There's No Mistakes the Friends You Make

by GhostNote

Chapter 1

Starlight was listening; she was listening very carefully. Every word that left the princess’s lips seemed rational, but there was no way she could ever understand what Starlight was feeling. She had always wanted to have friends; it’s not as if she didn’t try, but that was the problem. She did try yet always ended up alone. How could any pony who tried as hard as she had to achieve the one thing she truly wanted still not have what this group so easily maintained and was always destined to have: friendship? How could anything be this unfair and cruel? That’s why Starlight had no other choice.

Star Swirl the Bearded’s scroll hung between the two mares in an azure light. With each forced syllable Starlight tore the scroll a little more. ”You just don’t get it do you? You and your friends have it so easy. All my life I’ve worked for something only to end up with nothing! I’m sure it’s so nice having such loyal friends isn’t it? Well, Twilight, your friends aren’t here to save you, and now they Never. Will. Be!” Twilight leapt forward, but it was too late. With a final smirk Starlight ripped the scroll in two.

As the scroll vanished the portal reappeared above Twilight and Spike, and they were sucked back into whatever dimension awaited them, but something was different this time. Starlight was being pulled along as well. It was a physically gut wrenching feeling; what may have only taken moments seemed to take a lifetime. A lifetime full of memories and lives altered. Misplaced. Erased… As she reached her final destination she couldn’t help but think of the alicorn once more, and wonder how she had traveled through the portal so many times without becoming sick as she had just managed to do. Rubbing her eyes, she slowly opened them to see .. darkness. It was the kind of darkness that had a weight to it. It feels heavy on your chest and you feel like your ears could pop at any moment. The darkness was thick, and the silence was deafening. Maybe she hadn’t actually opened her eyes yet? She rubbed them harder this time, she could see little celestial patterns dancing with each rotation of her hooves. When she removed them the sight was still the same: nothing. Startled, she stumbled backwards, nearly falling off of, well, something. She couldn’t quite be sure. Her mind began to race; was it a set of stairs, a cliff, a cloud …

Her legs were shaking, one wrong step could end everything, but how could she know what step was right and wrong when she couldn’t see? She tried to produce a small orb of light, but whether it had worked or not was uncertain for she was still cloaked in a sea of black. How can this be happening? She wanted to run off and find help, or light for that matter, but the fear of falling kept her hooves cemented to the ground. Then a sound pierced the silence like a sword; it was her name, or at least she thought it was. With little choice she called out into the darkness. “Twilight?” A small purple light appeared about a hundred yards away, and there stood the princess once more. “Twilight!” She cursed what she had said of the princess and her friends moments before, swallowed her pride in roughly three hearty gulps, and started to run towards the warm glow. She was only hooves away from the alicorn when it happened; her hoof came thundering down only to make contact with the dark empty air. She began falling at an alarming rate, or so it felt. She was flailing, screaming. Why wasn’t the princess flying down after her? Why should she? She could hear the ground coming rapidly. With one last shriek she opened her eyes to an alarming contrast, white. And soft?

Her pillow was soaked with sweat; she could hear the reverberations of what could only be her shrill cry echoing down the castle hallways. It was a dream. Again… But the hoof steps she heard coming down the hallway shortly after, to her dismay, were not a dream. She was feeling rather embarrassed as she heard a knock coming from her door. “Is everything alright in there? Can I come in?” Starlight answered sheepishly as Twilight walked through the door.

“May I?” Twilight asked, gesturing towards the bed.

“Go ahead.” Starlight responded as she sat up to make room for the princess to sit at the end of the bed trying hard not to make eye contact.

“So what did happen, if you don’t mind my asking?”

Starlight squirmed a little; she hated to keep reliving the past, but it was hard to avoid when the past kept rearing its ugly head in every facet of her life. Even her dreams weren’t safe anymore. Maybe I can talk to Princess Luna about that later…

“Um, Starlight?” Twilight was waiving a hoof in front of Starlight’s face. She jumped a little at being pulled out of her thoughts and once again felt embarrassed.

“I’m sorry Twilight, it’s just … Well, I had another bad dream is all.”

