Applejack had, together with Spike, made a little campfire in the middle of the main room of the cave. Everypony was sitting around it. Not much was said.

The smoke found its way out even though they were inside a cave, so they didn’t have to worry too much about it.

Fluttershy sighed quiet to herself. She felt her sadness deep inside. It was growing like there was no hope left in the world. But right now, Sharpy was the world for her. And for him, they could do nothing but wait. Twilight and Rarity had explained that they had done everything they could for him. They told her how Sharpy’s lungs had now been healed, but he was still unconscious. They didn’t know what else could be done besides laying him in a position so that he could cough up the blood from his lungs without choking himself. But it had been hard for them to reach this far. Really hard. Not to mention exhausting. They were both lying down, almost sleeping. Twilight seemed to be in the worst condition here. Sharpy’s body had naturally tried to resist Twilight’s and Rarity’s magic, so they had to use so much magical power just to make the smallest of difference. Twilight had been the one lending Rarity her magic, so she was completely exhausted. Rarity was in a better shape, but she was still really down. It was obvious that she was exhausted, but there was something else. Fluttershy could see it. She was sad. Devastated. Just like she got the feeling that she just couldn’t do enough for her loved one. Just like Fluttershy felt.

Rarity was in love with Sharpy. Fluttershy could see that. That was a thing she was good at. She could tell how most ponies felt and thought just by looking at their expressions and actions. Rarity was lying on the ground but hadn’t closed her eyes like Twilight. She was staring at her own hooves, slowing rubbing them against the stone floor.

The rest of the company was pretty much their good old selves. Nopony dared to say much, though. The sadness from, especially Rarity and Fluttershy herself, made it all very awkward.

Rainbow Dash had, against all odds, actually been able to sit down for the entire evening. She had apparently started to feel a bit dizzy from time to time. Probably because of the hit she took from Huffy’s force push. But she refused to let anypony check her to see if everything was ok saying “It’s not that bad”. They were a bit worried at first, but they quickly let it go. Rainbow was still her normal self, even if she wasn’t flying around.

Pinkie Pie wasn’t really her jolly self, though. She wasn’t really acting strange. The problem was that she wasn’t acting strange enough. Apparently Pinkie had figured out that nopony’s mood wasn’t going to change very much unless something happened to Sharpy, so she’d stopped trying. She wasn’t really sad herself, though. She had, just like Spike, good faith that Sharpy would be all right soon enough.

Applejack was currently the only one besides Pinkie that was fully ok after all that had happened. She had to take care of most things, like preparing some dinner for them all. Pinkie and Fluttershy had tried to help with whatever they could, but Applejack wasn’t too interested in their help since she thought she could very well take care of things herself.

Fluttershy herself was just stared into the little campfire. She had seen Sharpy done the same thing during the nights when she and Spike had been spying on them. At those times she never really understood why he did that. But now she did. The flame was fascinating. It was almost like it had a life of its own, dancing around until it would finally die out. Though, it seemed distant somehow, it was still spreading its warm energy to everypony and everything around it. Fluttershy couldn’t imagine what went through Sharpy’s mind, but she was certain that the fire made him calm down.

Fluttershy sighed. She heard Sharpy cough back in the corner where he lied. She looked back at him, hoping that he would have recovered. But no. It was just a reflex. He was still unconscious. She saw how he spat out a little blood on the floor. It made her stomach hurt. Perhaps it would be for the best that he was unconscious for now. She didn’t even want to imagine what kind of pain he would be in if he was awake. Fluttershy quickly closed her eyes end turned away her head. She didn’t want to think about that. Thoughts like that wouldn’t help anypony. She slowly opened her eyes and looked at everypony. They all looked around like they were wondering or thinking of something. But Fluttershy didn’t care. Not right now. She had something else going on in her mind.

