//------------------------------//
// Every Little Thing She Does 
// Story: A Dream 
// by totallynotabrony 
//------------------------------//

	Twilight paced the room in front of her friends.  “So, the SOS is back, the robot that looks like me is targeting Coloratura and has been upgrading itself, Quibble Pants is on the path to becoming a supervillain, and we now own a hotel in Las Pegasus.”
The door opened and Sunset Shimmer stuck her head in.  “Also, I brought Cherry Jubilee back to life so Braeburn will stop hanging around Merry May in order for her to go back to being a murderbot.”
Sunset closed the door.
The room was silent for at least five seconds.
Twilight opened and closed her mouth several times before giving up.  “If I ask, ‘what else could happen’ I know I’ll regret it.”
“Um, isn’t anypony else concerned about how Sunset did that?” Fluttershy asked.
“Very,” said Applejack.  “But I also kinda don’t want to know.”
“Seconded,” said Rarity.
“What’s so great about it anyway?” grumbled Rainbow.
“Braeburn’s going to be happy about it,” said Pinkie.  “After he gets over being super conflicted about it.  Oh!  I should throw Cherry Jubilee a Welcome Back to Life party!”
Rainbow frowned.  “Wait, exactly how did Sunset bring her back?  What’s Cherry like now?  Uh, Pinkie, what are you planning on serving at the party?”
“Well, it would be totally uncool for me to get brains and then find out that she doesn’t eat them,” Pinkie said.  “I guess I’ll just have to go and ask her.”
“Aren’t you worried?” said Twilight.
“Are you?” said Applejack.  “I thought you didn’t believe in zombies.”
“I don’t,” said Twilight.  “But I’m also very disturbed about any reanimation, especially when a pony like Sunset is involved.”
“Why don’t we ask Sir Win?” suggested Pinkie.  “I bet he would know all about death or lack thereof.”
Twilight nodded.  “Okay, I’ll do that.”
“You’re on your own,” said Pinkie.  “I have to get ready for the party.”
Rainbow said, “I have stuff to do.”
“Uh, m-me too,” Fluttershy quickly added.
Twilight looked around the group.  Rarity pretended she didn’t notice.  Applejack said, “I won’t lie.  I just don’t want to go.”
“Fine,” Twilight huffed.  “I guess I’ll go get to the bottom of this myself, and I bet the explanation won’t be zombies.”
As they say, karma’s a bitch.  Fortunately for Twilight, zombies are a stupid plot device, so that didn’t turn out to be the answer just to spite her. 
She went over to Sir Win’s place and knocked on the door.  When he answered, she explained the situation to him and asked for advice.
“Hmm, I think I might have an idea,” he said.  “Here, come with me.”
He led her out to his bicycle.  Twilight remembered that Valiant had given it to him, because he thought the phrase “hell on wheels” was funny.  Sir Win had fashioned a sidecar for it, which looked like a large wicker basket.
At his invitation, Twilight climbed in.  “So, why is this a giant basket?” she asked.  “Also, where are we going?”
Sir Win smiled as he pedaled.  “We’re going to ask Sunset if Cherry Jubilee is a zombie.”
“I could have just done that,” grumbled Twilight.
“Well, this way we’ll both have our curiosity satisfied.”
They passed Columbia and the Flim Flam Brothers setting up a campaign rally event in the town square.  They’d established the Committee Responsible for Electing the President in order to raise money.  Twilight wasn’t sure if they realized the acronym spelled CReEP.
Sir Win and Twilight arrived at Sunset’s place.  Twilight realized that Sunset hadn’t been around much since Valiant’s death.  Understandable, considering how much it had affected her, but Sunset had turned into more of a recluse than expected.
Sunset answered the door when they knocked.
“We’re here to see Cherry Jubilee,” said Twilight.
Sunset nodded them in.  As Sir Win passed the door, his eyes widened.  “Whoa, that’s a butt-ton of magic.”
Sir Win didn't use that adjective lightly, Twilight knew.  She sensed the huge volume and power of many complex spells, too.  Sunset must have been working for a long time on this project.  “How long did this take?  This must have been some complicated magic.”
