//------------------------------// // IX. Twilight Transcendent // Story: Falls the Shadow // by Kolwynia //------------------------------// Episode Nine: Twilight Transcendent What’s loved…lives -Diane Duane Deep Wizardry There was darkness. In the days before the power of Friendship went out of the universe, there were countless worlds lying under the power of shadow. There was pain and grief and cruelty. Children went hungry and friends were separated. There was war and disease and death. Everything died. And there were monsters, too, no matter what anyone said. But there was something else, a Power greater and more terrible than the shadow. It seemed to sleep behind the light, and the darkness feared lest it should awaken. And we who lived in the shadow-worlds of the Outside gave it a name, a single word to describe the awe in a child’s eyes gazing up at its mother, or the raging sea of emotion overflowing between two lovers, or the mystery that drove one to lay down her life for another. And the name we gave it was too small for it, a single unworthy syllable that we dressed it in, a word that hung like a cloak of rags upon a furious, untamable light. This is the story of that dreadful Power. At the center of All That Is was a world, a brilliant, shining world that was lit from within by the power of Friendship. Equestria. It shone at the heart of all things, casting the universes from its blazing center like shadows. And even though the worlds lay in darkness, the light from that world reached them. It took many forms. On one world, it came as a song, on another a tale passed down from generation to generation. And on another, a story for children… Until the end came, and the light was vanquished. Hope failed. The darkness was triumphant. Equestria, the light of worlds, faded. In the ashes of Friendship’s power stood Light’s Enemy, dressed in the body of a unicorn. Her dark laughter mixed horribly with the sound of weeping. Celestia, the greyed-out Princess of the Sun looked up from the body of Twilight Sparkle, saw Trixie laughing, and cast a bolt of white-hot magic at her. The magician deflected it with a casual spell. “Vengeance is not a powerful enough force to defeat me, Princess,” said Trixie. “Now that Death has entered your world and broken the bonds of friendship forever, nothing can defeat me.” Celestia had no more strength within her to try to attack the unicorn again, not after seeing her fiercest spell swatted down like a parasprite. It really was hopeless. Twilight was gone, and with her, the friendship that saved the world from Nightmare Moon and Discord. The power of Harmony was beyond their reach forever now. Rarity, Applejack, Rainbow Dash, and Fluttershy clung to one another, trembling. Their tears flowed unchecked. Octavia began to play mournfully. Nopony tried to stop her. The Element of Despair seemed right for the occasion. The armies of ponies and constellations stood as grey and motionless as statues, waiting for what would come next. A rip tore across the grey sky. It opened on nothing. Darkness began to seep into the greyed-out world. Black shadows drooled from the sky. Trixie gazed upward, exultant. Her eyes were the same black. The Darkness was calling to itself. “Surprise,” said a voice only one could hear. Surprise looked up, trying to blink away her tears. It was Pinkie, the phantom that haunted her. She was as grey as everything else in the world. “What?” said Surprise. Her voice came out as a strained croak. “Let me go to them.” More tears spilled hotly down Surprise’s cheeks. Why wouldn’t they stop? This was her moment, wasn’t it? Now that the Outside was bleeding into Equestria, she didn’t have to worry about being destroyed. She was just coming home. Only now the Outside didn’t feel like home. Pinkie’s love had ruined her. The grey existence of the Outside would never be enough for her anymore. She wanted more. She wanted… …the very thing I betrayed, she thought bitterly. “What does it matter anymore?” she said. “I can help fix this,” said Pinkie. “You? Fix this? Twilight is dead. You can’t be friends with a corpse. And if you could somehow get your world back, what would happen to me? I’m from the Outside, remember? I don’t have a place in your world.” Pinkie gave her a steady look. “You don’t have a place in this one, either.” There it was, put into words that Surprise could not deny. There really was no place for her. Still, how could she just give up? When the moment comes… “I don’t want to go,” she said through tears. “I know.” She regained her composure a little, enough to talk without her voice breaking. “Pinkie…I am very afraid.” “It’s okay. I’m here with you.” “Ha ha ha. Of course you are…you always have been, haven’t you?” “And always will be.” “Don’t forget me.” What was Surprise in the end? A creature of the Outside, nothing more than the dredge of grey emotion given form by chaos? Another side of Pinkie Pie’s soul? A real pony? Pinkie’s sister? A friend? For an instant, she was a hero. She closed her eyes. With an effort of will beyond anything she would have thought herself capable of, she gave up her