Romance and the Fate of Equestria

It's funny… while I try to prioritize RFE as much as I possibly can, MLP:FIM itself has kind of faded from my consciousness over the past year or so. During the entire run of Season 6, I often found myself forgetting to watch it.

So it only just kind of hit me, even though I've known for a while, that we're getting a theatrical motion picture this year. Never really thought about that until recently, when Twitter rolled out all the names and images of the characters that the film's eight celebrity guest stars will be playing. Pretty awesome, but with no knowledge of the plot, it makes me wonder how the heck they're going to keep eight celebrity guest characters plot-relevant. So far they look kinda gratuitous. Of course, I'm one to talk. If you've been to my DeviantArt (which I'm pretty sure nobody ever has since, well, ever) you'll see that I envision a lot of celebrity guests for this story, especially in Legend of the Goddesses, but… I kinda feel this story is bloated with guest characters sometime, and it's a lot longer, and less structured, than a movie.

But I feel that somehow it's gonna work, because that's what I've always wanted out of MLP, more celebrity guests. There are twice as many in the movie than there have been in the first six seasons of the series. While the series so far has seen a recurring role from John de Lancie and single-episode turns from Weird Al Yankovic, Lena Hall, and Patton Oswalt, the movie will introduce Kristin Chenoweth, Emily Blunt, Uzo Aduba, Zoe Saldana, Liev Schreiber, Michael Peña, Taye Diggs, and of all people, Sia.

In all the fancasting of this fic, not to mention my 26-person-long list of people who I once wished would do a guest turn on MLP, one of those actors has now come true: Zoe Saldana, whom I envisioned in the role of Lucgsi, a character appearing near the end of Legend, and in the movie will be playing some sort of captain, the pirate kind by the look of her, who appears to be a griffon or, given that she's named Celaeno, perhaps a harpy.

Oh, and Kelly Sheridan. She was the first name on my wished-for guest stars and also appears in my fancasts in the roles of Rose Belt and Glitter Mirror. I always figured her eventual, actual appearance on the show was inevitable, and she did indeed: her first G4 role, of several since then, was Starlight Glimmer. That Sheridan joined the show as the series' first season-long arc villain who eventually joins the main cast really seemed nothing short of exactly what was supposed to happen. Of course, I've thrown so many names at the wall that it only makes sense that there'd be some overlap between my dream cast and people who eventually actually became cast members.

Okay, that babbling got me all pumped up! Let's do some RFE! …Season 7 of the show debuts in less than a month, and I vowed to return properly to RFE in July, so let's raise a glass to some more falling behind! Why that bothers me, I don't really know. It's hardly as if I could fall more behind on the canon that I have already, I mean this story's canon is based on Season 2 for goodness' sake… (Ooh, and I just found out Season 8 has been greenlit! Holy crap, I really thought the movie would be the end of the series. Awesome-sauce…)

Chapter One Hundred and Sixty-Four

Twilight eagerly stood at the outskirts of Ponyville, accompanied by a small handful of others; Spike stood by her side, Pinkie unobtrusively off to the side, and nearest to the town was Rainbow. Derpy was riding on Rainbow's back, arms around her neck, nibbling at her ear and growling.

"All right, knock it off, baby," Rainbow giggled after a few moments of this. "Not appropriate behavior in front of the princess."

"I think the princess loves romance," Derpy declared, and she kept nibbling.

"Okay, seriously, quit it," said Rainbow, gently lifting Derpy off of her back with her wings, setting her on the ground.

Derpy pouted, shooting Rainbow a lopsided pair of bedroom eyes.

"We'll get back to it later," Rainbow growled under her breath, smirking. Derpy giggled in reply.

Pinkie glanced between the two of them for a moment, then grabbed a notebook and scribbled something down in it. "Ear nibbling…" she muttered.

"Hells yeah, ear nibbling," Rainbow agreed, nodding her head enthusiastically.

"That's, like, a kind of heavy petting, right?" Pinkie inquired, sucking on the tip of her quill. "What are some other kinds?"

"Just give him tiny little bites… everywhere," Derpy suggested eagerly.

"Everywhere?" Pinkie said in alarm.

"Everywhere," Derpy confirmed.

Unnerved, Pinkie wrote that down. "And that's… sexy?"

