After a tiresome day of work, Bon-Bon just wanted to sleep. She trotted home from the bakery as quickly as she could, but her legs weren’t being very agreeable. The walk through Luna’s dark night was pleasant, or it would have been if Bon-Bon didn’t have to force herself to drag her hooves home. Finally arriving, she opened the front door and dropped her saddlebags near the doorsill. When she made her way to the kitchen she saw that dinner was done. Lyra had long since passed out, her face covered in what remains of a carton of mint ice cream. Bon-Bon sighed deeply as she wiped off the milky remains from her lover’s lips with a damp towel. She walked into the bathroom and turned the metal dial on the bathtub. She tossed in a hoof full of bath salts and hopped into the pool of hot water, feeling the day‘s stress simply melt away.

Minutes later the bathroom door opened, the sound of clipping and clopping echoing against the tiled floor awoke Bon-Bon from her near comatose state.

“Well, look who’s awake.” Bon-Bon called out, still keeping her eyes closed.

“Ha-ha, very funny.” Lyra replied, obvious sarcasm in her voice. “How was your day, Bonny?”

Bon-Bon waved a dismissive hoof in the air. “I don’t wanna talk about it. Same old, same old, Ya’ know.”

Lyra nodded. “How could I not?” She looked into the bathroom mirror; her mane was a horrible mess. A quick burst of magic, and a shake of her neck fixed that up easily enough.

Bon-Bon let out an involuntary sigh as she sunk deeper into her blissful bath. “And how was your day, hon?”

Now it was Lyra’s turn to sigh. “My research on humans is at a standstill. My Lyre playing career, however, is still very much alive.” Lyra frequented playing her favored instrument, the lyre for which she was named after, at Canterlot, but more often than not she was usually much closer towards home in Ponyville. When she was not playing professionally she was out on the streets playing for the simple joy of creating art. A few kind individuals would stop to toss a bit or two into her lyre case, and Lyra would always play something special for them. None of it was written, simply played from her mind as she closed her eyes and imagined her magic taking the form of human hands to craft her music.

Lyra bent down into the tub and gave Bon-Bon a quick peck on the nose before saying goodnight and trotting back into the bedroom to salvage what she could of a nap. Before she got all the way there, Bon-Bon shouted for her to come back. Reluctantly, Lyra turned her flank around and walked down the hallway. When she did arrived in the steam filled bathroom, Bon-Bon told her to go do something about her horn - it was sharp and uncared for. Again. With all of the human research, Lyra often forgot to take proper care of herself. The unicorn feigned a yawn and dramatically held her hoof up to her forehead. "Oh, but I'm ever so tired." she said, horribly mimicking a Trottingham accent.

Bon-Bon smiled and watched as Lyra walked back to their bedroom. The cream colored earth pony finished her bath an hour and a half later once she noticed her hooves starting to prune. She drained the tub, dried herself off, and hopped into bed next to Lyra. In between her mint green hooves was a book entitled “Anthropology: Everything You Need To Know About Humans.” The inch thick book was laden with drool and the ink had begun smudging under Lyra’s muzzle. Wishing she had magic of her own, Bon-Bon reluctantly moved to book under the bed where it would rest until the morning when Lyra would wake up, alone and bored out of her right mind.

“What would you do without me?” Bon-Bon asked herself as she kissed Lyra on the forehead, angling her neck right under Lyra’s horn. "Ouch!" Bon-Bon shrieked in pain as she poked her eye on Lyra's sharp horn, consequently waking up the sleeping mare.

"Huh? Wha-" Lyra yawned and saw Bon-Bon clutching her right eye in pain. "Are you okay, hon?"

Bon-Bon nodded and reminded Lyra to take care of herself, she made the point clear with a tap on her jagged horn.

Lyra groggily apologized as best she could, then kissed Bon-Bon and promised that she would do something about it in the morning when she woke up. She was met with a lighthearted smile as Bon-Bon hopped into the bed and wrapped her hooves around her belly.