existence. It felt like…flying. “Goodbye, Pinkie,” she murmured. “I wish…” And she was gone. In a world of grey, a colorless pony opened her eyes. They were crystal blue. Trixie’s voice floated over the crowd. “Do you see? You thought you could keep me at bay forever, that your precious Star Seal could defy the darkness between worlds. Look what friendship comes to in the end. No matter how bright it shines, there is a line it cannot cross. Everyone who loves is destroyed eventually. It is inevitable. Before the tragedy of Death, even friendship is nothing!” A circle of weeping friends could not argue with her. They had never lost anypony before, not really. If a friend ran away, they could go and bring her back. But this…what could any of them do? They were powerless. The sky continued to bleed darkness. Trixie’s power swelled. It was felt across the universe. On undiscovered worlds where dark gods lived, they felt a power and a cruelty that dwarfed their own and shuddered, knowing that it would soon stretch its hoof across the vastness of space and reach them. There were earthquakes on a thousand worlds, heralding her coming. All of creation trembled as her black eyes gazed upward and she decided where she would cast her shadow next. In that moment, when all hope was lost, Octavia’s tragic music was broken by the last sound anypony expected. She ceased her playing and everypony listened. It was laughter. Pure, clean, childlike, wonderful laughter. It was not mad and cruel like Trixie’s. It was the sound of joy. The armies of ponies turned to see whose voice had pierced the despair that hung over them. What they saw brought a drop of hope to each of them. Twilight’s friends stared with openmouthed awe. It was a pony, a simple wingless, magic-less earth pony. And it was pink. She was the only thing of color in the whole world. The crowd of grey ponies parted as she approached her friends, who watched her with uncomprehending expressions. Trixie saw also. Her black eyes narrowed. For the first time, uncertainty crept into her dark heart. A pony untouched by the Outside? It was impossible! And yet, there it was… “Pinkie Pie?” asked Rainbow Dash. She had none of her trademark pride and boldness left in her. She was a wreck, her wet eyes wide and afraid. “It’s me,” said Pinkie. “The real me.” “Twilight…” Rainbow Dash couldn’t say it. “I know,” said Pinkie. She was smiling at her friends, but there were tears streaming down her face. “It’s all over.” She bowed her head. “No it isn’t, Silly,” said Pinkie. “How can you say that?” asked Rarity between sobs. “Don’t you remember what happened the last time you lost your colors? It looked bad then, too, didn’t it? But we won.” “Because of Twilight,” said Applejack. “She used her memory spell ta remind us of our friendship.” “And now it looks like we’ve all forgotten again,” said Pinkie Pie. There was something stern in her eyes. “Pinkie…” said Fluttershy. “We…don’t have Twilight to help us anymore. She’s gone, just like the Elements of Harmony. There’s nothing left…” “But, Fluttershy, don’t you remember? The Elements have been destroyed before. By Nightmare Moon. And they came back.” “Because of Twilight,” said Rainbow Dash. “She discovered the sixth Element and the…” “The…” prodded Pinkie. Rainbow Dash shook her head. “The spirits of the Elements of Harmony.” “That’s right! The real Elements of Harmony can’t be destroyed.” “They can by Death!” said Trixie savagely. Pinkie laughed again. “Why are you laughing?” said Trixie. A fury was building within her. She was more powerful than anything in this world and this little speck of a pony dared… “You think Death can destroy the power of Harmony? That’s worse than silly. It’s just dumb. The power of Harmony comes from friendship.” “Your friend is dead. I have killed her. You will never talk to her again, never hear the music of her laughter, never feel the warmth of her, never look into her eyes and see any life in them. Where is your friendship?” “The same place it’s always been,” said Pinkie. “Just because she’s gone doesn’t mean we can’t be friends.” “But…doesn’t it?” asked Applejack. “Of course not!” said Pinkie. “I…think I get it,” said Fluttershy. They looked at her. She blushed. And they kept staring, because they could actually see the rose color of her blush on her yellow coat. Yellow! Her colors were coming back. “But…” Rainbow Dash started to say, but went quiet. “It’s like Pinkie Sense,” said Pinkie. “It doesn’t have to make sense to be true. Do you remember what it was like when Twilight used her memory spell on us? It’s like that. You just have to remember her.” “I do!” said Rarity suddenly. “But…oh, it hurts!” “I know,” said Pinkie. “But friendship is friendship, even when it’s painful. The spirits of the Elements of Harmony can’t be destroyed because they live in us. And the same is true…” she had to force the words out in her grief, “the same is true of Twilight!” One by one the grey bled out of the Guardians of Harmony, replaced by the brilliant colors that once filled their world. They remembered Twilight. They remembered that moment, when she brought them