Hey! It looks like you're new here. You might want to check out the introduction.
Organised by
Anonthony
Word limit
2000–25000
Prizes
First place wins the choice of either a Rainbow Dash or Derpy vinyl collectible.
The Lunar Half
Lyra stared at her bookshelf. It was filled with tome after tome of mythologies she had written about her favorite subject in all of Equestria: Humans. She rested her gaze on the newest volume of her work and frowned. This isn’t the type of story that we’re interested in at this time... Gritting her teeth, Lyra flared her horn and threw the books off the shelf, across the room. They hit the wall and fell to the floor, making a loud crash.
A moment later Bon Bon opened the door and peered inside. “Lyra?” She trotted into the room, carrying Tootsie Flute on a harness Lyra had made for her. “What’s wrong?”
“I’ve been to every publisher in Canterlot and none of them want to publish my books!” Lyra stomped her hoof on the floor.
Tootsie Flute started crying and Bon Bon patted her back. “It’ll be okay, Lyra, we make enough with the candy shop.”
“It’s not about the money,” Lyra grumbled. “It’s about ponies reading books that I’ve written. It’s about them sharing the same joy I have for humans. I want other ponies to be inspired to write about humans, the same way I was inspired to as a filly. Right now the only stories about Humans are silly picture books for foals.” Lyra started to gaze off into space.
“Why don’t you try writing about something else for a change?”
“Huh?” Lyra turned to her.
“Write a few stories about ponies, then after your Pony stories get popular, you start publishing your books about Humans.”
Lyra cracked a grin. “Yeah, yeah! This is a great idea. Why didn’t I think of it?” Lyra planted a kiss on her wife’s cheek. “Thanks, Bon Bon.”
“I’ll leave you to that, then,” Bon Bon said, trotting out of the room.
Lyra took a out scroll of parchment and her quill. Let’s see... What to write about... She stood there in silence for a moment before growling. Arrg! I can’t think of an idea that isn’t about humans.
She stomped over to her window and gazed outside. The sun was just setting over the horizon when she saw a streak of rainbow fly through the air. Lyra’s eyes widened and she started writing.
A week had passed since Lyra started her Pony story. During that time, she only left her study for food and bathroom breaks. Bon Bon had even moved their bed there so they could still have each other’s warmth as they slept.
Bon Bon was still asleep when Lyra scribbled out the last page of her manuscript. And so, with Ahuizotl defeated, and the sapphire statue secured, the world was safe and sound once again, thanks to Daring Do! Lyra put down her quill. “Brilliant!”
“Huh?” Bon Bon sat up a little.
“Go back to sleep, Bon Bon.” Lyra trotted over and kissed her on the forehead before setting off to the publishing house.
“Get out, ya bum!”
Lyra fell on her flank outside the door to Canterlot Publishing. She was about to stand up when the manuscript of Daring Do and the Quest for the Sapphire Stone flew through the air and landed on the stone path next to her. She got up, dusted herself off, and picked up the book she had written.
They wouldn’t even look at it. Her stomach rumbled, making her lose her frown. She spotted a café and decided to have breakfast. Her meal consisted of a bagel with cream cheese, a bowl of oats, and a cup of coffee. As she sat down to eat, her gaze rested on the street in front of her. The ponies traveling it chatted with each other, most of them on their way to work. She took a bite of her bagel.
A grey pegasus who was cantering along the road, turned and went into the café. A large mailbag was strapped across her chest. Lyra’s eye’s widened. She quickly took out her quill—which she always brought with her in case she got another idea for a book—and started scribbling the address of the publishing house on the envelope of her manuscript. She was about to write her own return address, but stopped. I can’t use my real name or they’ll just throw it away! Darting her vision around, she soon glanced at the side of her flank and saw a portion of her lyre cutie mark.
Heartstrings! In an instant, she wrote the return address on the envelope with her new pen-name at the top. She looked back at the doorway to the café; the mailmare was just trotting out with her morning coffee.