-----

Bon-Bon felt a sharp pain in her lip as she awoke from the grasp of sleep. There was something warm dripping down her neck, her first thought was Lyra‘s persistent teasing.

“Mmn… C’mon Lyra, we can play later. I’m tired.”

The pain only got worse, amplifying with every passing second. The warm drips feeling as if they were getting hotter as her body woke up.

“Lyra, stop it. That hurts…”

She began to taste something metallic on her tongue. Bon-Bon looked down towards her lover’s head; through the darkness she saw the horn peeking through her snout, crimson liquid dripping down the sides. Blood. Bon-Bon instinctively let out an ear-piercing shriek, waking up the sound asleep mare next to her.

“What? Who’s there!?” Lyra said, immediately jumping off the bed and landing into a defensive position by the door. With the flick of her horn she magicked on the lights, only to see the sanguine liquid covering her bed and her shaking marefriend’s face.

“Wha-?”

Bon-Bon pointed a shaking hoof at Lyra’s horn. Lyra, confused, looked in the mirror that adorned their wall. Her horn, as well as her mane, was soaked in blood. The closet door slammed open as a jacket surrounded by Lyra’s golden aura floated over to Bon-Bon. “It’s cold outside. We have to get you to a hospital ASAP.” Before Bon-Bon could protest, or at least tell Lyra to put on a jacket of her own, the jacket was wrapped around her and then she was levitated into the air and dropped a few short inches onto Lyra’s back.

Lyra didn’t know much medical magic, but she tried everything that she could to stunt the bleeding. The first of which being a spell that would increase the production of blood platelets, which would make her blood coagulate faster. While galloping through the freezing cold of night, carrying a pony that weights just as much as you do, maintaining a spell is difficult, however Lyra soldiered on through her blind search for the hospital.

The guard’s flashlights told Lyra that she was extremely close. The gruff voice of a stallion scared her as she nearly lost focus on the spell. She ignored him and continued galloping through darkness towards the red, illuminated cross. The lights of the building were all off, save two: one above the entrance, and the other above the secretary’s desk. Lyra halted the spell to use her magic to pry open the door while she was still galloping through the darkness. She arrived in the hospital with Bon-Bon moaning in pain, she began casting a different spell, seeing as the bleeding wasn’t stopping. This one was a supposed to act as a mild painkiller, hopefully it would work. Seeing her marefriend in pain because of her own carelessness was devastating.

“Help!” Lyra called out. “Doctor!” The sound of hooves clip-clopping on the cold tiled floor told her help was coming. She used her magic to gently lift Bon-Bon off of her back and held her in her hooves. She brushed Bon-Bon’s matted and sweaty mane while humming a soothing tune. Bon-Bon opened her eyes and smiled up to Lyra, she knew that she was safe. Lyra bent her neck down to kiss Bon-Bon on the forehead. When she looked up there was a unicorn colt standing in front of them. His eyes widened as he saw the pool of blood flowing down Bon-Bon’s neck under the two mares. He lifted up the crème colored mare with his magic and galloped away, calling for the Lyra to follow him.

He opened the door and floated Bon-Bon onto a bed. He hoofed over a white towel to the mint colored mare and trotted of to find additional assistance. Lyra pressed the cloth into Bon-Bon’s cheek and continued humming, this time something different. Her coat was stained with blood, but she didn’t care. Lyra had managed to soothe Bon-Bon to sleep by the time that the doctor and his nurses arrived. She moved her bloodied hoof inched away from her mouth to signal them to be quiet, they complied without question;:It would be much easier to stitch up somepony and subdue them while they’re already asleep.

The thing about unicorn’s horns is that, obviously, they’re magic. They allow unicorn ponies to interact with the natural magical waves around them and alter them to do whatever they please. A puncture wound by a unicorn horn rarely heals properly because of the residual energy that they’ve always got swirling around them, even while a pony isn’t casting a spell.

