Dear Spike,

I really don’t know how to start this. I can’t even fathom how to say this just the right way. Then again, is there a right way to say this? I’m not sure. I wouldn’t be able to fathom ever even thinking what I’m about to say, let alone put it to paper.

I suppose I’ll start by saying that I really don’t want to do this. We’ve been together for two years sorry, three years. Just checked. I guess the stress is starting to get to me. I’m frankly surprised I remember my own name these days. Sorry, need to stop talking about myself. This is about us, isn’t it? Three years. Feels like a lifetime ago. Feels like several lifetimes ago I had to look down to look you in the eye, and oh you were adorable. But you’ve grown up. We both have.

I’ve really loved most of the time we were have been together. You really have been a great coltfriend. You’ve been very kind, loving, and more than a bit charming; everything a mare could hope for. I always loved those winter nights when we’d just cuddle up at my house. Remember how you always said that it was because dragons hate the cold and that I was warmer to cuddle with than Twillight? I suppose that was just an excuse until you could bring yourself to ask me out on that first date. I could see through it even then, but I decided to humor you. To be perfectly honest, when you were still a hatchling, that’s mostly what I was doing: humoring you. Keeping your little dreams from breaking. What kind of heartless monster makes a child cry, anyway? I assure you, though, what I’ve felt for you for the past few years has been quite real.

That’s why it hurts me even more to say this, Spike: I can’t do this anymore. We can’t do this anymore. There can’t even be a ‘we’ anymore. I am so, so sorry.

Please understand, I really don’t want to do this, but it just isn’t working out. The writing on the wall was as clear for you as it was for me, but like me you’ve probably just been lying to yourself, saying that our problems would just go away with time. They won’t, Spike, and even if they would, we can’t wait for them to.

You’re growing older, Spike. Your dragon nature is getting worse growing more pronounced. When you were a child, the simple act of getting a birthday present set off your hoarding instincts. Now, it takes even less than that. You know that better than anypony else, and it’s been obvious. I’ve seen that pained look on your face whenever you have to force yourself to not steal anything that strikes your fancy. A few months ago, I saw you outright reach out for that earth emerald you not five minutes before said that you’d love to taste. I couldn’t even give you anything more than a kiss for our last anniversary, I was so afraid what would happen if I actually gave you something valuable substantial. To be brutally honest, sometimes I’m scared that somewhere, deep inside, you consider me part of your hoard, some treasure that you want to hide in a cave. I know that’s unfair and I know it’s irrational, but I can’t help but wonder what you really see when you look at me: marefriend or property.

That alone is bad. That alone is difficult to deal with. I really think we could overcome it if we tried, but we can’t. We can’t afford to.

With you, I can be many things. I can be honest, I can be kind, I can be loyal, but do you know what I can’t be? Generous. I cannot give you a single thing without the nagging fear that you’ll wreck half the town again, maybe even kill somepony. You’re my coltfriend; you’re one of the most important people in my life. I can’t afford to be generous with you, even the tiniest bit. I’m even starting to get hesitant to be generous in general, and it’s weakening my connection with my Element. It almost won’t even work for me anymore when the girls and I practice. The Elements of Harmony are the last and greatest line of defense against great evil, and if one doesn’t work, the rest are useless. This is putting the entire nation at risk, maybe even the entire world.

So by order of Princess Celestia and a heavy, grieving heart, our relationship is officially over.

I am so, so sorry.

With love,

Rarity

“Oh, Spike…”

Twilight looked up from the letter to see the same scene she’d come home to. Spike was curled up in his bed and crying his eyes out, his claws digging deep into his mattress, in their wrecked bedroom. Books had fallen off their shelves as if by an earthquake. Ashes littered the floor, though she could see some bits and pieces of photographs in the remains; an alabaster coat there, a hide of purple scales there. A heart-shaped fire ruby was lying across the room from Spike, with a dent in the wall to show how it got there. To say that it looked like a rampaging dragon had trashed the place would be both an understatement and entirely accurate.

“Spike, I’m so sorry,” she said softly, trotting up to him and draping a wing across his back.

He shrugged the wing off and turned away, curling up into himself. The change of position only made his gross sobbing louder in her ears. She felt her own heart crack and splinter with each passing second.

“Spike, please talk to me,” she pleaded, laying down next to his bed.

“What is th-there to talk about?” Spike stammered with a loud sniffle. “I’m a dragon that c-can’t keep his filthy claws to himself, and my marefriend couldn’t even be herself around m-me. End of story...”