Lyra took out the title page. Here’s hoping this works. Her horn glowed and her name disappeared off the page. In it’s place Lyra quickly wrote Heartstrings.
She glanced up from her paper to see the pegasus getting ready to take off. “Wait!” Lyra screamed. She stuffed the page back in the envelope, sealed it, and darted over to the mailmare. “Here!” Lyra shoved it in her face. “Could you deliver this for me, please?”
The pegasus raised an eyebrow at it. “I’ll need a bit for the stamp.”
“Okay, okay.” Lyra paid the mailmare, who then saluted with a wall-eyed expression and took to the sky.
Lyra grinned like a madmare as she went back to her breakfast.
A week later, Lyra got a letter from the publishing house. They accepted her submission and her novel would be published the following autumn. The three month wait had been agonizing for Lyra. But when she finally got her hooves on a her advance copy, she knew this was something that was worth waiting for. Another month had passed when Bon Bon came into Lyra’s study.
“Just a minute, Bon Bon.” Lyra scribbled out the end of the sentence she was on and put down her quill. “Now, what was it you wanted?”
“You got another letter from the publishing house.” Bon Bon started to place it on Lyra’s desk, but Lyra leapt in the air and snatched it from her.
“Mine!” She tore it open and started reading. It said that her book had sold out of it’s second printing and they were getting ready to make a third. It asked that Lyra get started on the sequel right away. Included was the first month’s royalty check for 100,000 bits. “Aww, yeah!” Grinning, Lyra did a backflip in the air.
She levitated her saddlebags onto herself. “I’ll be back later, Bon Bon. Canterlot Publishing wants to see my next book,” she said, dropping the letter and the first few volumes of her Human books into her bag. Wait’ll they see these. She trotted outside, chuckling to herself.
Lyra felt like she could glide as she sped off and the trip seemed to take no time at all to her. A smirk planted itself on her face as she opened the door. “Hey, guys!”
Raven—the pony who worked as an editor for Canterlot Publishing—stood and went over to Lyra, frowning. “You’re not welcome here.”
“Gee, I thought you asked to see my next book.” Lyra held up her letter. “But I guess another publisher might be interested in the work of a bestselling author.”
“Ha, I bet you stole that!” She pointed a hoof at Lyra.
“No, I’ll prove it!” Lyra took out her quill and a piece of paper. In one smooth motion she signed the name Heartstrings on it. “See!”
Raven sighed. “Okay, so you are Heartstrings. So let’s see what you have for us.”
Lyra gave her the first volume of her Human series, grinning.
Raven pushed her oversized glasses up and started reading. “Hey! This is the same dreck you showed us before!” She threw it back at Lyra. “The ponies who bought your Daring Do novel won’t buy this. We asked for a sequel to that!”
Lyra picked up her Human book and turned to leave. “Fine! I’ll write another Daring Do book.” She trotted out the door. Daring Do and the planet of the Humans, by Lyra “Heartstrings.” She started off for home, snickering to nopony in particular.
It was the dead of night. The ponies who worked at Canterlot Publishing had gone home for the day hours ago. A bug crawled up the shelf of first editions in Raven’s office; it rested on a copy of Daring Do and the Quest for the Sapphire Stone. The whole shelf started to rumble and the book fell to the floor, squashing the insect flat.
A bright light came from the pages inside as the book opened. A green hoof shot out and planted itself on the floor. The horn of a unicorn poked out of the pages, followed by a light green mane and then the rest of it’s head. “Rrrgg!” The unicorn dragged itself out of the book and just lay there, panting.
Eventually, it stood and scanned the room. It stopped when it’s spotted a quill and paper sitting on the desk. The unicorn took them and started scribbling on the paper.
Heartstrings Heartstrings HeartStrings heArtstRings hEarTstrIngs HEARTSTRINGS Heartstrings
“Horseapples.” Heartstrings crumpled the paper and threw it in the garbage.