"Yup," said Rainbow.

As expected, Celestia was arriving via chariot, looking sleepy as her soldiers brought her to a stop among the five of them. She muttered thanks to the guards, briefly glanced at something hidden in her chariot's depths, and slowly made her way to Twilight, who ran out to meet her first.

"Princess… I'm sorry," Twilight said immediately. "I'm sorry I failed so badly."

"On the changeling mission?" Celestia said, raising her eyebrows. "That wasn't a failure, my darling. You made a difficult decision and protected us from invaders in the process. That's not a failure at all."

"But… Chrysalis is still alive," Twilight said. "And she has Discord now. We ended tens of thousands of lives for a temporary solution."

"A temporary solution is still a solution," Celestia instructed. "Or at least it can become one. Sometimes what you need is a bit of time to sit back and think about things. We didn't have that luxury before, but now, thanks to you, we do."

Twilight was clearly not reassured, and lowered her head in shame regardless.

Celestia placed her hoof on the back of Twilight's neck, rubbing it slowly. "It's not easy having blood on your hooves," she said gently. "But it's an inevitable part of being powerful. A part that only the worst of us ever get used to. The last thing I want is for it to eat you alive, my sweet, sweet Twilight. Are you going to be okay?"

"I… I think so," Twilight muttered. "Eventually. It's good to have you back, Princess."

"And it's wonderful to see you again, Twilight," said Celestia. "Oh, Spike? Come here a moment. I have a surprise for you, something very interesting that Luna and I found just as we were on our way back."

"Really?" Spike said, intrigued. "Something for me?"

"Mm, in a sense." She turned and called to the chariot. "Snarl? Snarl, it's time. Come on out here and meet your brother."

Spike gasped as the creature emerged from the chariot. At first glance, it looked exactly like Spike… or rather, Spike as he had looked on the morning after a certain fateful birthday, for this dragon was gangly and long-limbed. Other differences became apparent as he approached: he walked on all fours, he was slightly more pink than purple in color, and his green spines and ear fins were sharper and more ribbed than Spike's. The green of his belly scales, which stopped on Spike's lower jaw, covered this dragon's entire snout and a small, thin patch between his eyes. Most strikingly, the dragon's tail was cocked over his head like a scorpion's, and ended in a vicious point.

"Holy guac," Spike whispered. He gaped at the dragon, then at Celestia. "My brother? Are you sure?"

"I can't be entirely sure," said Celestia. "But more than any other creature in the world, every dragon is totally unique. If two dragons resemble each other even slightly, it's almost certain that they come from the exact same parents. And as you can see, Snarl resembles you more than slightly. The moment Luna and I saw him, we knew. Well, Luna saw him. She had to show him to me. We told him about you and we asked him if he'd like to come home with us. He was all for it."

Spike grinned broadly as he approached the slightly larger dragon. "Hey, Snarl. I'm Spike."

Snarl lowered his head shyly. "Hi, Spike," he said in a raspy, bubbling voice.

"You don't mind, do you?" Celestia said to Twilight. "I felt they should meet, perhaps get to know each other. If you need certain accommodations in order to take care of Snarl, I can raise your stipend, anything else you need."

"I think Spike and I can handle tending to his needs," said Twilight, looking over Snarl interestedly. "I'll let you know if anything changes."

"Very well," said Celestia. She looked around. "A smaller welcome wagon than I'm used to. Is something amiss?"

"No," said Twilight. "Fluttershy is helping Big Mac with some work stuff, and Applejack… the same, I assume. And Rarity's having brunch with Sweetie Belle. They should all be out here momentarily."

Celestia nodded. "Hello, Pinkie Pie," she said. "Word is that you're a much more prominent fixture in Canterlot than you used to be. What are your intentions with Fancypants, may I ask?"

"Intentions?" Pinkie said softly. "Well, I guess I intend to… keep dating him? For the foreseeable future?"

"I'm glad to hear it," said Celestia. "Perhaps with your influence, the Canterlot party scene will start to… well… suck less."

Pinkie giggled.

"And Derpy, I don't think we've ever properly met," Celestia added, walking to her and Rainbow. "Hello."

"HI-EEEEE!" Derpy chirped back.

"Twilight tells me Rainbow has never been more comfortable in her own skin."

