare behind the desk smiled, and shook her head as her cheeks turned a deep crimson.
<-oOo->
****
“My nose hurt for weeks after that, Gol-...” Soarin's voice failed him as another tear trickled down his cheek and the paper dropped from his hooves to the ground. He sobbed, and brushed away another grey hair from his face.
Soarin breathed heavily as he regained his composure and wiped his cheeks as he taped the paper onto the stone. He looked towards the sky as he hoofed out a tiny figurine of a pegasus mare with golden streaks in her mane. “You gave this one to me... After our first date,” Soarin said as he began sobbing again.
“I'll never part with it... I still think it's rubbish, but you gave it to me...”
<-oOo->
Soarin kept combing his hair as he looked at himself in his mirror. “You can do this, Soarin! She'll like you,” he told himself over, and over again as he tied a red velvet scarf around his neck. His father had always told him that was the way to impress a mare.
“Really?” he asked his own reflection, and ripped the scarf off. “Blech, not my thing,” he added as he walked out of the bathroom and into his bedroom. Soarin slouched onto his bed and took out his red rubber ball, and started to bounce it against the wall. His eyes drifted towards the phone several times.
Soarin sat almost glued to the bed, and was half-awake when the noise of the phone knocked him back into reality. He snorted awake, and tripped over himself as he leapt towards the phone. Soarin landed on the floor with a thump and twisted in pain, but reached his hoof forwards to take the phone.
“You ready?” a voice emanated from the phone, and Soarin recognized it immediately as a smile crept across his muzzle.
“Yeah, I'll meet you there, Gold.” He chuckled into the phone as he answered.
“Good... and don't call me that,” a mare's voice said from the phone as she hung up. Soarin also hung up and stood up, and hoofed out a pair of movie-tickets from his blue saddlebags that was tucked under his bed.
He grinned as he stuck the tickets into his Saddlebags as he put them onto his back, and stepped outside the door.
Soarin took off into the cool summer-night air.
****
Soarin smiled as he landed and swerved between ponies on the ground towards a grey mare, and poked her playfully on the shoulder when he arrived. “Hi!” he said and chuckled as she turned around, a frown forming in her muzzle.
“You big goof-ball!” she said playfully back as her frown vanished and was replaced with a smile. “Got the tickets?” she asked Soarin, and got a nod in response as he patted the side of his saddlebags with a hoof.
“Good.” The mare smiled briefly. “I almost forgot!” she exclaimed as she vanished into a crowd of ponies, but she quickly came back and hoofed Soarin a tiny figurine as she whispered to him. “It's of my favourite super-hero.”
She giggled as they walked towards the booth. The lines into the cinema was short, so Soarin and the mare got to their seat fairly quick. Though an outdoors night-time movie showing isn't something that will be filled up. Soarin had also managed to get with him some popcorn and a pair of sodas as he sat himself down alongside the mare on a cloud over-viewing the large outdoor screening.
He could smell the faint odour of lilacs as he sat himself down next to the mare. He smiled and turned to look at her, and she smiled back. “Don't think I'm going soft on you yet, fly-boy!” she quickly added as her cheeks flashed red.
Soarin coughed. “I-I didn't say that-”
The mare interrupted him with a 'shush' and held a hoof to his mouth to quiet him as the movie started. It was a boring movie centred around some ancient story about the rise of nightmare moon, a split between a documentary and fiction. Soarin kept yawning throughout the movie, but used a hoof to hide it as much as he could.
****
Soarin's date used her hooves to illustrate the ending of the movie to Soarin as they walked down the golden-lit streets to her house, and Soarin noticed that she smiled the entire time.
“You like movies, huh?” Soarin asked, even though he already knew the answer.
His date grinned. “Yes!” she erupted as she leapt towards him for a hug, but in the last second retreated away and covered her face. “I mean, I'm not a crazy fanatic or anything,” she added clumsily.
A pony galloped past Soarin and his date, knocking him into her. The mare's eyes went wide as Soarin accidentally kissed her. Soarin froze and just kept the kiss, but none of them moved for several minutes and just stood there on the street.
She blushed furiously as she pushed Soarin away, and scrambled for her door. “Bye! I'll... t-talk to you tomorrow!” she said as she went into a giggle-fit, and closed the door. Soarin looked blankly at her door, and smiled as he continued to walk down the street.
Soarin looked at the tiny figurine once, and then hoofed it into his saddlebags, giving them a pat on the side to make sure it was safely in there.
<-oOo->
****
Soarin put the figurine on top of the tombstone just as a breeze flew by and threw it off the stone. Soarin scrambled to get it up from the ground, and removed the soil from it as he perched it on the tombstone once again.