“Lyra?” Bon Bon poked her head into Lyra’s study. “Are you coming to bed?”
Lyra dropped her quill. “Yeah, sure!” She left the room and they both trotted to their bedroom.
Bon Bon smiled. “How’s the next Daring Do book coming?”
“Great! Daring landed on Jarsoom and she’s just had first contact with the leader of one of the Human tribes.”
The nape of Bon Bon’s neck started to sweat and her smile disappeared. “That’s... great, Lyra...”
“Oh, and I have this great idea where she meets a dog named Woona.”
“Err...” Bon Bon gritted her teeth. “Isn’t that a nickname Princess Luna had as a foal?”
“Huh?” Lyra shrugged as they stepped through the bedroom door. “I guess I should’ve paid more attention in history class.”
Lyra and Bon Bon sat on the bed. “I doubt she’ll make an issue about it. Princess Luna probably don’t want to start a royal scandal.”
“Lyra?” Bon Bon tossed a blackberry in her mouth.
Lyra raised an eyebrow at Bon Bon. “Yeah?”
“Shut up.” Bon Bon pressed her lips against Lyra’s and shoved the blackberry in Lyra’s mouth. Lyra’s eye’s widened, but she quickly become lost in Bon Bon’s kiss.
When they broke off, Lyra realized that she swallowed the berry whole. Eh, whatever. They both crawled under the covers and Lyra wrapped her hooves around Bon Bon as they fell asleep.
The next morning they awoke to the sound of Tootsie Flute crying. “I’ll take care of it, Bon Bon, go back to sleep.” Lyra stood and walked over to Tootsie’s room, scratching her messy hair on the way.
“All right, what’s wrong?” Lyra levitated Tootsie in the air and sniffed at her diaper. “Still clean. I guess you’re hungry.” She brought her to the kitchen and prepared the formula for her. “There we go,” Lyra said, lifting the bottle to Tootsie’s mouth.
Lyra heard a knock at the door. Who could that be at this hour? Still holding her foal, Lyra trotted over and answered the door. “Hel—low!”
Heartstrings stood in the doorway. “Greetings, Lyra!” It wore a grin on it’s face. “I believe you have something of mine.”
“I-I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Lyra’s forehead started to sweat.
“Daring Do and the Quest for the Sapphire Stone! I wrote it and now you won’t let me write the sequel.” Heartstrings tapped Lyra on the chest with her quill. Lyra looked down at Heartstrings’ hoof; it’s fur was covered in black patches. “If I don’t write, then I die! You wouldn’t want me to die, do you Lyra? Why, I’m like a sister to you.”
“Well...” Lyra gulped. “When you put it that way.”
“Good.”
The three of them went to Lyra’s study. Heartstrings kept her quill pointed at Lyra’s neck. Tootsie Flute looked up at them, smiling. “Dada!” she said, hooves outstretched at Heartstrings.
Heartstrings smirked. “Aww, look. She said her first word.”
Lyra dropped the quill that she was holding. “H-how’d you know t-that was her f-first word?”
“We’re sisters, you nimrod!” Heartstrings dug her quill into Lyra’s fur. “Now get back to writing!”
“Kay!” Lyra lifted the quill up and went back to writing.
Daring Do and the Griffon’s Goblet.
Daring Do’s eyes shot open. The bed she sat in wasn’t her own. She was in somebody else’s—
The quill dug even further into Lyra’s neck, drawing a trickle of blood. “Somepony!”
“R-right...” Lyra did as she was told and went back to the story.
somepony else’s house. She glanced out the window to see a nuclear missile charging right toward her.
“Let me take over now.” Heartstrings took Lyra’s quill.
Daring Do leapt out of bed and darted out of the room, down the hallway. She found herself in the kitchen. Thinking quickly, she opened the refrigerator and scattered the food all over the floor. Just as the missile broke through the wall of the house, Daring Do got in the empty fridge and shut the door.
“Are you kidding me?” Lyra looked up at Heartstrings. “They’ll never believe she survived that.”