“Yeah,” said Sunset.  “It’s pretty much all I’ve been doing since Valiant died.  That’s why you haven’t seen me around for months.”
She brought them into the living room.  Cherry was sitting on the couch.
She appeared to be perfectly normal, save perhaps missing her usual makeup.  She looked up when they entered.
“Cherry Jubilee?” Twilight asked.
Cherry nodded.
“Can you speak?”
“I most certainly can,” said Cherry, quietly.
Twilight studied her, walking slowly from side to side to observe from other angles.
“What did you do, Sunset?” Twilight asked.  “She looks normal, like she never, uh…”  Twilight didn’t finish the sentence.
“It wasn’t easy,” said Sunset.  “Months of work.  The hardest part was the psychological aspect, and I still don’t have that quite right.”
“What do you mean?”  Twilight took a closer look at Cherry, only now realizing how quiet she was.  Cherry had been rather outgoing.
“Well, dying a painful death will leave scars on anyone’s psyche,” said Sunset.  “As will living a painful reanimation.”
Cherry grimaced and looked away.
“But,” Sunset continued, “I’m sure she’ll get her mojo back with a little love.  That’s how it worked for me after you poked around in my head after you brought me back from that high school.”
Twilight sensed the barb in that statement, but quickly avoided it.  “So you think the love’s going to come from Braeburn?”
Cherry looked uncomfortable.
“He’ll either love her or reject her as an abomination.”  Sunset shrugged.  “Or, failing that, she can love him.  It worked for me.”
This time it was Twilight that looked uncomfortable.  Sunset obsessing over Valiant was one thing.  A potential zombie obsessing over an easily disturbed stallion like Braeburn might not go over well.  For anyone.  Anywhere.
“So have you told him?” Twilight asked.
“Look at you, concerned with minor things,” said Sunset.  “I’m surprised you haven’t asked about the implications of a process that could bring ponies back to life.”
It took Twilight a second, but her blood ran cold.  “Did you bring Valiant back?”
Sunset shrugged.  “It wasn’t me.”
“Wait, are you saying it was somepony?”
Sunset put on a trollish grin that she had to have practiced in front of a mirror.  Twilight didn’t know if that meant yes or no, and that only frustrated her more.
“Where is he?” Twilight demanded.
“I honestly don’t know.  His body’s gone from where we left it.”
“You don’t know that means he came back!  We were busy and didn’t bury it, if you remember.  Wolves could have gotten it.  I knew we should have put it in a cave and sealed it with a stone like Cordoba wanted.”
“Are you sure you wouldn’t rather have him back?” Sunset said.  “What with the SOS, Twi-minator, and Quibble Pants presenting a threat, plus the management of a hotel and dealing with the potential shitstorm of a Cherry-Braeburn-Merry May love triangle?”
Twilight’s eye twitched.  “Were you behind all of this?”
“I’m tempted to say yes, because I want to see your reaction.”
“But were you?”
Sunset put on the same trollface from before.  “All I can say is, you might want to think about what you’ve done lately.  Have you been a good girl?”
Twilight went from angry and confused to just confused.  “Of course I have.  Why do you ask?”
“You’ll find out.”  Sunset beckoned Cherry and they disappeared into the back room.
Sir Win wore a look of simple contentment.  Twilight glanced at him.  “Do you know what’s going on?”
“No, but I have a feeling things are going to hell.”  He smiled.  Twilight did not.  Sir Win glanced at her.  “You know, it’s a pun.  Because I’m a demon.  I like hell.”
“I got it,” Twilight growled.  “But this is all so confusing.  Why did Sunset ask me if I’d been a good girl?”
They walked outside.  It was snowing.  Also, there was a fir tree with colorful decorations propped up in the middle of the street.
“Nope, we’re not doing this,” said Twilight.  “I am not dealing with another mystery today.”
The weather ponies were already at work clearing the clouds away.  As hurried as they were, Twilight thought that they must have been caught off guard by the sudden weather.
Sir Win dropped her off at the library and she went inside.  Cordoba was there, drinking coffee.  On impulse, Twilight said, “So, Sunset brought Cherry Jubilee back to life.”
“I know.”
