The Broken Bond

by TheApexSovereign

IV.XIII - Gored at the Gourd (2 of 3)

Twilight’s sure been slipping. Not just as a princess, but a friend, too.

This wasn’t the time for self-pity. “I’m sorry! I’m sorry, sorry. I shouldn’t have snuck up on you like that.” She wished her legs could bend impossibly, or curve her magic so improbably so as to zap her in her ignorant face. What kind of friend triggered the most traumatic experience of both their lives? “Starlight, is something wrong?”

Starlight breathed like she was suffocating, eyes twitching this way and that, taking it all in. That was what was wrong: the rather monstrous sight of hundreds waving their forelegs, familiar faces cheering, eager for her attention, and the advancing few wanting to thank her personally—Ponyville ponies in the likes of its most well-known residents. Cheers, shrieks, cries and comments engulfed them, ringing their ears. It really was too much, especially for one having not expected it, who’d probably despaired and felt so alone these past several days.

Twilight anticipated speechlessness, but not something akin to fear.

“D-do you like it?” Twilight asked, stupidly. She had to know, she wished to gauge with Starlight, but it was stupid to ask that. Just what she needs, more stress devoted to formulating an opinion over something she still hasn’t fully processed.

“Nevermind.” Twilight shook her head. “Don’t answer that now. Not if you don’t want to. I’m just… you know!”

“Overwhelmed,” Starlight said at last, “if I were to hazard a guess?” She turned to Twilight was eyes mirroring her own emotions:

Scared. Tired. Sad… Really sad. And probably trying to be none of these things, harder than anypony expects of me, but I have to try and live up to society’s expectations.

Twilight would dismiss herself as princess if she burdened Starlight with any of that right now. Once upon a time they would talk in private, nursing tea or cocoa between them, but nowadays…

She nodded in agreement. “Overwhelmed, yeah. That sounds about right.” She chuckled lightly, only for Starlight’s eyes to widen, well, and finally clench shut. As if her first guess was the last she wished to be true. “Starlight? Starlight, what’s wrong?”

“It’s nothing,” she choked. Starlight dashed a hoof across her eyes, sniffling. Smiling. “I’m just, I’ve been just… stupid. Really, really stupid. And selfish! And… and I should stop talking now.”

“You are not ‘stupid,’” Twilight told her firmly. “You are Starlight Glimmer. You’re the friend who would risk her life for another no matter the cost.” Beneath the roar of friends, Starlight shuddered, wracked with muted sobs. She shook her head slowly, though Twilight didn’t understand for what. “I am so sorry I haven’t been the friend you deserve, nor needed these last few days. If it makes you feel any better, it was all for you.”

Over AJ’s hollering, demanding order, Starlight let out a hollow chuckle. “That doesn’t make me feel particularly great, Twilight. Believe me, though, I’d understand if you actually had some important duties to catch up on.”

Twilight did, in fact, but that was not the point. Her most important duty was that of friendship.

And Starlight was surprisingly… okay, for lack of a more fitting term, with the fact that Twilight had seemingly abandoned her for no good reason. “Come on, you gotta feel something right now.” Angry, or happy. Something instead of more of the same.

Starlight’s face fell. “What do you mean?”

A distant thundering boomed across the quieted crowd beside them—Twilight’s heartbeat.

Straightforward. Honest. “You must have felt alone these past couple days. Like nopony was recognizing your accomplishments, and that you were all alone in dealing with this—”

“Neither were things I really minded, though,” Starlight muttered. She lowered her head, meeting Twilight’s eyes with something of a glare. “Just saying.”

Twilight blushed. “Right, of course not.” Starlight had always been independent. It’s why she wrongly asserted she was fine having lost her magic, and did so now. “But you have to admit,” she continued with forced pep, “this is a nice surprise, isn’t it?”

“Oh, yeah! Sure is!” Starlight smiled in a way that didn’t reach her eyes—Twilight knew, for she’d seen her friend smile so many times the last three years.