all together for the first time. And it was like we had known each other forever, they thought, as if something had connected us before we had ever met. “She is dead,” said Trixie. She was furious by now, and her fury was cold. “Dead! Don’t you understand? Death is the end of friendship. Every world in the whole universe knows it except for you. A memory is not a friend. It’s just an image in your minds, a trick your hopeless little hearts play on you. Your Twilight is gone. Your friendship with her is over!” “Why should we listen to you?” said Rainbow Dash. She was defiant. Every color of the rainbow shimmered in her mane. She was flapping her wings, hovering. “That’s right, what do you know about it?” said Applejack. Pinkie beamed at her friends, then faced Trixie. “See? Our friendship doesn’t have to play by your rules. This is our world and Twilight is our friend. And Death can’t stand in the way of friendship here because friendship is magic!” A necklace of brilliant blue light appeared on Pinkie’s neck. It was aflame with the power of joyous, defiant laughter. One light became five as the Elements of Harmony returned to their guardians. They stood their ground together, a circle of lights against the darkness. Whatever was happening, Trixie knew she had to stop it. She cast a bolt of deadly magic at the circle of friends. Her powers were such by now that there was not a force in existence that could save them from her spell. Except one. Far away, a fountain of sand began to fall upward through the giant Hourglass. A purple hoof stretched out, caught Trixie’s spell and flicked it casually aside. Years ago, a young unicorn filly had felt the faintest caress of friendship’s Power. She hadn’t even met her friends yet, but in a flash of colored light that connection had brushed up against her. Magic had lit her up like a firework. It had chosen her, marked her as its own. The Element of Magic. Friendship Incarnate. That had only been a drop of the Power. In an ancient ruin, the young unicorn finally discovered the magic of friendship. And in that moment, when she knew that she had friends, Magic awoke within her. For the first time in a thousand years, the power of Harmony had been called upon. And it had answered. A princess had wielded its power to banish her possessed sister. A peasant girl had wielded the same power and redeemed her. She did not realize how pure her connection to Harmony was. Even Celestia had been in awe of her. That had only been a sip of the Power. It had been incredible. It had broken the power of darkness, vanquished chaos, united a circle of friends to save Equestria. It had been pure holy White Fire flowing through her, all the colors of magic blended into a single blinding flash. It had remade the world that Discord had broken. And all that was nothing--nothing--compared to what happened when Twilight’s friends stood in her name before the shadow, their love for her unquenchable even in the face of her death. All she had ever known of the Power before could have fit inside a bowl. This was an ocean. It was every ocean on every world in every universe. Only a being that was magic in every fiber of her being could have survived it. Anypony else would have been destroyed. Twilight, who had already been destroyed, was remade. The spirit of the living Element of Magic had lived on in the hearts of her friends, all the fragments of her being strung like pearls on the thread of their love for her. And when they called on Harmony, the Power had answered. It had reached beyond Death and ripped Twilight back from the Sunless Lands with no more effort than a lovestruck filly plucking the petal from a flower. Twilight had felt what a phoenix feels when a pile of ash becomes a living flame and spreads its wings in a flash of burning light. The light of magic flashed in Twilight. Its power brushed through her mane and tail, turning them as brilliantly white as the sunlight on the snow. She was glowing. Now she was more than a pony. Her hour had come at last. She opened her eyes and the Power looked out from them. The Dark One met her without flinching. Its power was great. The evil of countless worlds coursed through it like a boundless sea of living shadows. All the black hatred of the universe glared at Twilight from pitiless eyes. Twilight floated toward her Enemy and alighted on the ground in front of her. They faced one another and bowed their heads, pointing their horns at each other. Their horns glowed like flares. They ran at each other. Just before they met, a smile touched Twilight’s lips. “Trixie,” she called out. Her voice was tinged with power. And from the depths of shadow, the magician heard her call her name. “Twilight!” she tried to cry. It was like trying to scream in a nightmare. The thing that held her in its power did not allow her a voice. Twilight dodged the unicorn’s horn and flung her hooves around her in a fierce embrace. “Come with me, Trixie,” she said. And she tore Trixie from the Dark One’s grip in a flash. The blue unicorn trembled in Twilight’s arms. “Trixie is…Trixie is…” “I know,” said Twilight. Her Enemy did not