Coalburst approached Blue slowly, uncertainly. With every few steps that she took she stumbled, the garment between her teeth something of a hindrance each time that it slipped underneath her hooves. She kept her head held ever so high and struggled to prevent the dress from getting dirtied in the muddy floor. When that attempt proved futile, she instead spat it out and grabbed it with her magic, the yellow aura against the mutated hazel leaves looking unnervingly like a crackling display of fire. She couldn't help but sigh when it didn't turn to ash—though her relief ended when she began to force the dress onto Blue, but to no avail; she was having none of it.

Coalburst huffed and turned away with a snort. She then trotted slowly back to the chest and placed, with a regretful moan, the leafy gown down on top of the lid. Once she had done so, however, a smile grew upon her muzzle at the sight of it. After brief consideration and a hesitant pawing at the ground, she sent a wide—though a little forced—grin to Thorax and lifted the gown in her magic. She then inched forwards and dipped her head into the fabric before she pulled it over herself; it fell around her frame in massive waves of material and pooled on the ground in an oval around her three hooves. She giggled and pranced about a bit, with a buck now and again—or at least until her hoof got tangled in the excessive folds of fabric and she crashed down to the ground. She landed with a yelp on her side and rolled a little before she then leapt back up to her hooves, squealing. Thorax, too, gave a cautious laugh; when her attention turned to Blue, however, she was disappointed to see that she still sat glumly.

Slipping the dress off quickly and throwing it to the side, she glanced about and her eyes landed on a small box which lay at the edge of the hut. She scampered over and peered inside the case; her eyes lit up when she did so and she hovered out a small brush. She then turned to Blue and trotted over, beaming—but found the challenge of utilising her new tools less than simple.

"Geez, Blue! Just stop moving already!" Coalburst gritted her teeth as she leaned towards Blue, her hoof outstretched. Paint coated the tip and dripped slightly on the grey coat, making her scramble backwards and snarl. Her expression was dull; gloomy and depressed.

"Go away, Coalburst," she whispered, opening a wing to push the filly away as she, herself, turned to face the wall. Coalburst, however, merely hissed and grabbed one of the feathers in her magic so as to pull it away from her path, then skipping in front before she could be stopped. Her hoof swept across Blue's cheek in one fluid motion after that, painting a gentle swirl across the fur. It was a warm shade of orange and yellow and red, not unlike the palette of colours which decorated the filly's window shard from the facility; warm, inviting.

When Blue opened her mouth to protest, Coalburst gritted her teeth and clasped her lips shut in a yellow aura so that she could not complain. A dainty paintbrush was then raised and dipped in a bowl of snow-white paint; held tentatively between the filly's teeth, it traced the outline of the fresh mark roughly so that the fine white line produced took on a gently marbled effect with the surrounding colours. She drew away afterwards with a final, gentle flick so that a few white droplets were sprinkled across her muzzle, not so unlike snowflakes falling from a cloudy sky. Blue's eyes crossed as she strained to look at them; the scowl on her muzzle then grew larger and more prominent.

"What are you doing, Coalburst?" she asked with an audible sigh, her voice now gentler in tone than it had been before—but that didn't mean that it was lacking in sorrow. That much was even more clear when she turned away, wings fallen open so that her feathers were draped across the floor, with her ears resting backwards slightly; they were neither pinned back in anger, nor were they alert. They simply hung there, without the enthusiasm to even flick about.

"It's tradition, duh. My mum always said, it's good to be like that and follow tradition 'cos it's a part of your... well, it's part of you. And your history. And stuff." She spoke with a roll of her eyes and a small grin rose on her face as she did so. When Blue's only reaction was to look further away, however, the happiness all but fell from her face and her eyes dulled. "Blue? Are you alright?"

Blue gave a feeble smile and nodded slowly but pushed Coalburst away as she sighed again and lay down; after a few breaths, she then rolled over and wrapped her wings around herself in a cocoon of sorts. Her feathers were long overdue a brush off, by now slightly darker in colour than they should have been. The odd flecks of blood which stained a few did not help her appearance. Both Thorax and Coalburst seemed to notice this at the same time; they glanced to eachother, the latter slightly reluctantly, and made eye contact. Both seemed to think the same thing.

With a quick backwards glance, Coalburst scampered outside hastily with Thorax at her side. Left alone, Blue merely whimpered. After a few moments, she then drew her rear legs closer to her body and tightened her hold on her body whilst her eyes slipped shut and her breathing slowed; there she lay, suddenly cold. There was no breeze, though that much was obvious. Nevertheless, she couldn't help but cringe at the chill which now seemed to seep through her skin and into her heart—or, it did for a moment. After that second, however, something gentle and warm began to brush across her body, caressing her aching and torn up muscles. She let out a breath and her body relaxed ever so slightly as water trickled across her fur, and all the while the gentleness continued.

When she straightened a little and began to sit up, her body feeling inexplicably lighter, healthier, Blue squinted an eye open. Before her stood an exciteable Coalburst, a scrap of cloth in hoof and a bucket of slightly steaming water beside her. She was grinning again now and her eyes shone with glee once more as she leaned in to wipe Blue's neck. Each soft stroke of warm water against the fur eased away the dirt; with every tender touch, a section came up clean as it was meant to be. And with the tickle of the warm water as it trailed down her side, she felt her distress lessen ever so slightly. She could not, however, quite bring herself to smile, not even when the tin bucket morphed back into Thorax in a flash of white light—who was promptly soaked by the warm water. She did, however, manage to heave her ears forwards and accept, reluctantly, the hazel-leaf dress which Coalburst had, by now, levitated back to her side.

"Thanks."