"Yeah, that's what ponies are sayin'," said Derpy, leaning against Rainbow. "I really like making Rainbow happy. I'm comfortable in her skin too."

She licked Rainbow's ear, and Rainbow cracked up. "Right in front of the Princess. Even I'm not that gutsy."

"Oh no?"

"Well… maybe." Rainbow licked Derpy's nose.

"Eeeee!"

"Ah, here come the others," Twilight reported.

The five of them were indeed approaching, Rarity and Sweetie Belle on one side of the road, with Fluttershy, Applejack, and Big Mac on the other. The latter three seemed to be chatting and joking, while Rarity and Sweetie looked a bit more solemn.

Fluttershy and the Apples reached them first.

"Hello, Princeeeee—AAAAAAHHHH!"

That was Fluttershy, who, in the midst of greeting Princess Celestia, had noticed Snarl, promptly causing both her eyes and her mouth to grow huge with shock and excitement.

"Oh my gosh, oh my gosh, oh my gosh! A new baby dragon!" She rushed over to him, a huge grin across her face. "Spike, who's this?"

"This is Snarl," said Spike. "He's sort of, he's my new… he's my brother."

"Your brother?" Fluttershy gasped happily. "My goodness, where did you come from?"

Snarl didn't answer.

"I guess Princess Celestia found him in… where was it?"

"Nara," said Princess Celestia.

"Snarl, this is Fluttershy," said Spike. "She's really into interesting creatures." He stared blankly at Fluttershy. "Dial the grin back a bit, Shy, you're freaking him out."

"Sorry," said Fluttershy. She made no changes to her impossibly broad smile.

"Fluttershy," Snarl muttered. "And…" He vaguely pointed to all of the others. "Yeah, I don't remember any of the names I've heard."

"That's okay!" said Spike. "It's a lot of names to remember."

"S-s-s-so, Snarl," said Fluttershy, leaning closer to him and stumbling over herself in her excitement. "How old are you?"

"I'm ten, I think," he said nervously.

"Oh, wow!" Spike exclaimed. "You're my younger brother?"

"What, really?" said Snarl in surprise. "How old are you?"

"I'm fifteen," said Spike. "That's crazy! You're big… do you have a hoard?"

"Well, kinda," Snarl said dispassionately. "It's a stockpile of food, it's not something I have just so I can have it."

"Ohhh!" Fluttershy gushed. "I applaud you for that, sir. That's very mature and admirable. You're a good dragon, I can tell."

Snarl chuckled bitterly. "No one's ever called me that before."

"Well, you are," Fluttershy said confidently. "Maybe not by dragon standards… we've met our fair share of 'normal' dragons. Pretty bad. Not being like them is good!"

As Rarity approached the group, she realized that Sweetie Belle had stopped walking several yards back and was still hanging back.

"Aren't you going to get any closer?" she inquired.

"I think this is as close to Spike as I can stand to get," said Sweetie, her face turning very red.

"Sweetie…" Rarity said sympathetically, walking back to her. "You like him. You now know for a fact that his relationship with Scootaloo was a scam, a scam formulated because he likes you. And he's in such a good mood. I couldn't possibly think of a better time to ask him out. What's holding you back, darling? Talk to me."

"He's… he's busy," Sweetie muttered.

"He's always busy!" Rarity countered. "He can spare a moment for you. Why are you making excuses?"

"I'm not ready, Rarity," she said, strained. "I'm scared."

Rarity frowned. "What is it with you, Sweetie Belle?" she said tersely. "It's always one step forward, one step back with you."

"Well," said Sweetie, bristling with sudden hostility, "maybe I'm not so keen to ask out a guy who's been, A, making out with one of my friends to B, deceive and manipulate me. That's kind of a double red flag, don't you think?"

"Sweetie, come on," Rarity said, irked now. "That's twisting his actions and his intent. You said you approved of it, that you were proud and appreciative."

"Yeah, well, maybe now I'm seeing it for what it is," Sweetie retorted.

"Sweetie…" Rarity said, attempting a patient tone but straining it far too much. "I understand that you're nervous. We all accept the love we think we deserve; that's why you continued to pine for Featherweight after he wronged you, and why I have… nopony. Every girl goes through this, this period of… resisting being happy. I'm just asking you to power through it. You don't want to wait too long. Then you won't have him at all, and then where will you be?"

