Chapter 68: Unexplained

"Why have my wings become electric?" He asks in a panicked state, "What has happened to them?!" He gave Rarity an accusing glare, since she touched his wings last.

“Why are you staring at me like that?” Snaps back the alabaster unicorn. “How should I know what this means? I don’t know how to make your wings like that, and even if I did, why would I even need to do this to you?”

Dusk thought about this for a few seconds, but he only drew up blanks, “Point taken. Anyway, do either of you two know how this is possible?” Both Rarity and Fluttershy shook their heads, since neither of them knew what was going on. With this lack of information, he continues, “Alright then, we may need to ask Twilight about it later, but I need to move onto another slightly different topic. Rarity, did the shock hurt?”

"A bit, it felt like a painful electric shot and-"

Dusk had thoughtlessly (and accidentally) cut the mare off mid-sentence "So it inflicts basically a powerful static shock, but the thing is, is that static electricity cannot be seen to the naked eye. The lightning which is coursing through- Wait a sec..."

He looks back down to both of his wings, and notices that not only had the lightning stopped, it had also 'healed' his left wing a little bit. While it is still in a bad state, he could actually move the wing again in a near painless manner. He could actually move the wing up and down a few times without pain. There is a big wide smile on Dusk's muzzle as he finishes.

"Ha hah~ I now absolutely love this lightning thing now. It has actually somewhat cured my ailment by taking away most of pain from my wing.” He says happily.

“Well...” Rarity says with uncertain tone, “It could just be that the electricity was hurting you the whole time, until I went and took it away.”

Fluttershy speaks up as well, “Also, it um... might be because the massage may have even soothed your wing so much that it doesn’t hurt anymore.”

His facial features show a very unconvinced look, “No offense, but those theories sound pretty ridiculous.”

Rarity objects again, “And your ‘healing lightning’ theory doesn’t?”

Realizing that she had a very good point, he tries to think of a suitable comeback. Unable to find one, he just resorts to childish tactics, "Shut up, don't take my awesome lightning wings away from me." He retorts jokingly.

"Hush you, now if you have finished with your theories, I think it is time to continue your massage, wouldn't you agree?"

He had almost forgotten the reason why he was here in the first place. "Oh yeah, uh... so shall we continue?"

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The whole wing massage had taken a further twenty minutes, which mainly consisted of socialising, gossip between the two mares, and moans of pleasure from the stallion. (From the entirely non sexual massage, it just felt that good) After it had finished, he had tested the wing, and was pleased when he couldn’t feel any pain coming from it. He is smart enough to know that trying to fly right now would still be a bad idea.

“My wing actually feels surprisingly good now. Thanks for doing that for me.” He says to Rarity, with an appreciative tone.

“That’s no problem Dusk. If you don’t mind me asking, how do you feel around me now; do you still fear me?”

“...I ...don’t know...” He doesn’t actually know the answer to this question, he knows that he still feels a bit uncomfortable around her, but that is the thing, only a bit. He had not only felt comfortable with the mare being in the same house as him, but he actually trusted her enough to let her touch his wings for a period of time. He almost felt ashamed by the fact that he is still somewhat scared around her, especially since she has tried so hard to reconcile with him after... that incident.

‘Maybe I could just let this stupid fear go. I know that she won’t do anything bad to me anymore. It’s the needles that I should be more worried about. Damn it, I thought I got over this fear the last time we met.’

“...I guess not...” Continues Dusk, “Considering that I trusted you enough to let you do this massage and all. I don’t think I’m scared of you anymore.”

He could see some positive reactions from the two mares, with Rarity looking relived by the news, and Fluttershy smiling sweetly at the stallion. It made him feel good inside. “Thank you Dusk. It’s good knowing that you now feel comfortable around me now,”

“Well, that’s no problem Rarity, but I need to say something first.” He hesitates just before he continues, as he finds it difficult to say this. He has never really been good at doing this, “I’m... sorry for making you worry about me, and for fearing you, and all. This may sound a bit lousy, since I’m not so good at apologies, but yeah, I’m sorry for doing that to you.”

The alabaster unicorn seems surprised by the stallion's unexpected apology. "Why, that's no problem at all, but I am afraid that I don't understand why you are apologizing to me. If anything, I should be apologizing to you (again) for attacking you that during that incident."

"There is no need to, since we have already made up for that. I'm just talking about how I have treated you a bit unfairly, even after you have tried to make things better for me. Although this couldn't be helped, I still feel bad for doing this to you. So... well, I'm pretty terrible at ending an apology." There was a slight pause after Dusk had finished, when the two expected him to continue, but he had ended it on that. (Proving that he is indeed, terrible at ending apologies)

Rarity ignores this little problem, as she finishes. "Apology accepted. Now let's never speak of this topic again." She says in a half serious, half joking tone.