“Hey, it’s my story. Got it?” She twisted the quill deeper into Lyra’s neck.
“Got it.” Lyra squeaked.
As Heartstring went back to writing Lyra glanced down at her lap. Her eyes widened when she saw black patches were popping up all over her fur. “Hey, wait a minute!”
Heartstrings laughed. “It’s too late, sister.”
Lyra punched Heartstrings across the face. Heartstrings grinned at her; the side of her face had a black streak across it. Lyra pulled her hoof back to see that a corner of it had been cut off. Lyra started pummeling Heartstrings, but every punch and kick only shredded parts of her limbs.
“I told you,” Heartstrings said, writing the last few words of the scene. “It’s too late.”
Heartstrings dropped her quill and Lyra turned to dust. Heartstrings levitated and broom over and swept up Lyra’s remains into a neat pile. Then she took a dustpan and swept the remains of Lyra the unicorn into it.
Heartstrings stood, trotted over to the window, and opened it. “Bye bye, sister.” She emptied the dustpan outside and watched as the black cloud blew across the city of Canterlot.
She turned back to her desk. “Oh, I almost forgot about you.” Despite the commotion a moment ago, Tootsie Flute had drifted off back to sleep. “C’mon, let’s go wake up Mom.” She lifted Tootsie Flute onto her back and left the room.
“Good Morning, Lyra!” Bon Bon said when she saw her and Tootsie come in the kitchen.
“Morning, Bon Bon.” She sat down at the table and placed Tootsie Flute in her highchair.
Bon Bon placed their breakfast of toast and jam on the table. “So, did you and Tootsie Flute get any writing done this morning?”
“Oh, yeah! I wrote a whole chapter.” She smiled. “Say, I’ve been thinking: why don’t we take the money I made from the first Daring Do book and move out of Canterlot?”
“Hmm.” Bon Bon put a hoof to her chin. ”I don’t know, Lyra. I still have the candy store here.”
“Well, we’ll hire somepony to manage it. Then we can go off to live in a small town. You know what they say: it takes a village to raise a foal.” She motioned to Tootsie Flute who sat just there, picking at her cereal.
“Well, when you put it that way.” Bon Bon smiled. “Do you have a town picked out?”
She shrugged. “What about Ponyville?”
A moment later Bon Bon opened the door and peered inside. “Lyra?” She trotted into the room, carrying Tootsie Flute on a harness Lyra had made for her. “What’s wrong?”
“I’ve been to every publisher in Canterlot and none of them want to publish my books!” Lyra stomped her hoof on the floor.
Tootsie Flute started crying and Bon Bon patted her back. “It’ll be okay, Lyra, we make enough with the candy shop.”
“It’s not about the money,” Lyra grumbled. “It’s about ponies reading books that I’ve written. It’s about them sharing the same joy I have for humans. I want other ponies to be inspired to write about humans, the same way I was inspired to as a filly. Right now the only stories about Humans are silly picture books for foals.” Lyra started to gaze off into space.
“Why don’t you try writing about something else for a change?”
“Huh?” Lyra turned to her.
“Write a few stories about ponies, then after your Pony stories get popular, you start publishing your books about Humans.”
Lyra cracked a grin. “Yeah, yeah! This is a great idea. Why didn’t I think of it?” Lyra planted a kiss on her wife’s cheek. “Thanks, Bon Bon.”
“I’ll leave you to that, then,” Bon Bon said, trotting out of the room.
Lyra took a out scroll of parchment and her quill. Let’s see... What to write about... She stood there in silence for a moment before growling. Arrg! I can’t think of an idea that isn’t about humans.
She stomped over to her window and gazed outside. The sun was just setting over the horizon when she saw a streak of rainbow fly through the air. Lyra’s eyes widened and she started writing.
A week had passed since Lyra started her Pony story. During that time, she only left her study for food and bathroom breaks. Bon Bon had even moved their bed there so they could still have each other’s warmth as they slept.