Sweetie Belle glared furiously. "I can live without Spike, you know," she growled. "I don't need him or any other guy."

Rarity's eyes widened in surprise, then she winced guiltily. "Of course you can, I…" But Sweetie Belle had already started stalking away. "Sweetie, come back! I'm sorry!"

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

"So, the bakery one is Pinkie Pie?"

"Yes."

"And Applejack… she's with the big red guy?"

"No, no, they're brother and sister."

"Oh. …What difference does that make?"

"…Okay, add that to the list of civilized things you need to learn about. But Big Mac, he's actually engaged to Fluttershy."

"And Fluttershy is…"

"The one with the breathy voice who was all over you."

"Right," Snarl said dully.

Spike glanced over his shoulder at Snarl as the two of them walked down the streets of Ponyville.

"We'll just keep going through it," Spike assured him. "You'll be living with us. You'll eventually pick up on everything."

"…Thanks, Spike," Snarl said under his breath.

"Hmm?"

"For not getting bored of all the explaining," Snarl said in his burbling voice.

"Hey, no problem," said Spike. "You know, I really like your tail. Is it a weapon?"

"Huh? Oh… yes, it is." Snarl absently looked at his tail and gave it a little wave.

"Nice!" Spike said appreciatively. "Is it venomous, or does it just poke?"

"I use it like a club, mostly. Can't aim it well enough to sting anybody."

"Do you need to use it very much?" Spike said solemnly.

"I live out in the woods. Take a guess."

Spike flinched. "I'm sorry."

They walked in silence for a moment, nearing the library.

"Our parents…" Spike said softly. "Do you know them?"

"No," said Snarl.

"Any idea at all…?"

"No."

"…Is that normal?" Spike wondered.

"I don't meet a lot of other dragons," said Snarl, "but I think so."

Spike paused in front of the library door. "How are you at controlling your fire?"

Snarl shrugged. "Pretty good."

"Any allergies?"

"Don't think so."

"Just have to make sure," Spike said thoughtfully. "We work with a lot of books… in a tree… so I'd have to…" His stomach churned loudly. "Whoop, hang on…"

Spike vomited out a sealed scroll, and neatly naught it in hand. "Ooh! This one's from Cadance," he noted. "Cool!"

"What the heck?" Snarl said blankly.

"Oh! Yeah, my fire is used to convey messages between Twilight and the princesses," Spike explained, chuckling at Snarl's eye-popped expression. "That fits perfectly, 'cause we were just talking about dragon fire, weren't we? We gotta find out what enchantment they put on me to do that, so you can have it too. It makes our fire a lot less dangerous; as long as I keep the stream narrow, my fire doesn't burn anything, it just sends the stuff to Princess Celestia's location."

"I don't want them to put an enchantment on me!" Snarl said in alarm.

"No, no, it won't do any harm to you, I promise," Spike said quickly. "It's fine."

Snarl huffed. "Can I have some time to think about it?"

"Of course."

There was an awkward silence.

"Come on in," said Spike, opening the door. And so they did.

"So, this is Golden Oak Library," Spike said grandly. "It's where Twilight and I live."

"What are all these things?" Snarl wondered.

Spike took a moment to realize what he was asking. "Oh… books. They're books. Be careful, they catch fire very easily. They contain all of the knowledge and stories of ponykind."

"How do they do that?" said Snarl, his eyes widening. "Magic?"

"Not at all," said Spike. "You don't know how books work? We're going to have to teach you how to read. That'll be fun and exciting!"

"Great, more things I have to remember," Snarl grumbled.

"Oh, it'll be fine," Spike said dismissively.

Peewee fluttered down to the library floor.

"Ah! Here's another name for you," said Spike. "This is Peewee, my pet. Peewee, my brother Snarl."

Peewee warbled.

"He approves," said Spike.

"That's a phoenix!" Snarl exclaimed, recoiling in terror. "Where did you get him?"

"As an egg. Some mean older dragons were trying to smash him."

"Smash the egg?" Snarl said, revolted. "They weren't even gonna eat it?"

"Nope. Terrible, isn't it?" He eyed Peewee uncomfortably. "Er… not that I would have approved if they were planning to eat you. So… after I saved him I took him home with me. Admittedly, I probably could have put a little more effort into tracking down his parents."