“I’m sorry to hear that,” she said with a genuine level of sincerity. “What was it about? You know, I have plenty of books that talk about the dissection and meaning of dreams down to the smallest details, even the stuff you may deem minor or not useful. They really came to good use when I kept having this reoccurring dream about my teeth falling out, and…”

“I don’t think I need help dissecting this dream, Twilight.” Starlight cut in. She sighed, anticipating whatever backlash may came from digging up the past. “It was about the scroll. This time I really ripped it. The portal took you, and Spike. It even took me this time... Everything was dark, but I found you. I tried to run to you, but just before I could get to you I fell through the floor. I was falling so fast. You didn’t help me …” Starlight’s eyes began to water as her sentence trailed off. She knew how silly it must have sounded. Dreams never pack quite the same punch when you say them aloud, but it all just felt so real. They always do.

They both sat in silence for a moment until Starlight decided to follow up her thoughts.

“I know it was just a dream, and I know it didn’t actually happen, obviously. But what if it had? I kept sending you back through that portal having no idea what waited for you on the other side. I’m so sorry.” She looked down, hoping Twilight wouldn’t notice the pools forming in her eyes.

Twilight placed a hoof on her shoulder. “I know you are, Starlight. You’re right about one thing, it was just a dream. But dream or not, I know you wouldn’t have ripped that scroll. And do you know how I know that?”

Starlight continued to stare into the blankets, only responding with a slight huff.

Twilight struggled to form an answer, which was rather silly considering she was the one that posed the question. The answer seemed simple, but she wanted to word it in a way that would reassure her friend.

“You’re not an inherently bad pony. We haven’t known each other long, but I know that much is true. You feel passionately, and that may come off as aggressive to others, but that passion is not coming from a place of hate. You said it yourself; you were fighting over friendship. That’s what you wanted. Deep down your intentions were good, and are good. They always have been.”

Twilight paused for a moment more before finishing, “I have faith that given the choice a second time, or a hundred times the outcome would still be the same. Us sitting here in this castle, in our castle, as friends.”

Starlight was making eye contact with Twilight now. She comprehended everything that was said, and believed it all to be true, but there was still a larger looming issue. Why did Twilight believe in something, or in this case some pony, so wholeheartedly so quickly? For now that didn’t matter. The only thing that did matter is, for some reason, she did, and Starlight was forever grateful for it.

“Thank you, Twilight. I’m sorry if it seems that I am always searching for reassurance, but there’s no pony else I would rather hear it from. Thank you. For everything.” She pulled Twilight in to a hug; it was nice to have a pony there to do that for a change.

Twilight stood up from the bed, and turned to look out the window only to realize the sun had started to make its way into the sky.

She turned back towards Starlight. “Well, it looks like it’s a bit late to head back to bed. Why don’t we get an early start to our day?”

Starlight groaned ever so slightly. She was never much of an early morning pony, but considering the fact that Twilight stayed up with her all night just to comfort her, she could suck it up this time, for her.

“I suppose we could do that.” She said with a small grin.

“Great!” Twilight exclaimed with far too much enthusiasm for the time of day. “I’ll have Spike start some breakfast, and we can start preparing for our next friendship lesson this afternoon; I hope you’re just as excited as I am!”

“Maybe with a few more hours of sleep…” Starlight rolled her eyes as she said this more to herself than any pony else. Especially considering Twilight was already half way to the kitchen by now.

Author's Note:

I'm not sure how many chapters will come of this, but it is most definitely ongoing. I apologize for the romance tag with no romance yet, but I promise it will come

Comments

[Jarvy Jared]

Truth be told, I'm not much of a StarLight shipper, and the former villain has left certain tastes in my mouth that are both positive and negative.

But this being your first fic, it's only fitting that I cast aside my doubts and look at it with as much of an objective lens as I can muster.

It's certainly well-written, and not at all rushed. You pulled together the dream sequence and the conversation following it nicely enough. Though, I can't help but feel that the conversation itself is somewhat lacking in effect.

This may be mostly because of the fact that I've read a lot of stories that have Starlight confront her past, via way of dreams, and having either Twilight or Spike comfort her. It may be biased, but I feel that more could have been done to heighten this effect. After all, the moment I realized that the first part was a dream, it was easy to guess where the story was heading.

That isn't to say that it isn't a bad story. Far from it. For a first fic on this site, it's enjoyable, even if its premise is a cliche. It's short and sweet, and fulfills its intended purpose, neither rising above nor falling behind its set level.