“Tornado just joined the Wonderbolts... I know you're proud of him. I am.” Soarin wrapped his tail around himself as the wind kept making his mane flutter. “He's not the best in his class, but I wouldn't worry. He takes after you after all.”
“And... when I look at him I see that same determination you always had,” Soarin smiled weakly for a moment, but the smile faded as quickly as it had appeared.
Soarin rubbed circles in the grass with his hoof as he looked back at the tombstone with wet eyes. “I know you blamed yourself to the end, Gold... but... It wasn't your fault. The doctor said it was a miscarriage...”
“... I still can't forget Tornado's birth though.”
<-oOo->
Soarin paced back and forth outside the mare's room at the hospital. He had brought her there an hour earlier, racing past any ponies in his way. Soarin was sure that he would probably get a visit from a few guards soon, but he didn't care.
The door opened and clicked shut as a unicorn doctor came out, and he levitated a clipboard in the air. “Soarin?” he asked into the air, and the blue pegasus turned his attention towards the doctor. He turned towards Soarin, and spoke reassuringly.“ She's perfectly fine, Mr. Soarin.” The doctor smiled and patted Soarin on the shoulder as he let out a sigh of relief.
“Thank you, doctor!” Soarin exclaimed and shook hooves with the doctor, who retracted his hoof after a few moments of Soarin's forceful and nervous hoof-shake.
“Yes. It's good you came here when you did, but you can go and see her for now. It'll still be a while before she's ready,” the doctor said with a smile as Soarin pushed past him and into his wife's room.
The grey pegasus mare was alone since Soarin's status, and money had earned him that much. It was sparingly decorated, but what hospital room isn't. She awoke when Soarin seated himself next to her bed and gripped one of her hooves.
The mare smiled in return, and clenched her eyes for a brief moment as she grasped Soarin's hoof tightly. He contorted his face in pain, but it was quickly over as he looked back at his wife, her face flustered.
“Ugh... “ she moaned as the pain curled through her body, up her back, but she didn't lose eyesight with Soarin the entire time.
“It'll be all right,” Soarin said with a smile and brushed a lock of the mare's mane out of her face. “Just be strong,” he added as she clenched his hoof again, tighter this time.
“E-easy for you to say!” She shouted as she twisted her entire body in pain. “You're not the one giving birth!”
“True, but I'm here to support you,” Soarin commented endearingly as he looked on her with worry in his eyes. The mare stopped holding his hoof and looked back at him as she panted.
“C-could you get the doctor f-for me?” the grey mare asked Soarin. He nodded to her and slowly, but reluctantly let go of her hoof. He just gestured for the doctor to go back inside the room as he exited it.
Soarin paced back and forth a few times before he went to get a soda out of the machine at the end of the hall. He approached the machine, and chose orange soda as he slipped a bit into the slot. The can rolled into the bottom, and he hoofed it out.
The doctor exited the room as Soarin went back inside. He smiled to the mare as he once again sat himself down next to her bedside. Soarin hoofed her the orange soda and smiled as she drank it, placing the half-empty can on his head, and making his mane droop in front of his eyes.
****
Three more hours passed, and Soarin knew because he counted every single moment his mare was in agony. The doctor walked inside and looked under the covers at the grey mare, and got a frown in response from Soarin.
Along with some more hospital personnel, the doctor wheeled the grey pegasus mare through the hallways of the hospital. Soarin stayed with her the entire time, until the doctor stopped him at the last door.
“She said that she didn't want you there,” the doctor said blankly and walked through the door to join the others.
Soarin looked at the door, clenched his eyes shut and resumed his pacing. The hospital hallway had grown quiet as they only sound that could be heard was the clopping of hooves against the floor. Mostly it was Soarin's hooves.
Less than half an hour later, the doctor came back out and smiled at Soarin. “You have a beautiful baby colt,” Soarin gasped as he heard the doctors words. His hooves wobbled and he blacked out.
<-oOo->
****
“He misses you, but he has his own family now,” Soarin smiled dourly as he hoofed out an ultrasound image from the lunch-box and laid it down onto the grave. Soarin wiped his cheeks. “He's actually awaiting his first foal.”
“I'm sad that you never got to see him grow up into the person he is,” Soarin's voice faltered, and wearily he continued. “But I know you are watching him from afar, and smiling.”
“He has it you know, your smile...”
<-oOo->
“I'm sorry, for both of you,” the unicorn doctor said as he looked towards Soarin and his wife seated in front of him. They looked back at him mournfully as the grey mare tried to speak, but her voice only came out in a squeak.
“Isn't there anything you can do?” Soarin asked and reached for his wife's hoof, and gripped it tightly as he gently stroked the top of it with his other hoof.