Peewee tenderly nuzzled Spike's head with his beak.

"Aw, thanks, buddy," he said. "Ah, and here's the other bird of the house. This is Owloysius. Why don't you introduce yourself?"

Owloysius stood atop the railing of the second floor, gazing down at them all.

"Uh, okay," said Snarl, crawling a bit closer with his lizard-like gait and looking up at the owl. "Hi. I'm Snarl."

"Hoo?" Owloysius inquired.

"Snarl," he said blankly.

"Hoo."

"Me. Snarl. And you are?"

"Hoo."

"I thought you said his name was Owloysius?" Snarl said to Spike dubiously.

Spike broke out in laughter. "'Hoo' is just the sound an owl makes, buddy."

"Oh."

"Don't worry, it happens to the best of us," Spike said jovially. "He gets it."

"Did that happen to you when you met him?" Snarl said hopefully.

"Who, me? Naaaah, I've always been pretty knowledgeable about things like that…"

Owloysius threw a small gray stony object at him, which bounced, not entirely harmlessly, off of his head.

"And over here we have the changelings…" said Spike, bobbing over to the pedestal that held the bedazzled eggs. "We've been tending to these eggs for, oh, a couple months now… they're gonna hatch in the summer. Twilight's gonna raise the changelings as her daughters."

Snarl nodded, impressed. "Lucky changelings."

"I completely agree."

"What's that?" Snarl asked, pointing to the doll sprawled across the eggs' pedestal.

"Oh, that's Smarty Pants," Spike said dismissively. "Twilight's doll from when she was little. She sleeps with it. Twilight's the greatest, but she's kinda funny in the head. But in all the best ways. Oh, and here's another important thing: Olivia!" He raced to the window and pressed his face against it. "An olive tree I'm growing. I know she doesn't look like much right now… but she'll be blooming soon. And we'll have olives! All the fresh olives we can eat…"

He stepped away from the window and leaned toward Snarl conspiratorially. "I'd never say this in front of her, but I'm actually not that crazy about olives. But it's the principle of the thing."

"I… I could go for some olives," Snarl said with a shrug.

"Good, I'm glad."

Snarl thought hard. "So… when you want food, you just go someplace and buy some."

"Uh… yeah," Spike said cautiously.

"Must be nice…" Snarl muttered.

"Well… now that's how you live," Spike said brightly. "Don't worry about it. You don't have to hunt or forage anymore. Unless you want olives, and they're, like, right there."

Snarl shrugged and continued his inspection of the library floor. "What is it you do here?" he finally asked.

"Oh, I'm sort of a personal assistant," Spike said proudly. "I help Twilight out with her research and her daily stuff. I write her letters and her lists of things to do and such. Owloysius is kind of my co-assistant. Taught him everything he knows."

"Really?" Snarl said in surprise. "He can do all that writing and list-making too?"

"Oh, sure."

"Wow," Snarl breathed. "Smart bird."

"Eh, he's not that smart. He can't even spell 'oh really'."

Owloysius hurled another small object at Spike, identical to the first. This time Spike caught it and held it up to his eye, inspecting it. "What are these, barnacles? Where did you get these?"

Owloysius shrugged.

"Oh!" Spike exclaimed, pounding a fist into his palm with sudden excitement. "And on Fridays we have guys' night, when all the dudes I know get together and play some cards. It hasn't been the same since Mr. Cake went on vacation and Discord, well, betrayed us all, but there's still some pretty cool guys, you'll like it. Probably have to teach you to play cards, I assume… or you can just hang out, you don't have to play. You are a bit young for cards. But they'll like you there, they definitely will."

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

Later in the afternoon, the two dragons were outside tending to Olivia.

"Hey Spike! Who's this?"

Spike chuckled to himself as Scootaloo flew over to him. "Boy, we ought to do a press conference or something, explaining this is getting old." He turned to her, grinning. "Scoot, this is Snarl, he's my brother, we've just met and we're getting to know each other. Snarl, this is Scootaloo, my girlfriend."

Snarl gaped at her, his jaw slack. "A girlfriend too?" he muttered to himself.

Scootaloo looked at Snarl, but her eyes kept distractedly shooting back toward Spike. "That's… awesome. How did he get here?"