lose much in their contest. Now that the Outside was bleeding into Equestria it did not need a vessel anyway. It had only been holding on to Trixie because she was comfortable, like a well-worn dress. Now without a body, the Dark One stood in its own form. It looked like a standing shadow, a pony-shaped hole in the universe. “Take her then,” it said. “Let’s settle this between ourselves, Twilight Sparkle.” Twilight pulled herself away from Trixie gently. “Wait here,” she said to the unicorn. “This isn’t going to take long.” This time when they raced toward each other, they collided. Supreme Light met Supreme Shadow. Twilight knew what she had to do. She had seen the future, how the Darkness filled everything. The shadow was her opposite, everything that stood against Friendship. But she had learned something from Pinkie and Surprise. Love can take a shadow and make it something else… “What are you doing, Twilight Sparkle?” the shadow hissed. It was similar to the memory spell she had used to bring her friends back from the grey of Discord, only far more powerful. She opened her heart to the darkness, and let the light within her pour into it. The shadow knew at once what she was trying to do. It resisted. “No! I am the Darkness.” “That’s okay. I like the dark as much as the light.” “I am Friendless!” “Not anymore.” “Foal! You can’t change me. You don’t have the power to change the very nature of a being.” “You should ask my parents what I did to them the day I came into my magic.” There was a struggle. Even Twilight, at the zenith of her power, was not sure she would win. The power of Friendship searched the shadow desperately, trying to find a single place in that dark heart that might welcome it. “I am Nameless!” “Then I will name you.” The emptiness that made up the Dark One was being filled. Twilight looked into the creature’s eyes. All she saw was need, a desperate longing that would drink in the universe if she let it. But no, Twilight Sparkle would not give it the universe. She would give it something infinitely more vast. Twilight embraced her shadow, let her heart open all the way. All the oceans of the Power that filled her poured themselves into her opposite. Twilight and her shadow were locked in a circuit of Power. Twilight loved endlessly. And her love was returned. The shadow took on substance. She looked like a pony. Her features were similar to Twilight’s own, except her coat was grey. When she opened her eyes, they were filled with the same blazing white light as Twilight’s. A fierce pride blossomed within Twilight. She’s beautiful, she thought. “Your name is…” she said. All existence seemed to hold its breath. “…Harmony.” And there was light. The White Fire of Magic filled the entire world. The grey was washed away in a flood of countless colors. The stars leapt joyfully back into the heavens. The Great Seal was restored. All the darkness of the Outside was banished. The once-shadow was a daughter of the light and the darkness both. A child of the twilight. She felt the Outside call to her. Harmony ascended, leaving behind Equestria. “Go, my Harmony. See the worlds. Love them.” As the Star Seal closed, Harmony slipped through. The light continued to shine. The world was remade. All good things were restored. The constellations returned to their caves to slumber peacefully in the darkness. For the first and only time in her life, Twilight Sparkle brought the night to an end just like her beloved Princess. With a surge of magic, she raised the sun. Twilight’s dawn caught the Doctor and Ditzy Doo, and they were freed from the stone. Ditzy looked around. Something else had changed. She flexed her wings. No, that wasn’t it. “Princess!” cried the Doctor, hugging her. She could feel magic flowing through her. Oh! That must mean… Her broken horn had been healed. The light of Harmony did not stop. The mark of chaos was erased from the Cutie Mark Crusaders. Their sisters swept them up in joyful embraces. Rainbow Dash did the same with Scootaloo, caught up in the moment. Then she quickly set her back down. Both of them were blushing. Octavia felt the power of despair break. Glorious joy flooded her entire being. She closed her eyes against the light. There was a music to the power of Harmony. She would spend years trying to put into her own music what she heard in that moment. Every wound on every pony was healed down to the last scratch. The Princesses of Day and Night were restored to their glory. Far away, in the Sculpture Garden of Canterlot, another princess woke from what felt like a long sleep. Princess Stella took her first steps in over a thousand years. She blinked, looking around herself. There was no trace of the madness of Discord’s reign. The world seemed…perfect. The Princess of the Stars smiled, her eyes sparkling with happy tears. Only when every star was in its right place, every pony painted her right color, every trace of the corruption of the Outside gone for good, only then did the power of Harmony subside. The White Fire cooled in Twilight’s eyes and she slowly floated down and rested on the earth. Her friends surrounded her