“Doesn’t this make you feel good?” Twilight gestured to their surroundings. “Knowing everypony out here loves you and loves what you did for me?”

Starlight sweat, biting her lip. “Uh…”

“We love you Starlight!” cried Sweetie Belle from someplace, only to get shushed sharply by her sister.

“That was a rhetorical question,” said Twilight. “But even then, it saddens me I have to ask this at all.” Starlight flinched—stabbing Twilight’s heart—-as she touched her cheek. “You’ve changed so much, my student—”

“I’m not your student,” Starlight croaked, stiff in her upper lip.

“In my heart, you’ll always be my student.” Twilight felt moved herself as Starlight blinked tears out of her eyes.

“I’m sorry,” she said, and then, blubbering, “I’m so sorry, Twilight! I’ve been messing up so much! Our fight—”

“Doesn’t matter,” Twilight asserted. She steeled herself against the fact that Starlight just apologized for this. “Starlight, for all your mistakes do not forget: you’re the pony who’s willing to risk everything, give up anything, for the sake of a friend. Nopony can be expected to just bounce back after what’d happened.” She looked away, eyes shut tight, hair falling over her poor horn. “I know this transition isn’t easy, that you’d rather avoid any special treatments—”

“Then why this, huh?! What’s all of this?” Starlight cried. Not snapped. There was no anger in her face, her posture. Only disbelief, laced with guilt. “You know I hate pomp and circumstance, Twilight, so why’d you think I’d like any of this?” She recoiled, as though having just talked back to her teacher. “I-I mean, ah! I love it!” she cheered halfheartedly.

Nopony took up her cry. The longer it went unanswered, the redder Starlight became. In a second, she was aglow like her namesake.

“Starlight.” Twilight would take her by the hoof, if not her eyes, and did so. “This party is for you because we wanted it to be for you. We only want to celebrate the wonderful friend you are!” Twilight blinked back tears, sniffling, smiling. “Past what you perceive as mistakes, past what’s worthy of praise in your eyes… We love you, Starlight. Won’t you let us show you that, and share in it?”

Several dozen murmurs rose up. Twilight showed them her gratitude, then to Starlight, her adoration—for a friend who deserved it all and much, much more, Twilight grinned and kissed her on the cheek. A quick peck, affectionate; something neither had ever done to one another before.

Her friend was stunned, her eyes dribbling. “I can’t necessarily disagree with any of that, but…” Her voice caught.

“But nothing,” Twilight said gently. She moved closer, holding Starlight’s hoof closer to her breast. “You’re in a lot of ponies’ debt for having saved my life. Like it or not, they love you, Starlight. They want to see you smile again, and so do I.”

And avenge you from those monsters. Twilight’s stomach tightened in knots. Those ugly, horrible monsters… Please, Celestia. Luna. Discord, too. Don’t let her down.

Twilight exhaled out her nose, expelling her righteous fury. Tonight was not the night for misguided heroism—an aspect of Starlight they both needed to address when all was back to a sense of normalcy.

“Do you understand, Starlight? Why we’re doing this?”

“Well, I’ll have you know I really do love it. Don’t go thinking I don’t!” Starlight’s eyes were ruddy, but bright and heartwarming as the smile on her face. “But I...  I’ve just made so many mistakes, Twilight, that I dunno if… I, I just dunno—”

“And so have I,” said Twilight. “I’ve made mistakes, Starlight! You think I’ve handled this wisely? Me?”

“Better than I have, I’m sure.”

Twilight shook her head, daring not speak it aloud within public eye. Starlight understood, though. For sure. “The point being that we’ve both struggled reacting to this in a healthy way. But that’ll be the end of such talk from now on.”

Starlight looked miserably to the ground. “You’re right, I know. I’ve been such a downer lately.”