Dusk could feel an sudden warmth inside him. It is like a feeling of accomplishment, and contentment. It is like he has accomplished something; he has beaten one of inner demons, and while it is only one, of numerous problems, it still felt good, great even. But even so, he had something else on his mind.

“Now, do either of you mares wanna go with me to Twi’s to ask about my wings?” The two just stare at him in silence. “Well?”

“That was a abrupt change of subject.” Notes Rarity.

“Ayep.”

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*knock knock knock*

"Coming~" Says the mare from inside.

After a few seconds, the unicorn opens the door to the guests, and is brightens up as she sees who it was, "Oh, hello girls, (and Dusk) how are you?"

Rarity starts to speak for the group, "We're fine Twilight, mostly. We have got a little bit of a problem on our hooves, and we all think that you might be the mare who can tell us what it is, and to fix it, if possible."

"Hey, wait a sec, I don't want it fixed." Voices the stallion of the group.

Rarity sighs in annoyance, "I still don't see why you want that inside your wings. What do you think of them Fluttershy?"

The shy pegasus, who was content with just listening to this small argument, was put on the spot, "Um... well-" She is cut off by Twilight, whose curiosity has piqued.

"What wrong with his wings?" Asks Twilight.

Dusk decides to be direct about the ‘issue’, “My wings were pulsing with electricity about twenty minutes ago for some inexplicable reason. None of us were able to figure out why my wings started doing this, and so we came to see you, since you are the smartest pony in town, and since you may know what this could mean.”

Hearing this, Twilight puts her hoof up to her chin, as if she was trying to think something, "Lightning wings you say... why haven't you got them right now?"

Dusk explains why, "The effect was temporary, but it was definitely there. The lightning was there for about a minute before it disappeared. We all saw it."

"Yes, we did." Adds in the alabaster unicorn, "I ended up being of the receiving end of such wings, and let's just say, it hurts."

Twilight, while still sceptical about these supposed wings, has no choice but to submit, no matter how logically flawed it sounds. "Okay, I believe you, but honestly, I have absolutely no idea how this is even possible. Could you maybe, uh.. try to get your wings to become electric again?" She needs to observe this phenomenon for herself, not only to figure out the nature of these wings, but to also remove all doubt attributed to the wings.

“Well, I don’t know if that is entirely possible, my wing seemed to electrify after it after Rarity had been making contact with it for a minute, and- hey, hey?! Take that look off your face, it isn’t what it sounds like.” Because of his rather poor choice of words, Dusk could not only see a massive blush on Twilight’s face, but he could also see it on Rarity’s and Fluttershy’s as well, with Rarity’s being by far, the largest.

He tries to fix things up, “All she did is give my wing a massage.” Much to his dismay, (and after another bad choice of words) it didn't seem to do anything to lessen the mares' blushing.

"No wait, what I meant-"

"Just shut up Dusk, you're not helping." Interrupts Rarity. In the attempt to fix this embarrassing situation, she begins to properly explain what happened, "I was at Fluttershy's at the time, when Dusk walked into the house with a bad wing. While I don't know how he mangled his wings, he did ask me and Fluttershy if there was somepony that could massage his wing to fix it up or something..."

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Rarity had finished her version of the events and thankfully, with her well chosen words, she has removed all of the embarrassment and awkwardness that Dusk had built up. However, Twilight was still baffled with the nature of his electric wings. ‘Everything is so inconsistent, like how the lightning just 'disappeared' according to Rarity, and how something no stronger than static electricity was even visible in the first place. If the lightning was visible, it should have had enough voltage to kill both Rarity and Dusk. (I’m thankful that this isn't the case, but still...) These supposed 'electric wings' are an impossibility, and yet, I still believe her, despite it all.’

After she had finished "Well, I'm glad you cleared that up Rarity. I almost thought that you three were almost about to *ahem* you know..."

Rarity has a very unamused look, but it wasn't directed at Twilight, "Yes, we so did we, isn’t that right Dusk." She glares at the stallion, still a bit peeved about what he said before.

He seems unfazed by the death stare but he apologizes anyway, “Sorry, it was an accident, it just came out wrong.”

Wanting to get back on topic, Twilight grabs the attention of the three, “But anyway, the thing is that I truly have no idea what could have caused this, I don’t even know if this is dangerous or not. I'm going to have to contact the Princess, see if she knows what's happened to your wings."

There is an apprehensive look on Dusk's face, "Wait, you don't need to contact the Princess just so she can have a look at my wings. I'm too insignificant to burden her."

Twilight was only paying half attention to the stallion, as she had levitated over a quill and parchment, and began to write the note, "Don't worry about it Dusk, I'm sure that the Princess will have enough time to do this for me. And speaking of which, SPIKE!"

