Bon Bon opened her eyes. A pale white ceiling greeted her. It was the ceiling she woke up to nearly every morning.
She pulled herself up. Her sheets lay tangled and knotted at the foot of the bed; she must have kicked them off in her sleep. Light trickled into the room around the curtains of the window on the east wall, bathing the room in the warm light of the rising sun.
She looked around. She was alone.
Bon Bon slipped off of the bed. Her hooves made small thuds as they hit the wooden floor. She’d always meant to put a carpet down, here, but she’d always been so busy, between running the candy shop and looking after Lyra—
Lyra.
“Lyra!” Bon Bon shouted, overcome by a sudden panic, it was wrong, something was wrong, Lyra was—
The door to the bedroom swung open. Bon Bon turned to look.
There was Lyra, standing in the doorway, a look of blatant concern on her face. She was wearing an apron, a blue one—one of hers, Bon Bon noted, her mind taking in the smallest of details even as she focused on the biggest of them.
“Bon Bon?” Lyra said. “Is everything—”
Her question was interrupted by Bon Bon’s hug. Bon Bon herself was crying. She couldn’t quite tell why.
“Uh… Bon Bon? You okay?”
“I’m just…” Bon Bon said, stuttering. “I’m just so glad you’re—”
A tingle shot down her spine. Something painful, uneasy.
It’s not real.
Bon Bon drew back. Something was wrong.
“You’re… you’re up early,” she said, still trying to pinpoint what exactly it was.
“Well, you know me,” Lyra said. “’Early to bed, early to rise’ and all that. Hey, I made pancakes! Want some?”
“Um… sure,” Bon Bon said. Early to bed, early to rise? If there was ever a pony to despise such a saying, Bon Bon knew, it would have been Lyra.
Or would it? She became aware of a second set of memories, ones where Lyra had embodied waking up at the crack of dawn. “I like to listen to the morning birds chirping,” she’d say. Really, Bon Bon suspected, it was just because she wanted to be the first one to get to the pantry, but—
No. That was wrong. Those memories were fuzzy, now, more distant than the others.
And something else was growing more distinct.
She shivered again.
It’s not real.
Bon Bon followed Lyra downstairs. She could smell the pancakes from halfway down the stairs. They would be blueberry, Bon Bon knew. Lyra always made blueberry pancakes. They were her favourite.
The pancakes were plain. Bon Bon looked down at them, puzzled.
“Bon Bon?” Lyra said. “Are you alright? You’re acting kinda funny today.”
Bon Bon. Not Bonnie. Bon Bon.
This wasn’t right.
None of this was right.
It’s not real.
And just like that, it came back to her.
The train. The Owls. Hollyleaf. The cave. Lyra.
Bon Bon jerked back, stepped way from Lyra—no, it couldn’t be Lyra.
“Bon Bon?”
“You’re not her,” Bon Bon said.
Lyra took a step towards her. The worry in her face was real, genuine, but it wasn’t hers. “What are you talking about?”
It’s not real.
“You’re not Lyra,” Bon Bon said. Her eyes were bulging. Her head pounded. “This isn’t… none of this makes any sense! Hollyleaf must have—”
Not Hollyleaf. Clover.
“Where’s Clover?” Bon Bon said. “Where is Clover the Clever?”
Lyra blinked. “Um… in Canterlot? Her palace? What’s gotten into you, Bon Bon?”
Bon Bon didn’t answer. She spun around and walked out of the kitchen instead.
─────
Bon Bon walked briskly through the streets of Ponyville. She kept her gaze forwards, attempting to ignore all else… and failing.
It was little things. Small changes. A street that had been named differently. A shop that had had a different sign. The removable wall panel that she kept her equipment hidden behind hadn’t been removable. A door that had used to squeak now had well-oiled hinges.
And the crystal castle that had sat on Ponyville’s horizon for the last two years was missing.
“Bon Bon! Wait up!”
It was the not-Lyra. Bon Bon could hear her running up behind her. Beside her.
“Would you just tell me what’s going on?”
Bon Bon made no reply.
Ditzy Doo flew past, in her mailmare’s uniform. She cast a glance in their direction and smiled. Her eyes focused in the same direction.
A pronking pink party pony passed by ahead of them. A little blue filly trotted along after her.
“C’mon, Bloo! We’re going to miss all the fun!”
“I’m going as fast as I can!”
Both looked perfectly normal. Bon Bon wasn't sure why that unsettled her, but it did.
Octavia and Vinyl Scratch walked past them, going in the opposite direction.
“So I say to her, ‘look, just because I’m a unicorn doesn’t mean I’m some kind of snob. And, hey, I didn’t want to this gig, anyway, so it’s a win-win!’”
It was Vinyl speaking. Octavia laughed.
Bon Bon shivered.
It’s all wrong.
─────
The line at the ticket booth was short today.
“Bon Bon, you need to tell me what’s going on, right now,” the imposter said. “What’s going on? Where are you going? What is all of this?”
Bon Bon grimaced. She didn’t want to speak to her. Not to this mockery of the pony she held dearest. So, she kept her eyes focused on the ticket booth, as if she were speaking to it and not the pony at her side.
“I’m fixing this,” she said. “All of this. It’s wrong.”
“That doesn’t… what? What are you talking about?”
“This. It isn’t real.”
“…This train station isn’t real? It looks pretty real to me!”
Bon Bon said nothing. Every word spoken by the imposter sent a chill through her… but also warmth. She knew it wasn’t Lyra, not really, but…
She shook her head. No. It wasn’t Lyra. No matter what she sounded like.
The line moved up one. Bon Bon made to step forwards, but the imposter stepped in her way. Her golden eyes looked straight into Bon Bon’s own.
“Bon Bon. Please,” she said. “Tell me what’s happening. You’re scaring me.”
She wasn’t Lyra.
She wasn’t.
But she might be close enough.
“Just trust me,” Bon Bon said. “Please. Something is very, very wrong, and I need to go to Canterlot to fix it.”
The imposter looked into her eyes. Bon Bon looked into hers. She stood firm.
“…Okay,” the imposter said, after a few moments. “I trust you. But I’m coming too.”
Bon Bon let out a breath.
“Suit yourself.”
─────
The train rumbled down the tracks, leaving Ponyville station behind.
It was funny, Bon Bon thought. by her memory, she’d just been on this train a few hours ago, except this time she'd actually bought a ticket.
The imposter sat beside her, by the window. Bon Bon would catch her sneaking worried glances at her every now and then. It was uncanny, the resemblance. Too perfect.
Bon Bon shivered once more, an electric tingle running down her spine. Was this what it had always been like for Lyra? It certainly matched her descriptions.
Bon Bon glanced past the imposter, out the window. She could see Canterlot, off in the distance. From so far away, it looked identical to the Canterlot she knew.
There lay Hollyleaf.
There lay Clover.
There lay the key to fixing all of this… or so she hoped.
A pit formed in her gut. She’d fought monsters. She’d faced threats, great and indescribable. But this? Something that could do… could do this? What chance did they have?
Nothing to do but try, she thought.
The train rumbled down the tracks.