instantly, hugging her and talking very fast through tears. A white blur collided with the group and ripped Twilight out of their arms, clobbering her and tumbling in a ball of hooves and horns and wings. They came to rest several yards away, Princess Celestia held her precious student in an unyielding embrace. If what lit the sun in the sky was the purest, most furious love, and you could fall into it without being destroyed, you would feel what Twilight felt at that moment. “My faithful student,” Celestia whispered, “I thought I had lost you.” Twilight’s friends joined them. So did Princess Luna. There was more hugging and more tears and demanding of promises that she would never leave them again. “You know what this calls for?” said Pinkie Pie. They all did. * * * In the shadow lands, Death stood over her scrying pool, watching the joyful ponies. Her expression was unfathomable. Once more their world was beyond her power. “A world where nopony dies…” she whispered. She had seen people and places that had hidden themselves from her before, but nowhere like Equestria. The light at the heart of all things. She wondered how long that light could shine. She was not one to use the word ‘forever’ lightly. But she wondered… Her blind brother approached. “It seems…” he started to say something, but couldn’t seem to bring himself to. Death smiled. “Your Book was wrong,” she said. “Not wrong,” he said. “Changed.” “Changed?” Death raised an eyebrow. “How is that even possible?” Destiny’s horn glowed and he magicked the Book open before her. “I do not understand,” he confessed. Death looked at the pages. The words that told the story of the universe, the unchanging destiny of all things, had been written over. “Is this…crayon?” Death tried to rub the new writing with a hoof, but it didn’t come off. It was as eternal and unchanging as the words of Destiny himself. “Everypony lived happily ever after,” the words said. They were scrawled in a suspicious color. Pink. * * * “It feels strange,” said Twilight. She was walking with Princess Celestia in the gardens of Canterlot. Everypony that saw them there greeted Twilight with every bit as much awe and respect as they did the princess herself. Twilight still hadn’t gotten used to that. She had been a hero of Equestria before, and people had not treated her so differently. Maybe that was because she had always seemed like the same old Twilight, even after she made friends. This time, she had been changed. There was the obvious physical difference. Her mane and her tail had remained crystal white. But there was something else, something far deeper. It was in the way she moved, the way she talked, the way she looked at you. To have touched the Power at the heart of magic, to have felt a boundless love course through her entire being, to have wielded all the power of Harmony in its brightness had left Twilight transformed. Princess Celestia was the only one who had an inkling of what it had been like. “Are you happy, my faithful student?” “Oh yes. Happier than I’ve ever been. I just…it’s strange to not be…you know.” “To not be connected to the Elements of Harmony. Yes. I do know.” “The others are still the Guardians of their Elements.” “And how are they doing now?” “Great! No, they are…really great. I mean, Rarity and Applejack are spending a lot of time with their sisters. Rainbow Dash is trying to teach little Scootaloo to fly. Fluttershy has a…well, I don’t know if I can call him a very special somepony. She tells me they almost held hooves yesterday. And Pinkie is…well, she’s Pinkie. She’s taking the whole Surprise thing really well, I think. I wonder what her secret is.” “And what do they think about you not being a Guardian of Harmony anymore?” Twilight smiled. “They’ve let me know it doesn’t change anything. Every time I see them somepony seems to feel the need to tell me something to that effect. It’s kind of sweet and annoying at the same time.” Twilight had known as soon as the power of Harmony had left her that it would never return again. Like the princesses, she was no longer connected to the Elements. Her friends still were. After discussing it with the Princess, Twilight felt she knew what had happened. The power of Harmony cannot be wielded against itself. When Celestia banished Nightmare Moon a thousand years ago, both princesses had been cut off from the Elements. The same happened to Twilight when she had used the Power to name the shadow. Harmony. If she had not been born in that moment, if the Dark One had merely been destroyed, Twilight would probably have remained the Guardian of Magic. But Harmony the pony, being a creature of the Outside even now that she loved, had been cast out by the light. The power of friendship was used against a friend, just as it was between the princesses long ago. And so Twilight had lost her connection to the Elements. It was okay. She was happier the way it had turned out. She felt the same pride in her Harmony as a mother feels for her foal, or perhaps an elder sister for a younger. A part of her wished she could look beyond the stars, see the Outside, watch her creation find