Romance and the Fate of Equestria

Chapter One Hundred and Forty-Eight

By the window of Sugarcube Corner, Twilight furiously scrawled a letter, so quickly that smoke rose from her quill strokes. A shadowraven stood on the windowsill, its burning eyes staring hard at her.

"Uh… hey Twilight?" Fluttershy said nervously. "Are you okay?"

Twilight rolled up the note and passed it to the shadowraven, who swiftly and silently took off. "I'm fine," she said tersely. "Just having a little bit of a… a fight… with Joe."

"Oh, I'm so sorry!" said Fluttershy. "About what?"

"It's something petty, just forget it," Twilight muttered. "Not a big deal, I won't bore you with the details."

"Twilight, of course you can bore us with the details," said Fluttershy. "I—I mean, give us the details. That's what friends are for." She gestured to all of the others, lounging all around the bake shop as was their preference.

"It's really nothing," said Twilight. "I know I've said this before and been wrong, but this is really something I can handle by myself." She exhaled through her nose, agitated.

The raven, or perhaps a different one, came in through the window and gave Twilight another scroll. She unfurled it violently and gave it a quick scan.

"Oooh… OOH!" she fumed. "That is just—let's see what you think of this!"

With ludicrous speed, she prepared another scroll, wrote two paragraphs lightning-quick, punctuated it with enough force to tear a hole in the parchment, rolled it up and prepared to give it to the waiting raven.

"No, wait, wait!" she said suddenly, snatching it back from the bird and adding another paragraph. Indignantly, the raven took the revised note and began to depart. "No, wait, wait!" Twilight yelled out the window, frantic. The raven circled back around and gave the note back to her, glaring.

Twilight scrawled several other paragraphs, then rolled up the note for the third time and offered it to the raven, who simply stared at her incredulously.

"Go on," she insisted. "Just go, it's fine."

It slowly reached out with its foot and clutched the note, glaring all the while, and flew off.

Twilight watched it go with satisfaction. "No, wait, wait!" she exclaimed, but the raven was already gone. Grumbling, she wrote two short lines on a fresh piece of parchment. A different raven came to the window and snatched it, leaving as quickly as it could.

"You know, Twilight, darling," Rarity said delicately, "if he's mad at you, I highly doubt he's going to read all of that."

"Oh, he'll read it if he knows what's good for him," Twilight retorted.

"Care to tell us what this is about, Twi?" Applejack said dryly.

She sighed. "It's personal."

"Twi, it's us," said Applejack. "The Mane Six. Nothin' is too personal to share."

A raven returned. Twilight accepted the letter it carried, but didn't open it, instead turning toward Applejack with a raised eyebrow. "The 'Mane Six'? What's that mean? Who calls us that?"

"Uh… I dunno," Applejack admitted. "I just… heard it somewhere."

Twilight unrolled the letter and read over it. "Well, that's… that's… he's absolutely right." She sighed and hung her head, then hastily whipped out a quill and parchment to begin another letter. "I take issue with his tone… but he's right." She smiled. "Oh, Joe, I am so, so sorry…"

She finished writing and passed it to the raven, who tilted its head suspiciously.

"It's okay," she assured it. "I really am done. Thank you."

It bobbed its head and carried the letter away.

"You and Joe have a lot to write about, usually?" Rainbow inquired.

"Yeah," said Twilight. "Generally, we fill each other in on everything that's going on, and share our thoughts about it."

"Okay," said Rainbow. "Just curious. That's good, I was worried that maybe you didn't have enough to go on, to do the long-distance thing."

"What are you talking about?" Twilight said in mild alarm.

"Well… what exactly did you two ever do together besides have sex?"

Twilight glared. "Not a whole lot. What do you do besides have sex?"

"Not a whole lot," Rainbow echoed promptly. "Touché. That's why I'm wondering if the whole relationship thing, it still holds up well, even though you can't do it anymore? Even though you actually have to just chit-chat now?"

Twilight shrugged. "It's not as if there was no 'chit-chat' before. You're overlooking the fact that sex takes ten minutes at most, while recovering from sex takes half an hour at least. So 'going at it all night' involves more talking and bonding than actual doing it."

"Mm," Rainbow said, lifting her head in comprehension. "Well, there you go. Of c—"

"I know, I know," Twilight said exhaustedly, "you're with a girl, you don't have that problem, you actually have sex all night."

"…Huh," Rainbow said dully. "I'm that predictable now? I better work on that."

"Well, that's what happens when you settle down," Twilight said, amused.

Another letter arrived by shadowraven, and Twilight looked it over. "Oh!" she said tenderly. "Oh… oh, he's so sweet." She held the letter to her heart.

"So… everything's all right, then?" Applejack said cautiously.

"Everything is great," Twilight gushed.

The raven began to leave.

"No, wait, wait!"

It scowled.

"Thank you," said Twilight, tapping the bird's foot with her hoof. "I appreciate your work."

Pinkie popped up between Twilight and the window. "Cookie?" she said, offering up a plate of them.

The raven nodded and took one.

"How about you, Twilight?" Pinkie continued. "Cookie to celebrate everything being great?"

"That sounds wonderful," Twilight chirped.

"So… what were you fighting about, if I may ask?" said Rarity.

"It really doesn't matter now, Rarity," said Twilight, munching on her cookie.

"…So we're just never going to find out?" Rarity said blankly.

"Nope. Doesn't matter anymore, 'cause everything is… right."