“And you didn’t tell me!?”
“There are a lot of things I don’t tell you, Twilight.”
Twilight controlled her temper.  “Just a simple heads-up would have been nice.”
Cordoba turned to face her.  “Everyone has secrets.  So do I.  So do you.  Return from death is a big deal, but what would you have done if you knew sooner?  What would Braeburn do?”
Twilight decided she didn’t want to actually consider her answer, because that would have been treading a path she didn’t relish.  “So if Cherry’s back, is your father too?”
“What?”  Cordoba blinked.
Twilight frowned.  “I just thought that if Sunset told you about Cherry, she might have also told you about him?”
Cordoba got up. “What did she say?”  
“She didn’t say anything.  I only assumed.”
Cordoba’s face fell, but then she looked at Twilight again.  “See?  What if Braeburn knew about Cherry, but then the work to bring her back wasn’t successful and the hope he’d gained was crushed again?”
“Okay, good point.”  Twilight sighed.  “You know, if you put as much passion into helping others as you did murder, a whole bunch of Equestria’s problems would be solved.”
“So you admit Equestria has problems,” said Columbia, barging in.  “Elect me President and I’ll fix them all.”
She put a Columbia for President sticker on Twilight and walked out again.
Twilight hastily peeled it off and threw it away.
“My dad would know how to solve Equestria’s problems,” said Cordoba.
“While he created new ones.”
“Maybe.  Maybe not.”
Twilight shook her head.  “This is too much to deal with.  I need a nap.”  She headed upstairs.
Pausing at the entrance of the attic, though, a thought struck her.  Valiant’s box of contingencies was still up in the attic.  He’d left instructions for how to deal with a multitude of improbable events if they happened in his absence.
But no, Twilight had sworn she would never open the box.
Unless of course, that was what Valiant had planned, in which case he had expected her to never touch it.
Twilight suddenly decided to go to the attic.  She didn’t need to follow his advice.  Just knowing what Valiant had written down would inform her of his thought process, so that even if he were trolling her from beyond the grave, she could plan around his plan to plan for her.  She was smart enough.  Surely he couldn’t still be making her out to be a fool.  After all, which one of them was dead?
There was a wooden trunk buried under piles of old paperbacks.  A piece of masking tape on the top had Valiant’s Contingency Box written on it in black marker.
Twilight paused, but then opened it.  It was filled with small envelopes with various situations written on them.  Twilight found one that read Sentient robot is naughty.
That seemed relevant.  She hesitated, but she’d come this far.  
She opened the envelope.  Inside was a card.  It said Wait.
“Typical,” muttered Twilight.
She stuffed the note back in the envelope and put it back in the trunk.
Coming back downstairs, she saw Spike basking in the sunshine in front of the window.  That dragon sure did like basking in things.  Pausing for a moment to look out the window, Twilight spotted Braeburn and Merry May outside.  The sun glinted on both of their respective metal.
Outside, Merry and Braeburn were having just as good a day as Twilight guessed.  That was surprising for both of them.
“It’s a nice day,” said Braeburn, looking up.  He subtly edged closer to Merry.
“It certainly is,” said Merry.  “According to local atmospheric data, after the snow clouds are cleared away, it will stay clear and sunny all afternoon, giving way to a few scattered clouds to give contrast to the sunset.  The temperature will be comfortable all day.”
“That’s a really useful ability you have,” said Braeburn.
“Okay, I will admit that as much as I dislike being a helicopter, I do enjoy having raw weather data from satellites available,” said Merry.  “You know, I think I’m as happy as I’ve been since this happened to me.”
“I’m happy for you,” said Braeburn.  He hesitated, but then leaned against her.  After a moment, he heard her hydraulics hiss as she leaned slightly back towards him.
“I want to thank you for being there for me,” said Merry.  “I’m flattered that somepony would go to so much effort for, well, me.  I know I haven’t been the easiest to get along with.”
“I know what you’re going through,” said Braeburn.  He affirmed, “I’m here for you.”
Sunset, with Cherry Jubilee following quietly behind, walked up and tapped Braeburn on the shoulder.  “Hey, look who I’ve brought to see you.  It’s, you know, your wife.”