An ordinary dinner followed. Twilight had woken up and everypony had their mood up again. They were talking and laughing to each other. Everypony except Fluttershy. Sure, she felt better and the participated in the discussion as much as she usually did. But she didn’t really enjoy it. In fact, she thought it was awkward. She didn’t felt like talking about trivial things and give everypony a fake smile. Not right now. It felt wrong, somehow.

She looked to her side and realized Rarity wasn’t very active in the conversations at all. And that was very unusual for her since she always had something to say. In fact, she was once again looking down at her hooves while making small circles with them. Rarity realized that Fluttershy was looking at her, so she lifted her head and looked at her. Fluttershy quickly blushed and looked the other way. Rarity looked skeptically at the ponies around the fire. Then she looked back at Sharpy with a sad smile. She sighed deeply. She nudged Fluttershy with her hoof to catch her attention. Fluttershy tried to act surprised and looked back questioning at her. Rarity nodded discretely at Sharpy as a sign for them to go there. Fluttershy tool a final look at the other ponies around the fire before nodding. Neither of them was talking very much anyway. It wouldn’t matter much if they were there or not.

Rarity stood up, excused herself and started walking towards Sharpy. Fluttershy followed her example shortly after and trotted to catch up with Rarity.

“I want to talk to you, Fluttershy”, Rarity said sadly but clearly. Fluttershy looked at her, but Rarity avoided her eyes. She saw how a single tear ran down from her eye. Rarity bit her lip and looked up at the ceiling.

“Is everything all right?” Fluttershy asked carefully.

“No, everything is not all right!” Rarity said as quickly it surprised Fluttershy. Fluttershy looked down in shame, afraid that she might have upset Rarity.

“I’m sorry… I…” Fluttershy began, but Rarity interrupted her.

“No, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have shouted like that…” she said. “It’s just that…” Rarity stopped and looked at Sharpy, who were still unconscious. Fluttershy did the same. As soon as her eyes met the unconscious body of her loved one, her mood dropped instantly. She quickly turned her eyes away from him and looked questioning at her, wondering what she wanted to talk about.

“Sharpy, he…” Rarity said slowly. “I’ve done all I can for him, but it’s not enough”. Rarity walked up to him and looked at his face. His eyes were closed. His large, scaly wings were lying lifeless unfolded on the ground. And his mouth was covered in his own blood he had coughed up. Rarity raised her hoof to wipe away some of the blood around his mouth. When she was done, she looked at her hoof, now with blood stains. She got a mildly disgusted look on her face, but decided to ignore it for now.

“His body keeps rejecting our magic… I don’t know if he’s going to make it…” Rarity continued. Fluttershy reacted to this and took a couple of steps backwards. “Most ponies wouldn’t…” Rarity finished her sentence with a weak sob.

Fluttershy covered her mouth with her hoof after hearing that. She felt how her eyes started to fill up with tears. She shook her head and turned around. The little hope she had got were now completely gone.

Rarity closed her eyes as tears started falling down from her cheeks to the ground. She bit her lip so hard it almost started to bleed.

“I love him…” Rarity said. Fluttershy stopped her crying for a moment and listened on Rarity without turning around. “I really do… And I can’t do anything to help him…” Fluttershy now looked back at Rarity. Rarity was standing over the unconscious Sharpy, looking down at him. Fluttershy started to recognize her own feelings in Rarity. More than before. Fluttershy wasn’t fond of the fact that Rarity was also in love with Sharpy. Especially when she realized Sharpy could very well share feeling with Rarity. But she had to put that aside for now. Rarity was her friend and she couldn’t let her down. Especially not now when she truly knew they felt the same way. Fluttershy slowly walked up to her sobbing friend and put her hoof on her back.

“I know how you feel Rarity”, she said. Rarity looked at her with wet eyes. Fluttershy’s eyes were as wet as Rarity’s but had an intense stare. “I feel the same… I can’t seem to do anything right for him…” It was a bit unusual for Fluttershy to have this role when she was the one supporting Rarity. It was usually in the opposite way. But Fluttershy didn’t do this just to make Rarity feel better. It also helps herself.