Bon Bon was still asleep when Lyra scribbled out the last page of her manuscript. And so, with Ahuizotl defeated, and the sapphire statue secured, the world was safe and sound once again, thanks to Daring Do! Lyra put down her quill. “Brilliant!”
“Huh?” Bon Bon sat up a little.
“Go back to sleep, Bon Bon.” Lyra trotted over and kissed her on the forehead before setting off to the publishing house.
“Get out, ya bum!”
Lyra fell on her flank outside the door to Canterlot Publishing. She was about to stand up when the manuscript of Daring Do and the Quest for the Sapphire Stone flew through the air and landed on the stone path next to her. She got up, dusted herself off, and picked up the book she had written.
They wouldn’t even look at it. Her stomach rumbled, making her lose her frown. She spotted a café and decided to have breakfast. Her meal consisted of a bagel with cream cheese, a bowl of oats, and a cup of coffee. As she sat down to eat, her gaze rested on the street in front of her. The ponies traveling it chatted with each other, most of them on their way to work. She took a bite of her bagel.
A grey pegasus who was cantering along the road, turned and went into the café. A large mailbag was strapped across her chest. Lyra’s eye’s widened. She quickly took out her quill—which she always brought with her in case she got another idea for a book—and started scribbling the address of the publishing house on the envelope of her manuscript. She was about to write her own return address, but stopped. I can’t use my real name or they’ll just throw it away! Darting her vision around, she soon glanced at the side of her flank and saw a portion of her lyre cutie mark.
Heartstrings! In an instant, she wrote the return address on the envelope with her new pen-name at the top. She looked back at the doorway to the café; the mailmare was just trotting out with her morning coffee.
Lyra took out the title page. Here’s hoping this works. Her horn glowed and her name disappeared off the page. In it’s place Lyra quickly wrote Heartstrings.
She glanced up from her paper to see the pegasus getting ready to take off. “Wait!” Lyra screamed. She stuffed the page back in the envelope, sealed it, and darted over to the mailmare. “Here!” Lyra shoved it in her face. “Could you deliver this for me, please?”
The pegasus raised an eyebrow at it. “I’ll need a bit for the stamp.”
“Okay, okay.” Lyra paid the mailmare, who then saluted with a wall-eyed expression and took to the sky.
Lyra grinned like a madmare as she went back to her breakfast.
A week later, Lyra got a letter from the publishing house. They accepted her submission and her novel would be published the following autumn. The three month wait had been agonizing for Lyra. But when she finally got her hooves on a her advance copy, she knew this was something that was worth waiting for. Another month had passed when Bon Bon came into Lyra’s study.
“Just a minute, Bon Bon.” Lyra scribbled out the end of the sentence she was on and put down her quill. “Now, what was it you wanted?”
“You got another letter from the publishing house.” Bon Bon started to place it on Lyra’s desk, but Lyra leapt in the air and snatched it from her.
“Mine!” She tore it open and started reading. It said that her book had sold out of it’s second printing and they were getting ready to make a third. It asked that Lyra get started on the sequel right away. Included was the first month’s royalty check for 100,000 bits. “Aww, yeah!” Grinning, Lyra did a backflip in the air.
She levitated her saddlebags onto herself. “I’ll be back later, Bon Bon. Canterlot Publishing wants to see my next book,” she said, dropping the letter and the first few volumes of her Human books into her bag. Wait’ll they see these. She trotted outside, chuckling to herself.
Lyra felt like she could glide as she sped off and the trip seemed to take no time at all to her. A smirk planted itself on her face as she opened the door. “Hey, guys!”
Raven—the pony who worked as an editor for Canterlot Publishing—stood and went over to Lyra, frowning. “You’re not welcome here.”
“Gee, I thought you asked to see my next book.” Lyra held up her letter. “But I guess another publisher might be interested in the work of a bestselling author.”
“Ha, I bet you stole that!” She pointed a hoof at Lyra.