[twistedsteelpony]

This is well done, I think it touches the scars that extreme emotions leave on us.
Starlight is going to be effected by what she lost, and Twilight us trying to help, but her efforts are just as likely to set Starlight off as to bring her peace.

That and I like a good dream sequence, after all I just wrote one..
Haha
Keep writing ill keep reading

[EclipseSight]

This is a very interesting start. I enjoyed reading this. Not particularly how I would handle this situation per say but that's the fun in reading. Anyway, I felt that this was written well, and the style was pleasant to read. There's not a lot of actual story content to critique but what there is sets up the scene nicely. While I do agree that this setup has been done before, I am still invested in seeing where this will go.

The romance tag is going to make this story interesting, as this is shaping up to be a more drawn out take on the Twilight Glimmer ship... Or whatever you call it. :P I enjoy the ship myself so I am very interested to see how this will go.

For now I guess one of my critiques is the dialogue. It seems very clinical and lifeless. Especially the part where Twilight walks in on Starlight. She just screamed loud enough to echo across the castle, I think Twilight would be a little more, passionate isn't the word...invested I guess. It just feels very flat.

There is this line which comes across as a little confusing too.
"Is everything alright in there? Can I come in?” Starlight answered sheepishly as Twilight walked through the door.

That makes it sound like Starlight is speaking, though the dialogue would suggest Twilight... and as Starlight did not actually answer it feels like a line was missing here. I would suggest either have Starlight answer, then Twilight come in, or have her stay silent then Twilight grow worried and walk in of her own accord. Those are just my two cents. As is it's just a little confusing.

Another thing I noticed was that you use she when swapping characters to focus on. When swapping between Twilight and Starlight it is best to use their name in the first instance of mentioning them after swapping focus. It's again particularly important in this case as both characters in the scene are female so constantly using the pronoun she can get confusing.

Other than that I think this was a strong start and am excited to see more. Apologies if this was a little rambly it's currently 2am and I've been writing all day. My mind is a touch frazzled. If you want anything cleared up I'm happy to help. Good luck in future writing. I'll be watching this story closely. (Totally wasn't meant to sound creepy! I'm sorry!)

Okay! Shutting up now! Good luck!

[GhostNote]

>>EclipseSight
First of all thank you for the response. I was hoping for some sort of feedback, but I'm almost overwhelmed with the in-depth/helpful criticisms (in a good way =]). I knew I wanted to get some sort of story off my chest, and I do plan to draw this out a bit to (hopefully) give the romance tag a more genuine feeling.
I will focus a bit more on the dialogue as things progress. I guess I was just afraid of coming off too cheesy or over dramatized I suppose, but that may be what it takes to make a story come to life. Again, I really don't consider myself a writer, I was just interested in giving this a shot, so any criticism is welcome, and I will take it all to heart, and hopefully it will show as chapters are written. There's no need to apologize here c:

Lastly... I have no idea what to call this ship either, so Twilight Glimmer works for me

>>twistedsteelpony
I also enjoy good dream sequences. I feel like what little writing I've done I tend to lean on things of that nature.
Thank you very much though. It helps to hear things like this.

>>Jarvey Jared
I'm not sure what it is that fascinates me about Starlight, but for some reason this ship just sort of clicked in my mind. I understand the content may be a bit cliche, and that's completely understandable, but I guess I'm hoping as the story progresses I can deviate from the typical cliche and put a personal spin on it.
But thank you for the reassurance that this is well written, and giving this a shot even if its not one of your top picks. I appreciate it greatly =]

And to everyone, I will hopefully get to writing the next chapters soon. Life is hectic, and it's harder to find the time to do this than I thought it would be, but I definitely want to get back to it

[EclipseSight]

7600749 Heh, happy to be of help. Yeah sometimes a little bit of cheese goes a long way. This is a show about magical pastel coloured ponies and one of the characters is literally called Cheese Sandwhich. Always better to be a little cheesy than lifeless. A good trick I always do, and I've been complimented on my dialogue but take that with a grain of salt, is to read each line back to yourself while trying to imagine the character saying it. Imagine their inflections and how they would say it. If you can't hear them say something a particular way easily, try again with different wording. It's a slow process but it's the best way I've found. Don't think of it as just words on a page try and think how it would be said. I dunno if I'm explaining this well. If I'm not let me know and I'll try again. Anyway, good luck to you!