"Princesses," Snarl said simply. "Found me out in the wild. Guess I live here now." He waved vaguely at the library.

"That is so awesome," said Scootaloo. "Snarl, would you mind if I borrowed Spike for a second?"

"Sure."

Scootaloo grabbed Spike's arm and flew toward the library's front door, almost carrying him in her haste to get him there.

She pinned him against the tree trunk, jabbing him in the chest repeatedly. "I. Am not. Your girlfriend," she growled at him.

"I know, I know, take it easy," he said dismissively, rubbing his pained chest. "I just… he's got a lot to take in. I thought I'd go with the simpler explanation. I know you're not my girlfriend."

"Do you?" Scootaloo said bluntly. "Last time we were together, you didn't mention Sweetie Belle once, and we didn't even go where anypony we know could see us."

"I don't recall you asking me to stop kissing you," he retorted.

"Well, you're… I mean, I'm… I'm not some kind of angel!" she spluttered. "You're very tempting to me, and… no! I'm not going to forget why we're doing this! I've… I've been weak, and tempted… there's a lot of stuff going on with my body that I don't understand. But I've still got a head. So… not anymore." She looked away from him, her brow furrowed with fury.

"Well, maybe I think we should," Spike said softly.

"What?"

"Maybe we should forget that this was about Sweetie Belle," he said, more clearly. "I think we should."

"Well, tough titties, punkass, because that ain't happening!" she snapped.

"'Tough titties, punkass'?" he said blankly. "Who the hell says that?"

"Apparently, I just did," she grumbled. "I'm not going to real-date you, Spike. In fact… yeah. It's time. We did what we started this for, so… I'm never kissing you again. That's a promise. I should have made that promise the moment I realized you were interested in me. I was weak… and bad… and I'm sorry. A lot of the blame can be placed on me."

Stung by her words, he hung his head and wrung his hands. "You're not weak," he finally said. "Or bad. Okay?"

She nodded. "This has gone far enough. You get that, right?" she said, gently now.

"I know this wasn't the plan," he muttered. "But… you said you had a monster crush on me…"

"Used to," she said, firm but not unkind. "Used to. Not for a long time. I thought I could have my cake and eat it too, but I was wrong. I only want to see you with Sweetie Belle. Please, Spike. I don't want to see you lose faith. You were so determined to win her over for so long. I don't want to see you giving up on that because I'm here and I'm easy."

They stood in silence for a moment, both staring at the ground.

"You're better than this, Spike," said Scootaloo, pained. "You're my best friend."

He looked up at her. "Really?"

She nodded. He let out a huge sigh and leaned back against the tree in disbelief.

"It obviously hasn't worked," he said, still stunned. "She's obviously just not that into me."

"Yes, she is!" Scootaloo exclaimed. "Where could you possibly—you've seen her! In pain! Oh, sweet Celestia, why did we do this to her?" She collapsed, leaning against the tree beside him. "Look… Spike… the bottom line is that if you give up on her, you won't have her or me. Then where will you be?"

"I dunno. But I've never felt so alive as when I was with you."

"You weren't with me!" she said, jabbing at him again, more in disbelief than anger now. "It was a ruse! And I regret every minute of it now!"

"It didn't work, all right?" he snapped, batting her spindly legs away to deflect another jab. "I can read signals. Maybe I couldn't before, but I can now."

"You can't," Scootaloo said, so shocked and appalled that she was almost laughing. "You so can't. Sweetie Belle wants you so bad."

"I don't care!" he snarled. "I don't care about Sweetie Belle anymore."

They both jumped in surprise at the sound of a small, squeaky "nnnh!" of shock, and looked up to see Sweetie Belle, who had clearly just stopped in her tracks while making a beeline for the library door, levitating a glass box. As she stared wide-eyed at them, her magic sputtered out and she dropped the box. It shattered on the streets, and hundreds of tiny, glittering candies came tumbling out.

Scootaloo turned to glare at Spike. "Then you and I have nothing else to talk about, Spike," she said coldly. "Ever. I know that's a rotten thing for a friend to say, but it's how I feel."

Spike didn't answer, or even look at her; he was shocked, staring at Sweetie Belle, who gave another primal moan and galloped away.