“No...” the doctor turned his chair to focus at Soarin, “ALS is untreatable,” he added dryly, but his face contorted into sorrow as he looked back at the mare.
The mare found her voice, and spoke with her voice rasping. “W-what will happen?” she asked and nuzzled Soarin's cheek lovingly, but kept her eyes on the doctor.
“Your motor-neurons will slowly start to shrink and disappear-”
“In Equestrian, please, Doctor,” Soarin said as he kept holding her hoof.
The doctor sighed as he refocused his eyes on both of them. “At first you'll start to trip a lot, drop things more often than you do now. Then, you'll have trouble breathing, walking, and even basic things as swallowing. It may even damage your ability to remember....” The doctor took a brief break.
“I'm sorry... I truly am,” he said dourly as the mare embraced Soarin and sobbed into his shoulder. Soarin nodded towards the doctor as he left the room, and left the couple in silence.
Soarin stroked the mare's mane with a hoof to comfort her, and nuzzled her cheek as she kept sobbing and crying into his shoulder.
“It'll be all right... it'll work out, Gold...”
<-oOo->
****
Soarin cried as he looked up at the night-sky. It was clear, so he could see the thousands of white specks of light in the sky. “Y-you chose a good spot, Gold...” his voice petered out as he refocused his efforts and wiped his eyes.
He lifted out a pearl necklace and hung it off the edge of the tombstone as he had to wipe his cheeks again.
“... You were the only strong one,” Soarin said as his voice failed him.
“I can't even let you go... twelve years, and I'm still a wreck!”
<-oOo->
The air smelled of... it smelled of nothing.
Soarin hadn't noticed it until now when the rays of sunlight crested the hill beyond the room, and filled the room with light. It was sterile, white, clear, and nothing could disturb him.
He clenched his wife's hoof as she lay in bed. Soarin wouldn't eat, sleep, leave, not even go the bathroom since he had to bring his wife to the hospital in the middle of the night. Her condition had worsened all of sudden, though there wasn't much the doctors could do.
“It'll fix itself, Gold... this is just temporary.”
Soarin looked up at his gorgeous mare who slept peacefully in the bed. He followed her chest as she breathed. Slowly, and methodically he would follow the blanket up and down. Soarin looked down at his hoof as it embraced hers; he could still feel her holding it.
“Gold... I love you...” Soarin's voice faltered and cracked as he turned into a sobbing mess next to the bedside. He clenched his eyes shut to let the tears flood free since for once.
Soarin snapped too suddenly as the door into the room opened, and he looked towards the door. A little foal stood there, and he grasped a book in his mouth as he slowly walked into the room, and the door clang shut as the sound of hooves echoed through the room.
Gently, the foal surrounded the book with an amber levitation field and levitated it down onto the blanket covering Soarin's wife. Soarin smiled to the foal as he sat himself down beside Soarin, and weakly smiled back. Nothing was said between the two, words wasn't needed here.
The three of them sat silent in the room for hours when Soarin finally felt the mare's hoof go limp, and Soarin wrapped a wing around the foal as he laid his head down on the blanket, and tears brimmed in the edges of his eyes.
<-oOo->
****
Soarin sighed melancholy as he closed the lid on the lunch-box and pushed it against the stone, so it wouldn't be taken by the wind. “I love you Golden Envelope, but... but I need to move on,” Soarin said as he got onto his hooves. He wobbled in place and shuddered as he felt the wind against his feathers.
“Tornado has his own family, I'm retired from the Wonderbolts, Spitfire is retired and is living her own life, and... and there's nothing left for me here,” – Soarin flapped his wings once, gently. – “I'm old Gold, I need to go...” – Soarin clenched his eyes shut and sniffled – “But I'll always have you in my heart, you'll always be my one true love... nothing will ever change that.”
“And this is my final goodbye, I know I always say it, but I'm finally ready... I'm heading back to Fillydelphia today, and I'll take the last of my days there...” Soarin sniffled and wiped his cheeks as he pushed open his saddlebags, and hoofed out a red envelope. “I never could express my true emotions right, so I wrote them down... I know that wherever you are, you'll get my message.” He smiled weakly as he perched the letter against the lunch-box.
Soarin leaned down and kissed the top of the tombstone as he flapped his wings, but Soarin cast one look back at the tombstone.
Here lies
Golden Envelope
“I can only hope we shall see each other again in that place where there is only love, and no shadows fall.”
Soarin smiled weakly and mournfully as he traced the epitaph several times with his eyes, then flapped his wings and soared into the sky at the exact moment the sun crested the hill again, and coloured the hill-side in golden and beautiful light.
(A/N : I have to thank my always useful pre-reader: Mikaelssen who makes this crap legible.)