“No, I’ll prove it!” Lyra took out her quill and a piece of paper. In one smooth motion she signed the name Heartstrings on it. “See!”
Raven sighed. “Okay, so you are Heartstrings. So let’s see what you have for us.”
Lyra gave her the first volume of her Human series, grinning.
Raven pushed her oversized glasses up and started reading. “Hey! This is the same dreck you showed us before!” She threw it back at Lyra. “The ponies who bought your Daring Do novel won’t buy this. We asked for a sequel to that!”
Lyra picked up her Human book and turned to leave. “Fine! I’ll write another Daring Do book.” She trotted out the door. Daring Do and the planet of the Humans, by Lyra “Heartstrings.” She started off for home, snickering to nopony in particular.
It was the dead of night. The ponies who worked at Canterlot Publishing had gone home for the day hours ago. A bug crawled up the shelf of first editions in Raven’s office; it rested on a copy of Daring Do and the Quest for the Sapphire Stone. The whole shelf started to rumble and the book fell to the floor, squashing the insect flat.
A bright light came from the pages inside as the book opened. A green hoof shot out and planted itself on the floor. The horn of a unicorn poked out of the pages, followed by a light green mane and then the rest of it’s head. “Rrrgg!” The unicorn dragged itself out of the book and just lay there, panting.
Eventually, it stood and scanned the room. It stopped when it’s spotted a quill and paper sitting on the desk. The unicorn took them and started scribbling on the paper.
Heartstrings Heartstrings HeartStrings heArtstRings hEarTstrIngs HEARTSTRINGS Heartstrings
“Horseapples.” Heartstrings crumpled the paper and threw it in the garbage.
“Lyra?” Bon Bon poked her head into Lyra’s study. “Are you coming to bed?”
Lyra dropped her quill. “Yeah, sure!” She left the room and they both trotted to their bedroom.
Bon Bon smiled. “How’s the next Daring Do book coming?”
“Great! Daring landed on Jarsoom and she’s just had first contact with the leader of one of the Human tribes.”
The nape of Bon Bon’s neck started to sweat and her smile disappeared. “That’s... great, Lyra...”
“Oh, and I have this great idea where she meets a dog named Woona.”
“Err...” Bon Bon gritted her teeth. “Isn’t that a nickname Princess Luna had as a foal?”
“Huh?” Lyra shrugged as they stepped through the bedroom door. “I guess I should’ve paid more attention in history class.”
Lyra and Bon Bon sat on the bed. “I doubt she’ll make an issue about it. Princess Luna probably don’t want to start a royal scandal.”
“Lyra?” Bon Bon tossed a blackberry in her mouth.
Lyra raised an eyebrow at Bon Bon. “Yeah?”
“Shut up.” Bon Bon pressed her lips against Lyra’s and shoved the blackberry in Lyra’s mouth. Lyra’s eye’s widened, but she quickly become lost in Bon Bon’s kiss.
When they broke off, Lyra realized that she swallowed the berry whole. Eh, whatever. They both crawled under the covers and Lyra wrapped her hooves around Bon Bon as they fell asleep.
The next morning they awoke to the sound of Tootsie Flute crying. “I’ll take care of it, Bon Bon, go back to sleep.” Lyra stood and walked over to Tootsie’s room, scratching her messy hair on the way.
“All right, what’s wrong?” Lyra levitated Tootsie in the air and sniffed at her diaper. “Still clean. I guess you’re hungry.” She brought her to the kitchen and prepared the formula for her. “There we go,” Lyra said, lifting the bottle to Tootsie’s mouth.
Lyra heard a knock at the door. Who could that be at this hour? Still holding her foal, Lyra trotted over and answered the door. “Hel—low!”
Heartstrings stood in the doorway. “Greetings, Lyra!” It wore a grin on it’s face. “I believe you have something of mine.”
“I-I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Lyra’s forehead started to sweat.