“Spike...” She sighed and shook her head. “This isn’t your fault. You have hoarding instincts, yes; it’s no less natural than herding instincts in ponies. Pony society just... well, we’re not used to accommodating or dealing with dragons, is all.”

“Just because it isn’t my fault doesn’t make it hurt less,” he mumbled. “It wasn’t my fault I was born a dragon... it wasn’t even my fault I was born here, or that I fell in love with Rarity.” He let out an angry hiss and flailed around in his bed until he laid on his back, his crying eyes glaring at the ceiling. “And it wasn’t even my fault she broke up with me! How could Celestia do this to me? Do this to us?!”

“Spike, please understand!” Twilight begged, wrapping her forelegs around the larger lizard’s neck. “You read Rarity’s letter, and it’s true. Her Element barely responds to her anymore. We just can’t afford to put Equestria in danger over this!”

“We? We?!” Spike snapped, turning his head to glower at her with his reptilian eyes. “What do you mean we? Who is we?! You and Celestia?” He shoved her off of him and snorted smoke out of his nostrils.

Twilight backed away, instinctively flaring her wings as she avoided eye contact with her friend. “Spike, listen to yourself; you’re being paranoid!”

“Don’t lie to me,” he snarled, getting on all fours and crouching down. “I can tell when you’re lying, Twi. You’re not that good at it.”

Twilight bit her lip and said nothing, but a quick glance at Spike’s tear stained cheeks and seething gaze swept her resolve away like so much dust. “What do you want me to say, Spike? Yes, Celestia told me she was considering this,” the alicorn admitted. “She... she said she was going to order Rarity to break up with you so that you would blame her and not Rarity, and Rarity wouldn’t blame herself. She was really torn up about this; it was practically eating her alive! Celestia and I couldn’t just sit by and let Rarity drive herself insane trying to figure out what to do.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?” Spike roared, his tail lashing behind him and sending several more books crashing to the floor.

“I thought Rarity should tell you herself!” she yelled back. “It wasn’t my place to tell you that!”

“Oh, it wasn’t your place to tell me you were going to end my relationship with the only mare I ever loved, but it was definitely your place to end it?” he snorted, climbing down from the bed and standing upright. On all fours, he was the size of a pony. Upright, he towered over them. “Why am I not surprised?”

“What do you mean by that?” she asked, her own eyes narrowing.

“It’s just like you royals to mess with the lives of your subjects,” he spat. “Not even your subjects, but everypony around you! Pfeh, I should have seen it coming! Remember that time you almost got the whole town to kill each other because you were late for a weekly letter to Celestia?”

“Shut up!” Twilight spat, blinking back the water building up behind her eyes.

“Oh, does that hit too close to home?” Spike taunted with a smirk, crossing his arms as his tears began to dry. “Face it, Twi, you were made to be a royal by a royal. Do you really think Celestia moved you to Ponyville without knowing about Nightmare Moon and the Elements? She set you up! You’re only living the life you have because Celestia pulled your strings, you puppet!”

“I said shut up!” she shrieked, stamping her hoof on the ground with a resounding boom. When she opened her eyes again, she found the room awash in white light. She blinked and looked down to see he legs bathed in an ethereal glow. “No, no, can’t lose control!” She started to panic as she struggled to suppress her magic, screwing her eyes shut as if they were arcane floodgates.

“You never had it!” Spike spat. “How does it feel, Twi, to know that most if not all of your life is completely out of your power? Even after you became a princess, you’re still Celestia’s faithful little student. What do you think it feels like to me, being your ‘number one assistant’ for all these years and still having to answer to you? Being stuck in this library because nopony will ever trust me on my own? Being stuck in a town, in a society, in a country where I don’t even belong?!”

Through the swirling of her magic and her heart pounding in her skull, she heard sobbing aside from her own. She opened her eyes to see tears running down Spike’s face anew. He didn’t brush them away, or cringe, or even acknowledge them. He stood tall and glared at her as if she were the only thing in existence. As if all there was in that room was his question and her answer.

“I don’t know what it feels like,” she gasped as the ashes and books around her whipped up into an arcane tornado. “I’ll never know what it feels like. But I’m sorry! I’m so, so sorry! I didn’t ever mean to hurt you! I just want you to be happy, Spike. Please believe me...!”

“And if I do believe you? What then?” he asked, his legs starting to quake but his form unmoving against the books that battered his hide. “What are you going to do about it, Twi?”

“I don’t know,” she admitted, covering her head with her forelegs and sinking to the floor. “I don’t know, I don’t know, I don’t know! But I want to help! I really do love you, Spike; we all do! I just don’t know what to do...!”