“Do you know what Spike told me earlier?” Fluttershy said. Rarity shook her head. “That we need to have hope” Fluttershy felt stronger while saying this. She had made a promise. A promise where she told herself that she would do anything for Sharpy. That she wouldn’t go away, hide and cry. She had a different side. And the least she could do now was to keep the hope up. She knew would be hard to even convince herself, but she felt like that was needed. “Hope” she repeated and let go of Rarity. Her eyes were still flooded with tears and so was Rarity’s.

Rarity nodded and wiped the tears off her face. She looked into Fluttershy’s eyes and saw a flame. A flame which could only be awoken by one thing. True love. She saw strength. Unimaginable strength. Something she had never seen in Fluttershy ever before.  Fluttershy was afraid. No, she was terrified. But she was ready to face her fear. Face it with everything she got. Rarity almost didn’t recognize Fluttershy. Fluttershy didn’t usually stand up like this. But she still remembered. She remembered those times where they had been in trouble and Fluttershy was the one who actually took the step and saved them. Then she stood up to protected her dear friends. Now she stands up to protect her love.

“I don’t want to hide anymore…” Fluttershy said. Rarity was so deep in her thoughts she almost jumped backwards by the sound of Fluttershy’s voice. Fluttershy looked at Sharpy with sadness in her eyes. “That’s what I’ve been doing this whole time… hiding. And see where that brought us…”

Fluttershy pointed at Sharpy, turned around and took a few steps back. Rarity walked up to her and put a comforting hoof on Fluttershy’s back.

“It’s not your fault, darling”, she said slowly and tried to look Fluttershy in the eyes. Fluttershy didn’t move a muscle. She was quiet for a few seconds before finally answering.

“But it is…” Fluttershy said and turned to Rarity. “And that’s why I don’t want to hide anymore!”

“That’s the spirit!” Both Fluttershy and Rarity looked surprised behind them. There stood Rainbow Dash with an optimistic smile. Rainbow walked in between them and placed her front legs around their necks like friends sometimes do. “You two seemed a bit down, so I thought you might need some morale boost!”

“And you don’t think it ruins the idea by telling us that?” Rarity said slightly annoyed. Rainbow looked at her for a while. Then she looked up into the ceiling and started tapping her chin.

“No, not really” Rainbow said and smirked. She knew perfectly well that Rarity probably was right. But she couldn’t say that out loud. “But that’s not the point. The point is to keep out hopes up, just like I heard Fluttershy say. Otherwise we will all fall into depression, and that’s not something I wish on anypony”.

“Sharpy’s condition is terrible. He’s dying” Rarity said as more tears started filling her eyes. Rarity was now about to get upset and Rainbow realized that. She looked at her and immediately felt sad. She didn’t want to make things worse for her. She had hoped that Rarity and Fluttershy would be happy that she came. She looked from Rarity to Fluttershy. Fluttershy did still have tears dripping down from her cheeks, but her facial expression told that she wasn’t sad. Or at least tried to keep her mood up.

“But Rarity… I think Rainbow is right. To get through this, we have to keep our mood up”. Rainbow smiled to Fluttershy who gave her a shy smile back. Rainbow then turned to Rarity again. Rarity took a deep breath to calm herself down. She closed her eyes and stood quiet for a few seconds. Nopony interrupted the silence and just waited for Rarity to say something. Rarity then opened her eyes and looked at Fluttershy.

“Though I do admit that optimism is very important, you also have to be realistic. False hope might feel good for the moment, but after the hammer has struck…”

“Well you aren’t helping”, Rainbow Dash said. “I bet he’ll wake up any second now”.

“That’s very unlikely”, Rarity said in disbelief. “I and Twilight might have done quite a lot to help him, but it’s not nearly enough. You can’t expect him to…” but then she stopped. They all heard a quiet groan from behind followed by a deep, quiet voice that appeared to be in pain.

“I feel like a rotten potato…”

Next Chapter: Chapter 24: Recovery Estimated time remaining: 1 Hour, 23 Minutes