Starlight Glimmer wasn't okay. But she would be.
Right?
She gulped hard at her reflection -- it felt like swallowing dry glass -- and stared at her violently shivering body. Spike had helped, he had, and she wasn't as scared anymore... but Spike could only help her so much. She had that thought a few minutes ago, had tried to dismiss it, but now she knew that it had to be the truth. Spike couldn't get her through this with friendship alone, unfortunately, no matter how magical Princess Twilight tried to tell her it was. Or maybe that was just a lie, a test, some convoluted punishment for what she had almost done to Equestria.
Anyway, it didn't matter. She would just have to fix this herself.
She lit her horn-- but then she stopped with a strangled gasp. Oh, Celestia, could she? Should she? She didn't want to make this decision-- Twilight, all of her friends, they had told her why what she had done was wrong. She knew herself that what she had done to the ponies in Our Town was so awful, that blaming magic and Cutie Marks just wasn't the way. Cutie Marks didn't cause inequality, didn't cause pain.
But-- but maybe they were wrong! Maybe they were all wrong! Twilight was wrong about her, after all! She couldn't... handle leading, couldn't handle being an alicorn. It wasn't right for her to be above anypony else, and she knew that, but...
...maybe that just meant nopony else had that right either...
No! No, Celestia wasn't like her. She didn't... didn't impose her rule over ponies, didn't force them into some fate or destiny because that's what she thought was right, not like Starlight had before--
-- Not like Twilight had.
Starlight felt something dark curl in her stomach, saw herself glare, clench her jaw in a brutal smile, light her horn with practiced ease...
Her stomach churned, she gagged, and then she bit a sob into her chest. No! She couldn't... couldn't do that to Twilight, this wasn't her fault, it was-- it was Starlight's! It was her own fault! It always had been! So...
She gasped in a shaky breath. She could feel vomit bubbling in her throat. Tears dried around her eyes.
She wasn't okay, but she would be. And it would be fine. It would be fine, right? If she was just... doing it to herself?
Starlight didn't think about it anymore. She just gathered the magic -- so familiar, so hot, so sickening but just so tantalizing -- and then folded it in. Onto her Cutie Mark, and onto the new wings sprouted on her back.
As the cold gray magic washed over her, leaving her heavy as stone, she thought that this was how it was meant to be. She didn't deserve to be above anypony, as royalty or as a powerful alicorn, or anything else. Maybe it was wrong of her to even be a magically gifted unicorn, to place herself on a pedestal like that. Whatever Twilight Sparkle told her, she knew this was right.
The stars on her hide were stripped from her skin in a savage rip. Two strict black bars took their place, imposing and cold and final. With a twitch she flung those stars away, and they were gone. She didn't know where she sent them to. She didn't care.
No matter what she looked like, or what magic she had in her body, it wouldn't matter. Not anymore. Now she would be everypony's equal, like she always should have been.
Her coat turned a muted gray. Her wings fell heavy and limp. Her horn was drained in a second.
Starlight Glimmer smiled brokenly at her reflection.