Shinespark slowly felt herself come to... or, at least, her mind came to. Her body seemed to still be sleeping, regulating its own breathing and heartbeat but otherwise sitting, inert. She couldn't stretch her legs, she couldn't adjust the patch of fur she had slept on the wrong way, couldn't brush her bangs out of her eyes or scratch behind a folded ear... Every time she tried to move, there was no reaction. She was a puppet with her strings cut.
Even trying to ask for help or tell someone her back hurt produced no words, her mouth not acknowledging that it was being commanded to move. She could move her eyes, feel another body pressed against her, was aware of a horrible, lingering sensation that she had been broken in a way that didn't cause physical pain yet was clearly worse than any normal injury... and that was it. That was everything.
"Nngh... Buh?" The body beside her snuffled, Valey's voice reaching her ears. "Breathing's changing... Yo, Sparky, you awake? Sparky?"
Her bed shifted as Valey moved, the room around her recognizable as her own on the ship. Then Valey was blocking her vision, looking like she had been hit by a wagon and couldn't care less. "Yo, eyes? Tracking?" She waved a hoof, and Shinespark followed it. Valey sighed in relief. "Bananas, you're okay..."
Shinespark really wasn't okay, but she didn't have any way to tell Valey that. She couldn't even remember how she had escaped the arena, only passing out as Grandpapa used her sword to stab her and break Nyala over and over, long after she had lost the ability to surrender. She was as good as comatose, Valey's sister was probably worse, she had gotten herself tied up with Gyre for a chance she never did anything with, and now she couldn't even-
"Snap out of it!" Valey gently poked her, frowning. "I know that look. Real quick, you know the drill? Look right for yes, left for no, down for I don't know. Your directions, not mine. First things first: you're obviously not alright, but is there anything wrong with you that'll get worse if we just leave you to rest? Something that needs professional attention?"
Shinespark frankly had no idea, but assumed all of her maladies were magical or Mistvale-based in nature. That probably did need professional attention, but also wouldn't get worse if left. She hoped.
"Right. Cool." Valey let out a huge sigh. "Look, I... feel as bad as I look right now, and kinda need to lie down instead of standing around where you can see me. Got some stuff to tell you, but is there anything else you need me to ask you before I stop with the eye contact? Like, got anything pressing you need me to guess at until I figure out?"
Shinespark looked down, a whole mess of emotions concocting themselves in her chest. The longer she gave herself to think, the more they would grow, and she wasn't capable of expressing them in any way save for a wetness in her eyes that could soon turn into tears.
"Gonna take that as good enough." Valey flopped hard back into the bed, landing against her. "Ow. We pretty much both had to be dragged back here after that. Got them to put us up together so you'd have company when you woke. Nyaah... Next battle isn't until tomorrow, so at least I've got a little time to sleep this off. Who would have thought crashing into a giant invisible force barrier you didn't know the arena had was painful?"
At the mention of Valey's next battle, Shinespark froze... except her limp body didn't even feel like going stiller. The question burned on her tongue, and she had no tongue to voice it: Valey was having a next battle?
"Heh... not sure how I'm gonna one-up you, though." Valey's voice grew wistful. "I mean, I beat people up. It's kind of my job. Totally what I'm good at. And just because I was off catching Starlight after some big bad bagged her, you jumped in and found some way to take my place in this big macho fighting tournament I only entered to prove a point to you a while back. Bananas, if I lose, I lose. I got what I wanted already. And you ran in to keep me in at the risk of completely getting yourself blown up, and boom. You got completely blown up."
Shinespark felt a lot more than blown up, but Valey was no longer looking, so she couldn't even agree.
"Seriously. That was dumb," Valey chided. "Exactly the kind of thing I'd probably do. You do remember why I'm fighting there in the first place, right? Because I can? Figured you could, like... use a good example of how to live your life the way you want to, even if your past is something you just have to leave behind. Like how you were struggling with all your old responsibilities, and... bananas, I don't remember. Who even cares? I was just fighting in it because I could."
She paused, then chuckled. "Heh... I guess you cared. Maybe I was a better role model than I thought. Seriously, though. If you're willing to stand up to that for my chance, here? I don't even know what I want out of it, but there's no way I'm letting that down. You were cool, Sparky. Like, really cool. Even if there wasn't the whole 'Gerardo's sword kills batponies' thing, getting hit by that once was enough for Maple and Amber. I don't even wanna know what three or five or so times does to you."
Shinespark tried to fold her ears, again to no avail. Valey was still in the contest? She had lost! She was completely outmatched, Grandpapa's plaything from the moment she took her first step forward...
"Bananas, we need to get rid of that sword," Valey sighed. "What have we done with it so far? Tried to use it against Herman, and Maple got stabbed. Amber impaled herself because she was curious. Then it killed a whole lot of batponies, and when you tried to use it for another duel it turned right around and stabbed you. It's just not worth our enemies using it on us. Imagine if that jerkface had tried to stab Starlight instead of running off. I don't even wanna know what that would do... Point is, we should bury it, seal it, throw it in the ocean and be done with it, because unless there's some trick to it that completely changed everything, that sword just hurts us. All the time."
Shinespark burned with curiosity, and somehow, Valey picked up on it and answered. "Oh yeah, you wouldn't know about Starlight. When I found her? She had already escaped. Go figure. Used moon glass to do it, of all the possible things. Completely beats me how it works, but that time she touched the Nightmare Module back when we were doing the pirate stuff? She still had it. Just pulled it out and started using it, or something. I kind of got steamrolled a bit by some weird mind magic down in some tunnels and was a little too busy getting my own act back together to get the details on how it works, but honestly? She seems almost... like it's not completely terrible for her to be using them. No evil incarnations or getting ripped apart by shadowy magic or any of that stuff. Don't ask how or why. She's with Maple right now; for all I know they're finding a way to set her back to normal and gonna have that done before we even get up again."
Valey interrupted herself with a yawn, nyup-nyupping and continuing with her ramble. "Bananas, though, I still can't get that out of my mind, and I was borderline passed out from the collision when it happened. You were getting murdered up there by Gerardo's sword after I spent the whole fight listening to Amber's commentary, and it really sounded like you survived as best as you could, and then... right before the referee could whack him for attacking an opponent while they were down, I bet, there was Starlight. Just gave him one look and sent him running for the hills. Match was a draw. I guess maybe he knows what Nightmare Modules look like?"
Shinespark felt her eyes widen even in their cut-stringed state. Starlight had intervened? They had been that close to home while she was fighting? It had just been a battle of holding out long enough, then, and she had done it...?
It was fortunate she couldn't speak, because if she could, she wouldn't have stopped. She had actually done it. Even if it was hardly on her own, even if there was a terrible physical price and eventually a political one, too, she had made the difference. If she hadn't stepped in and given everything she had to the fight, spared no effort to go as long and hard as she could, the ending might have been different. But she had given her friend a chance?
Valey mumbled a little more about Nightmare Modules into her shoulder, sounding like she was starting to grow sleepy... until the door gently opened, Maple stepping into the room. "Are either of you awake?" she whispered.
"Huh? Oh yeah, both. Hi, Ironflanks." Valey didn't even look up in recognition.
Shinespark tried to move her eyes, but didn't have a direction for hello.
"Good to know you're alive," Maple hummed, just sharp enough that it sounded like she had seriously entertained the possibility. "Anyway, I don't know if you'd like to stay here or come out to the library or dining hall, but there are several people here who would like to meet you. I think you might want to hear from them..."