Toola Roola stuck out her tongue to catch a snowflake.  Closing her eyes, she tipped her head up.  The snowball struck her face, sending snow up her nose.  She screamed, brushing off the snow, and looked around, peering between the trees of whitetail woods.  “I’m going to get you, Coco.”  Scooping up snow, she shivered.  “Wherever you are.”

Coconut Cream’s scream echoed directionlessly through the trees.

Toola Roola shivered, but not from the cold.  “Come on, Coconut.  That’s not funny.  Where are you?”  There.  She heard it.  The crunch of snow beneath a rushing foal.  Toola Roola crouched, readying her snowball.  Coconut burst from the darkest of the hillside thickets and Toola let loose, smacking Coconut right in the face.

Coconut ran on, screaming, blinded by the snow.

“What are you doing?  Coconut?  Watch out!”  Toola lurched to the side, but slipped on the snow and ice, so Coconut barreled right into her, bringing them both down in a jumble and flailing about, kicking and punching.  “Ow!  Coconut, stop it!  It’s me!.”  Toola wrapped her hooves around Coconut.  “Calm down, okay?  I’m sorry.  It was just a snow ball.  You got me first.”

Coconut Cream rubbed her eyes, peering up at her friend.  “Toola?  Oh, Toola,” she sobbed, tears streaming as she crushed Toola in her embrace, rubbing her tears and snot into her neck.  “He just fell out of the sky.  And the rock, and blood, and—”  She sobbed, muttering incoherently.

Toola rubbed Coconut’s back, shushing like her mother still did for her when she banged a knee or had a bad day at school.  “I need you to calm down, Coco.  At least enough to speak.  Run and get help from a grownup.”  She wiped away Coconut’s tears from her face.  “Okay?  Can you go get help?  I’ll see if they’re okay.”

Coconut nodded and darted off.

Toola followed the tracks Coconut had left coming out.  “Hello,” she called.  “Are you okay?  I sent Coco to get help.  Are you hurt?  Where are you?”  She looked around.  Nothing.

Pushing aside branches, Toola went deeper, continuing to call.  Coconut Cream’s tracks stopped, and Toola looked around, her eyes adjusting to the darkness under the evergreen canopy that blocked all but a thin film of snow from reaching the ground.

She saw it.  The crumpled form of a pony in the dark.  “You okay, mister?  I sent my friend to get help.”  She looked up to the trees and clouds.  “What were you doing up there anyway?”  She knelt beside him, giving him a gentle shake.

The corpse’s head fell at an odd angle, and the Toola Roola gasped.  “Mister, are you dead?”  She poked at the corpse.  “Cool.”

Yelling in the distance signalled the arrival of grown-ups, but Toola Roola ignored them, poking and prodding at the corpse until they arrived and pulled her away.

[hr]

She spun in the chair.  Across the desk, Nurse Redheart frowned.  “Toola, please.  Stop.”

“Sorry, it’s just so cool.  I wish the chairs at school did this.”

“Toola, you saw something yesterday that nopony your age should have to see.  Do you want to talk about it?”

Toola gasped.  “Really?  You wanna talk about it?”

“Only if you want to, Toola.”  Redheart tried to smile at the foal, but concern twisted it.

“Do I ever?!  Nopony else wants to.  Not mom, dad, Coco, or Ms. Cheerilee.”  She leaned forward.  “Did you bring it back?  Is it here?  Can I see it again?”

Nurse Redheart gawked, he mouth moving, but unable to find the words.

[hr]

“Seriously? The necromancer’s true name was named Toola Roola?  How does that even happen?”