“There’s nothing you can do. I don’t belong with dragons, and I don’t belong here. I don’t belong anywhere!” Over the howling wind, she could faintly hear him crying again. She looked up to see him on his knees in a mirror of her own position, his arms over his head as tears streamed down his face anew.

“Spike…” Twilight screwed her eyes shut and breathed deeply, trying to still her beating heart and calm her raging mind. Her rampant magic slowly but surely dissipated as she reigned it back in. Books fell to the ground one by one with a chorus of thuds as ashes fell down on the pair like snow. She opened her eyes again, panting from the strain, and got to her wobbling hooves. She shakily trotted over to the grieving dragon’s side and stroked his neck. “Spike, it’ll be okay.”

“N-no it won’t,” he sobbed, clinging tightly to her fur in a hug and burying his head in her lap. He forgot his own strength and the sharpness of his claws and drew blood from her back, but she didn’t protest. “If Rarity c-can’t love me, nopony ever will. I’ll be alone forever.”

“Spike…” The alicorn sighed. “I could say how it’s normal to feel that way. And it is. All species tend to think that their first love will be their last. But your situation is special; I know that. I don’t know what I can do about it, but… I can promise you that you’ll never be alone.” She leaned down and wrapped her forelegs around him in a tight embrace of her own. “I’ll always be here for you. I promise I won’t ever leave.”

Twilight let out a surprised gasp when Spike shoved her away, his strength sending her plot skidding across the wooden floor. “That’s different, Twilight. You raised me,” he growled half-heartedly, sounded like he wanted to be angry but was just too tired to be. “A very special somepony, though, a mare to call my own? I can’t have that. I can never have that. I’m so much like a pony now that I can’t even hope to get a dragoness. And when I get older… when I get bigger… I’ll be lucky if I even have any friends besides you.”

Twilight felt her heart shudder and crack. “Spike… please believe me when I say I want to help, but I just can’t think of anything. I’m so, so sorry.”

“I’ve heard that a lot today,” he mumbled as he got back on his hind legs. He wiped away his tears with the back of his arm. “I… I think I better go talk to Rarity.”

“Spike, she’s hurting right now, too. The last thing either of you need right now is to see each other,” Twilight said, getting between him and the door. “Give yourself and her some time to recover.”

“Twilight, I didn’t ask for your permission,” Spike growled, his tail whipping behind him irritably. “I am going to see Rarity, whether you like it or not.”

“To do what? What do you hope to accomplish? Your relationship is over, Spike. All you’re going to do is rub salt in the wounds. Please, be reasonable!” Twilight looked up at his cold, hateful eyes pleadingly.

“Reasonable?” he repeated with a snarl. “You are the last pony who gets to decide what’s reasonable and what’s not, you neurotic wreck.”

Twilight glared at him and flared up her wings. “I’m not letting you leave, Spike.”

“Get out of the way before I hurt you.” He flexed his fingers and bared his fangs, letting out a serpentine hiss.

She didn’t budge. If anything, she grew more rigid. “I order you to get back in bed, Spike. As long as you live under my roof, you will live by my rules.”

“Then I just won’t live here anymore!” he snapped. “There’s nothing keeping me here. I’ll just go live in a cave somewhere like a dragon is supposed to do. You have your stupid pet owl to do all your dirty work, anyway!”

Twilight’s jaw opened and closed, no sound coming out as she silently screamed in her mind. “B-but, you can’t-”

“Oh yes I can!” he roared in her face, blowing her mane like a gust of wind. “You aren’t my mother, Twilight! You’ll never be my mother, no matter how hard you try!” He swatted her to the side with a swing of his hand and stormed out of their bedroom. With a slam of the front door, he was gone completely.

Twilight lay silent for a long time. She didn’t even make an attempt to get up and go after him. His words rang in her ears and paralyzed her as surely as if he had wrapped her in his tail and squeezed.

She eventually brought herself to get back on all fours, her legs trembling and her eyes watering. She looked around the trashed bedroom. There were books everywhere and ashes strewn about, much like how she’d found it. Just as messy, but infinitely more empty.

Her gaze fell on Spike’s prized possession. Or what was left of it. She saw the remains of his and Rarity’s fire ruby on the floor in a dozen different pieces. Among the crimson shards were the scorched remains of a half-destroyed photo. All that was left was half of Spike’s smiling face and the Los Pegasus skyline, from a vacation with his beloved a lifetime ago.

“…what have I done…?” Next Chapter: Dearly Beloved Estimated time remaining: 1 Hour, 29 Minutes