He walked out into the street and picked up one of the fallen candies, to find it wasn't a candy at all but a tiny, heart-shaped baby-blue sapphire glazed with sugar. "Be mine" was engraved on it in minuscule letters. He picked up another one, a purple amethyst, which read "I'm sorry".

"You still think it didn't work?" Scootaloo said from behind him, more icy fury in her tone than Spike had ever heard from her. "You… ugh. You fool. You blind idiot. She just wanted me to stall you for a little while longer so she could decide how she would… ugh. Freakin' ugh, man."

She waited for him to turn to face her. He didn't.

"I'm gonna go find her," Scootaloo said in disgust, flying away in the direction Sweetie had run.

Spike just stood there, staring at the miserable heap of tiny jewels, barely even moving. He had no idea how much time had passed by the time he was brought back to his senses by the sound of Snarl talking to himself. He shook his head to clear it, and turned to see Snarl curled up right by the door, covering his eyes with his claws, muttering.

"Hey, Snarl. You okay?"

Snarl froze for a moment, then slowly took his hands away from his eyes and looked at Spike. "Yeah… fine. Why?"

"You were talking to yourself or something," said Spike. "Sure you're okay?"

"Yeah," Snarl said flatly. "So, what was that about? That little white unicorn girl ran away again…"

Spike sighed. "Well… Scootaloo wanted me to tell you that she's not my girlfriend, first of all."

"Okay," he said, puzzled.

"We were just pretending to date because we wanted to trick Sweetie Belle… that's who ran away… into liking me," said Spike, wincing at the sound of the words.

"Did it work?"

"I guess it did," Spike said heavily. "Love can be jealous sometimes. But that's not supposed to be… I mean, you're not supposed to use that…" He buried his face in his hands. "I did a stupid thing, Snarl." He looked up. "I've never told anyone this before, but I do love her. I know I do. But… I think this is it. This is the time that I screwed up forever."

Snarl blinked uneasily, gently reaching out one of his long arms to pat Spike's shoulder. "Is there anything I can do to help you?" he said softly.

"Nothing," said Spike. "But thank you."

"Thank you," Snarl echoed. "For letting me live here. I mean it."

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

Twilight entered the library, to find Spike and Snarl lounging in bathrobes and large armchairs, Spike showing off one of his prized possessions: a bedazzled picture frame, in which there was a photograph of Spike holding up a framed photograph of Rarity.

"And so I had a crush on her for a couple years, then she had a crush on me, briefly, but by then I had started having feelings for Sweetie Belle, and Rarity was pretty cool with that…"

"You got a lot of girlfriends, man," Snarl grumbled.

"Naaaah, not at all."

"Hey, Spike," said Twilight.

"Oh, hey Twi. I've been telling Snarl here about… well, everything. Say, that spell on me that makes my fire breath… you know, less dangerous, more of a utility? Do you know how that works?"

"The message conveyance charm?" Twilight said in surprise, setting down her saddlebags at her desk. "Wow… that was a long time ago. I'd have to look it up. But then, certainly, yes, I'd be able to do it."

"All right then," said Spike. "We just kinda need Snarl to consent to it. You will, won't you? I understand that you're nervous, but it's absolutely vital that you don't burn anything. And if you need to burn something, it's all a matter of… I guess, throat control. I can teach you that too!"

"That's way too many things I've gotta be taught," Snarl muttered.

Spike shrugged. "We'll break it up into bite-sized pieces. Twilight will get that spell all fired up for you in no time. She's probably the best spellcaster in the world!"

Twilight blushed. "Oh, Spike…"

"I mean it!" Spike insisted. "By the way, for your own safety, don't ask Twilight to make you a sandwich. Most ponies will just pretend to wave a magic wand and say 'Zap! You're a sandwich,' but Twilight will take that joke to its logical conclusion."

Twilight chuckled. "Yeah, I have done that."

Snarl stared at her in terror.

"What?" she said defensively. "I changed them back. Nopony got eaten."

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

Spike rushed around his bedroom, cleaning it up, making a space for Snarl, who stood in the doorway looking around.

"How did you ever end up here?" Snarl muttered. "This great home, this great job, with all these powerful magical ponies who take care of you, beautiful pony girlfriends… how does a dragon get here?"