Dusk was about to object again, but he decided against it, partly because Twilight has already finished most of the letter, (and damn, is she a fast writer) but also because he really wanted to meet the Princess face to face, and now he has that chance. While Dusk was thinking, Spike had walked down the stairs into the main room of the library. He is holding a brown paper bag

which was filled with sapphires, emeralds, and many other kinds of precious rocks which he seems to use as food.

As he looks up at the group, the dragon makes eye contact with a certain white unicorn in the room, which causes him to freeze up. His usual calm/annoyed/tired expression has turned into a look of nervousness as he keeps staring at the mare of his dreams. “Uh... hello Rarity, um... you look really uh, good today.”

Dusk could feel himself about to facehoof, ‘Real smooth, Spike.’

Being completely oblivious to the terribleness of Spike’s compliment, she happily says, “Why thank you Spike, I’m glad you think that.”

“That’s no problem Rarity.” Rarity’s happy response had made him a little bit more confident around his crush, “Actually, I think that-”

“Ah Spike, you’re here.” Says the purple unicorn, who hadn’t paid attention to Spike’s attempt to start a conversation, since she had been so engrossed in her letter, “I need you to send this letter to the Princess right now. It’s important that this gets to her straight away.”

“Alright, alright, I’ll get to it.” He grumbles as he takes the rolled up parchment.

‘Twilight’s really making it sound a lot more important than it really is.’

Spike holds the note up into the air with his claw, as he uses his unique green flames, to ‘burn’ the note to Princess Celestia. It only took a few seconds for the fire to envelop the note in magical flames, before a purple (and sparkly?) mist from the note speeds away to the castle. When that had finished, Spike went back to trying to start another conversation with Rarity, and Dusk and Fluttershy starting a new one. Twilight on the other hoof, was beginning to pace around a nearby table, as she nervously waits for the inevitable return note.

It only took about two minutes for Spike to burp up the return letter in a burst of green flames. Dusk could see that this parchment in particular was rolled up, and held in place by a red ribbon This in turn, is held together by a smooth circular gold piece, with a horse shoe engraved onto it; Celestia’s royal seal. (Well, what else cold it be?)

Twilight wastes no time in grabbing and opening the letter with her magic. Her eyes dart through the letter at a fast pace as her expression turns from relief, to worry, and then finally to panic. She hastily throws the letter onto the table before her gaze goes in the direction of her purple assistant.

"Spike, I need you to clean as much as you can, right now." She was trying to keep as much composure as possible, just to make sure she didn't let her crazy side come out. "I know that you've done everything that I've wanted you to do, but it is important that you do this for me, alright."

"You've got it sis." Spike would have normally questioned the importance of whatever was on the note, but he noticed Twilight's mane was starting to become a little more disheveled. Sometimes, he worries about his caretaker. He watches as she hurries away, to sort out some of the books on the bookshelves, and was annoyed when he saw her putting the perfectly placed books in the wrong spots. “She’ll calm down.” He mutters to himself

Meanwhile, the remaining three were wondering what had caused Twilight to freak out like this, with Dusk being the first to comment about the situation, “Hmm, I wonder what has gotten into her?”

“Oh dear... What could have make her act like this.” Pities Fluttershy.

Rarity, who had thought of a way to possibly fix this, had levitated the note over. “Well, you know, you could have just grabbed the note yourselves, and read it.”

“Oh no, I couldn’t have possibly done that. I don’t want to read Twilight’s private letters... since well... they are hers and all.” Meekly responds the yellow pegasus.

Dusk just had the irresistible urge to facehoof himself for not thinking of that earlier, “Well then, do you think you can read it out to us.”

“Of course... okay, Dear Twilight Sparkle,

Your news intrigues me, never in my centuries of ruling have I heard of anything as strange as this. These ‘lightning wings’ as you call them don’t seem to sound as dangerous as you make them out to be, but I understand your concern. This isn’t a product of natural pegasi magic. Now normally, I would come and see you myself, but unfortunately, the day court is running a lot longer than usual.

So instead I’ll be sending my sister along, since she is...” Rarity saw no point in continuing to read out the letter, since they all heard what they needed to hear.

‘What?’

Author’s Note: No, the cause of the electric wings is not because of Dusk being some kind of Chosen One or anything like that. In fact, the thing that unknowingly gave him this happened sometime in the second half of the story. Also, I freak hate writing parts with Spike in it. I just don’t know how to do it well.

And just in case you are curious, here is how the rest of the letter continues:

…since she is much better with subjects involving magic and the arcane arts than I am. This is one of the few times that Luna has ever left Canterlot, and this visit will be a private one. She will be teleporting to the library in a few moments, and I hope that she does not catch the public’s attention.

Send my regards to Dusk for me. (We've heard the stories of the 'Protector of Ponyville'.)

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