Unfortunately, Lyra could not be in the room with Bon-Bon while her muzzle was being stitched up. What with it being a magical wound, the procedure would take much more time than a normal stitching. A unicorn would have to alter the wound so it would heal properly, and even then there would probably be a large scar under her coat. Having been politely asked to leave the room, Lyra dragged herself to the bathroom to wash up. Her forehead and mane was coated in dried blood, the white streaks in her mane now the dark crimson color of dry blood. She didn’t deserve to have magic. She didn’t deserve to have that coltdamned horn. She didn’t deserve Bon-Bon. Lyra’s shaky hooves fought to get the mess of a tangled mane clean. She looked up in the mirror - Lyra hadn’t noticed it, but she was crying. Her golden eyes were surrounded by a hue of pink as veins pulsed and burned.

Lyra’s head made a loud bang against the hard countertop. She looked up to herself, “You’re a monster.” She said. “You don’t deserve her.” She raised her hoof up to her forehead and moved her mane out of her eyes, revealing her horn. The grooved swirl that ran up it was still caked with the dark blood of her marefriend. She rested her hooves along both sides of her horn, pushing with one and pulling with the other. Lyra heard a soft crack, but the horn didn’t budge. The sounds of frustration and anger leaked out of her and echoed in the empty bathroom. Her eye twitched in pain as another crack, this one louder than the first, reverberated off the tiled walls. Whimpers of pain and determination. Crack.

Her head felt as if it was going to cave in on itself, the feeling of stress on her forehead and temples weakening Lyra’s strength to do what must be done. Crack. With a final shriek of rage and pain, cr-snap – the pistachio green horn, covered in her fresh, sanguine liquid, and Bon-Bon’s long-since dried blood, fell to the floor with a grotesque click. The leaking residual golden sparks of magic burned Lyra’s hoof as she knelt down to pick it up. She deserved it. Never again would she be able to play her Lyre; the golden cutie mark on her flank soon began to fade back into her mint green coat, as she lay on the cold hospital bathroom floor, alone - sobbing and bleeding.

-----

“Bonny?” Lyra awoke in a cold sweat - frozen and scared. Celestia’s sunlight had pierced it’s way through the bright cream colored drapes and landed it’s radiant light directly in Lyra’s face. Having gotten no response, she dug her hoof into Bon-Bon’s ribcage to wake her up.

“Mmm… what is it?” Bon-Bon rolled over and looked to Lyra whose golden eyes were shaking wildly with fear.

“I love you.” The comment was followed by a one-sided, open mouth kiss. Bon-Bon’s eyes shot open at the sudden show of compassion, but quickly relaxed as confusion melted into Lyra’s sweet taste. The embrace didn’t last too long however, Lyra excused herself to go to the bathroom and said that she would be back, leaving Bon-Bon alone to question what had just happened. Lyra opened the drawer and pulled out a small, metal file. She brought it up to her head in her hooves and began softly gliding it over the tip of her sharp, unkempt horn. She sighed as layer after layer of dust-like matter came off as her horn shortened ever so slightly. Feeling successful in her hoofdy work, she looked at her now blunt horn. She brought her hoof up to it to make certain that it wasn’t sharp, and was relieved when the rounded tip did not stab her.

She returned the file to the drawer and slowly trotted down the hallway to open the door to Bon-Bon and their bedroom. Bon-Bon was looking at herself on the side of their room, playing with her mane and getting any imperfections out of it. Lyra silently trotted behind her, taking mind of her own cutie-mark adorned saddlebags, and wrapped her hooves around Bon-Bon’s back. She leaned forward and whispered in her ear, “You don’t have to go, do you?” The question was followed by a kiss on the neck and playful nibble of Bon-Bon’s sensitive ear.

Bon-Bon cooed with a smile, “Well,” she began. “I supposed I c– “ Lyra swept Bon-Bon backwards off of her hooves, and before she could finish her sentence, kissed her on the lips. Both mares closed their eyes, feeling the world around them melt away into the warm embrace of each other. In the moment, nothing mattered – time did not exist.