"I honestly don't know," said Spike. "Twilight doesn't know where my egg came from. She got it when she was applying for Princess Celestia's School for Gifted Unicorns. Students were given the egg to hatch… it was meant to be an impossible task just to see what the students think of, what they try, but Twilight was so powerful she managed to actually hatch me. She doesn't know where the school got the egg, though.

"Princess Celestia raised me until I was, well, about your age… then she put me in Twilight's care. It was her job to raise and teach me, and my job to help her out. We've been together ever since, closer than family."

"So you've never been alone?" Snarl said quietly.

Spike shrugged. "No, I suppose I haven't."

Snarl didn't say anything for a while, and Spike turned to face him. He was curled up in a corner, pointedly looking away from Spike.

"Snarl?" he said cautiously. "Come on, little brother, don't be jealous. Now you're never gonna be alone either."

"I wish I was alone…" Snarl said gravely.

"Don't say that!" Spike urged, coming close to Snarl. He reached out to touch him, but recoiled at the last second, uncomfortable. "…I mean, you can be alone a little bit if that's what you want, I don't have a problem with that. As much as you need, I guess. But you can have a life here that's better, you know, it's not… well, what'd we just talk about, man? Jealousy's not good. Or is it envy? Are those the same things?"

Snarl lifted his head and glared at Spike. "How the hell should I know?"

"…I dunno," Spike mumbled, wringing his hands. "You're a really good speaker, I guess. I thought you might… don't worry about it. Whatcha think?"

He presented Snarl with the very large mattress that now took up his otherwise-empty half of the room, all of Spike's own possessions crammed into the other half.

Snarl sighed and closed his eyes. "It's great," he said sincerely. "Thank you."

He crept over to the mattress and curled up again.

"Goodnight, Snarl."

"Goodnight, Spike."

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

Endnotes

So, I'm very excited to be able to tell you about the genesis of Snarl as a character. Been waiting a long time to introduce this guy! He dates back to before the fic began—Christmas of 2011, I guess. My parents, when offering the various aunts and uncles gift suggestions, mentioned that my sister were into My Little Pony (presumably not ready to admit that I was as well). One aunt made the perfectly reasonable mistake of sending us a DVD of several episodes of My Little Pony Generation 1. Understandable; this would have been about the midpoint of Season 2, so the G4 fandom existed but hadn't really busted out, and I don't think Friendship Is Magic DVDs even existed yet.

And my sisters, well, they were little, so they watched it anyway, and it was, I suppose, cute and competent in a "dark age of animation" kind of way. Insipid, saccharine stories starring a bunch of ponies who are all identical in both looks and personality, just every episode throws out a different assortment of color schemes and names… you see, kids have a knack for remembering character names, so when the time comes to buy toys they'll ask for each individual character by name, so the show just throws out as many names as possible. It was the 80s; c'est la vie. Fortunately, it's now illegal for television programs to be nothing but 30-minute long commercials, though I'm not entirely sure how they regulate that sort of thing, considering a lot of modern-day cartoons could still be called that…

When I watched the show, I discovered something that surprised me: G1 had a Spike. Go figure, I'd somehow just not known that. From what I could tell, the current Spike is, character-wise, nearly identical to the original model. In fact, one of the episodes on the DVD was clearly the inspiration for the late-Season 2 FIM episode, "Dragon Quest". One major difference? The original Spike was not played with a cute little-boy voice, but in a terrifying demonic rasp provided by Charlie Adler. Okay, it was probably supposed to sound cute, and maybe to most people it succeeded, maybe it's just the same way I think Buster Bunny has a terrifying voice because that's what I think of all of Charlie Adler's roles… perhaps I was scarred by the roles that first taught me his name… Cow and Chicken. Very unsettling. Plus some nasty cackling villainy in Baldur's Gate II and Torment, some of my favorite games. When he was cast as Starscream in the live-action Transformers films, that was a head-scratcher for some people, but to me it made perfect sense. To me, Charlie Adler equals pure terror.

Anyway, at the time, I'd been mulling over the idea of writing an FIM fanfic, knowing I'd be waiting until the end of Season 2, and the G1 episode had given me a little brainstorm. And so, the genesis of the character of Snarl is, basically, G4 Spike meets G1 Spike… but scary, the way I perceive Charlie Adler.

Whoo! That felt good. I've been waiting to tell that story since day one. Only took me four and a half years.