her place in the universe. “Did you see her?” asked Twilight. Celestia knew who Twilight was talking about. “I did. Just for a moment, before she…left. She looked a lot like you.” “Do you think she’ll be all right? The Outside…it’s a pretty dark place.” Celestia smiled. “Yes it is. But our world will continue to give it light, thanks to you. All the things you do, the adventures you will have, the friends you make, every one gives a little more light to the worlds beyond. And some of that light will find its way to your Harmony, I’m sure.” “Then I’ll live as brightly as I can.” “Oh, Twilight…I don’t think it would be possible for you to do anything else.” * * * Trixie the unicorn sat in her trailer and thought about the object on her nightstand. She knew what it was, of course. She had gotten a front-row seat to its power. The little tiara was grey now, but whenever she touched it… She stretched out a hoof toward it. The purple jewel started to brighten. Trixie pulled her hoof back quickly, as if she’d been burned. What did it mean? Trixie knew who to ask about it. As soon as Twilight Sparkle returned to Ponyville, Trixie would tell her everything. And Twilight would say…well, Trixie had no idea what she would say. Oh, it would be something brilliant and wise and good, and probably would have a lot to do with the magic of friendship… Trixie blushed, even though she was alone. Friendship. Twilight did seem to know a lot about that particular kind of magic. More than Trixie. But maybe Trixie could learn. * * * The Doctor had somehow managed to remain in Equestria even after the power of Harmony had swept away all traces of the Outside. He didn’t tell his companion how he managed that particular trick, but then, he hadn’t told her how he got there through the Star Seal in the first place. He pushed the door of the TARDIS open with a hoof and cast a glance backward. “Come along, Princess,” he said happily. The grey alicorn took one last look at Ponyville. She saw the town through new eyes. Harmony had restored all of her magical powers, and her mind was whole once more. While she was crippled, she couldn’t help but wonder like a child at everything she saw. Now that she was healed, she was happy to discover that the wonder had not left. Ponyville was every bit as special as she had known it to be these past years. It was home. “We’ll be back by tomorrow, right?” she asked. “Of course! Really, what could go wrong?” She rolled her eyes. “Nothing, I’m sure.” “Trust me, Ditz…er…sorry, Princess Astra.” The princess shook her head as she stepped on board the TARDIS. “Actually, why don’t you keep calling me Ditzy. I’ve grown quite fond of it.” * * * At the edge of the world, a lonely pegasus stood on the Outside looking in on Equestria. She was watching Pinkie Pie make cupcakes with the Cutie Mark Crusaders and their sisters. They were laughing and getting messy and having fun… Surprise couldn’t bear it. When Harmony was restored, she had awoken on this side of the Star Seal. She didn’t know whether to be happy that she still existed at all, or heartbroken that she was cut off from her sister and friends forever. She decided on heartbroken. A grey unicorn came near her. She looked like Twilight Sparkle, except for the color. “Surprise?” she asked. “You know me?” The pony blushed. “Yeah. We’re…kind of sisters in a way.” “Oh.” “What are you doing here all by yourself?” Surprise gestured toward the window she was looking in. It was one of the places where Equestria’s light shone through to the Outside. But nothing from their side could pass through to Equestria’s. Surprise couldn’t even talk to Pinkie Pie. “They look happy,” said the grey pony. She was smiling fondly as she looked at the ponies through the window. “Yeah.” Surprise felt her voice crack. She couldn’t say any more. The grey pony turned from the window and looked around. The landscape was strange. Carpeted hills rolled beneath a starry sky. There was a wood of twisted trees ahead. It looked a little chaotic, like something Discord would come up with, but not as shifting and unstable. “What is this place?” she asked. “I do not know,” said Surprise. “It’s an In Between place,” said Pinkie Pie. “In between what?” said the grey pony. Surprise froze. Slowly she turned around. There stood Pinkie, beaming at her. “P-Pinkie?!” “Hi, Surprise! Hello, Harmony. What are you two doing here? I mean, there’s a whole universe out there, just waiting for us. Let’s go exploring!” “Sounds good to me,” said Harmony. Surprise’s eyes blurred with tears. She couldn’t believe it. She looked in the window. Pinkie was still there, pulling a tray of Crusader-baked cinder out of an oven. And yet, somehow, Pinkie was also standing right in front of her, hooves firmly on the Outside. “I don’t understand…” Surprise said, voice choked with emotion. “How can you be here too?” Pinkie grabbed Surprise with one arm and Harmony with the other, pulling them into a tight hug and facing the universe head-on. Surprise felt the warmth of her touch, and all her doubt melted away. Pinkie nuzzled her sisters and whispered, “…I’m kind of everywhere.” The End