“Daring Do and the Quest for the Sapphire Stone! I wrote it and now you won’t let me write the sequel.” Heartstrings tapped Lyra on the chest with her quill. Lyra looked down at Heartstrings’ hoof; it’s fur was covered in black patches. “If I don’t write, then I die! You wouldn’t want me to die, do you Lyra? Why, I’m like a sister to you.”
“Well...” Lyra gulped. “When you put it that way.”
“Good.”
The three of them went to Lyra’s study. Heartstrings kept her quill pointed at Lyra’s neck. Tootsie Flute looked up at them, smiling. “Dada!” she said, hooves outstretched at Heartstrings.
Heartstrings smirked. “Aww, look. She said her first word.”
Lyra dropped the quill that she was holding. “H-how’d you know t-that was her f-first word?”
“We’re sisters, you nimrod!” Heartstrings dug her quill into Lyra’s fur. “Now get back to writing!”
“Kay!” Lyra lifted the quill up and went back to writing.
Daring Do and the Griffon’s Goblet.
Daring Do’s eyes shot open. The bed she sat in wasn’t her own. She was in somebody else’s—
The quill dug even further into Lyra’s neck, drawing a trickle of blood. “Somepony!”
“R-right...” Lyra did as she was told and went back to the story.
somepony else’s house. She glanced out the window to see a nuclear missile charging right toward her.
“Let me take over now.” Heartstrings took Lyra’s quill.
Daring Do leapt out of bed and darted out of the room, down the hallway. She found herself in the kitchen. Thinking quickly, she opened the refrigerator and scattered the food all over the floor. Just as the missile broke through the wall of the house, Daring Do got in the empty fridge and shut the door.
“Are you kidding me?” Lyra looked up at Heartstrings. “They’ll never believe she survived that.”
“Hey, it’s my story. Got it?” She twisted the quill deeper into Lyra’s neck.
“Got it.” Lyra squeaked.
As Heartstring went back to writing Lyra glanced down at her lap. Her eyes widened when she saw black patches were popping up all over her fur. “Hey, wait a minute!”
Heartstrings laughed. “It’s too late, sister.”
Lyra punched Heartstrings across the face. Heartstrings grinned at her; the side of her face had a black streak across it. Lyra pulled her hoof back to see that a corner of it had been cut off. Lyra started pummeling Heartstrings, but every punch and kick only shredded parts of her limbs.
“I told you,” Heartstrings said, writing the last few words of the scene. “It’s too late.”
Heartstrings dropped her quill and Lyra turned to dust. Heartstrings levitated and broom over and swept up Lyra’s remains into a neat pile. Then she took a dustpan and swept the remains of Lyra the unicorn into it.
Heartstrings stood, trotted over to the window, and opened it. “Bye bye, sister.” She emptied the dustpan outside and watched as the black cloud blew across the city of Canterlot.
She turned back to her desk. “Oh, I almost forgot about you.” Despite the commotion a moment ago, Tootsie Flute had drifted off back to sleep. “C’mon, let’s go wake up Mom.” She lifted Tootsie Flute onto her back and left the room.
“Good Morning, Lyra!” Bon Bon said when she saw her and Tootsie come in the kitchen.
“Morning, Bon Bon.” She sat down at the table and placed Tootsie Flute in her highchair.
Bon Bon placed their breakfast of toast and jam on the table. “So, did you and Tootsie Flute get any writing done this morning?”
“Oh, yeah! I wrote a whole chapter.” She smiled. “Say, I’ve been thinking: why don’t we take the money I made from the first Daring Do book and move out of Canterlot?”
“Hmm.” Bon Bon put a hoof to her chin. ”I don’t know, Lyra. I still have the candy store here.”
“Well, we’ll hire somepony to manage it. Then we can go off to live in a small town. You know what they say: it takes a village to raise a foal.” She motioned to Tootsie Flute who sat just there, picking at her cereal.
“Well, when you put it that way.” Bon Bon smiled. “Do you have a town picked out?”
She shrugged. “What about Ponyville?”