“Oh, Starlight, I meant the both of us.” Twilight drew her face in for her. She still avoided her gaze. “Starlight, please look at me.” She did after several attempts, unwitting to Twilight’s fierce need to hug her and be hugged by her. “I know parties aren’t really your cup of tea. And I know that you would’ve rather spent this evening with… some friends you know well.” Twilight banished any selfish notion that this didn’t include her before coming here. “But I’ve been worried sick about you ever since you lost your horn. All of us have. Call me suffocating if you want, I know I am, but I can’t help the way I feel because… Because, Starlight, as strong as you are, I can’t stand the thought of you isolating yourself for the sole purpose of suffering alone!” She waited for… something. It was stupid of her: Starlight, wide-eyed, awaited a point to all that. “S-so we got together, as a town, to show we want to be a part of your struggle. It’s a little strange, saying it aloud, but it’s true! We’re your friends, and we’re always gonna be there for you.”

“Th-thank you.” Starlight swallowed, her breathing frantic. “Twilight. For reminding me of your first lesson.”

‘Because friends will always be there for you… There’s nothing that a friend won’t do.’ And Twilight couldn’t help but grin. “I’ve often had to learn my lesson more than once. And if you fear failing again, well, ideally, you’ll never forget this night, huh?”

“No.” Starlight sniffled, shaking her head. “Nah, I don’t think I will.”

Twilight laughed in joy, and Starlight shyly chimed in. They hugged at once, as if having the same urge and acting on it at once. Starlight embraced her wholly as Twilight’s ears rang with the anxiety-inducing reminder of their rapt audience. They were cheering for this, cheering for Starlight to have happily accepted their gesture. And Twilight poured herself, her slamming heart, racing mind and all, into this fact, into the warmth wrapped around her.

They were hugging for the first time since Starlight’s life truly changed forever. Twilight didn’t realize how much she’d missed this, this closeness and warmth with one of her best friends. She missed it so badly she wept into Starlight’s mane, who didn’t say a word.

She didn’t need to. She tightened her hold as if to say she was sorry for the fight, and that this ugliness was behind them starting tonight.

Before long and deeper conversation could take place, a small army of hoofbeats, following Applejack and Pinkie Pie’s announcements, broke into several clusters which filtered through the Hive’s many tunnels, refurbished for the Gourd Fest. Several familiar, excited voices floated overhead, a testament to Ponyville’s enthusiasm to try a changeling-styled holiday.

It was always one of the more open-minded, open-hearted towns of Equestria. A sentiment Starlight shared into her shoulder: “I’m happy everypony seems excited, as opposed to feeling nervous. Being in the presence of their former enemies.”

Twilight huffed, smiling, batting the dampness from her eyes. “Their misunderstood enemies, mind you. You’re a great judge of character, Starlight. They trust in that enough to feel completely safe here.”

“Only because of you being here. You’d befriended His Royal Highness the same time as me, remember?”

She never, ever forgot that day, the lesson Spike had taught them both. “True. But whenever Trixie comes to town, you can bet the two of you will be visiting the Hive.”

“Right,” Starlight chortled. “And if the Great and Powerful Trixie can party with changelings, anypony can. Speaking of which…” She peeled herself away, leaving Twilight feeling vulnerable.

She had to tell herself there would be more to come as Starlight gestured right, mane swinging over her stump, falling on her right eye. “I’m gonna go find Trixie, and proceed to get emotionally bombarded and physically transgressed. Some of those by the hooves of changelings. I heard some of ‘em saying they wanted a hug.”

Twilight laughed to hide her disappointment. Of… course. Of course! Did I really think were we just going to talk all night? “I won’t keep you, then!” she said. “Have fun. I’ll be around if you need me.”

“I won’t forget. I promise!”

“Promise?” Twilight didn’t want to hope, but if Starlight truly, genuinely understood she was here to talk if need be…

Starlight nodded. “I promise… w-we’ll talk. Promise.” And with a nod, she dashed off into a throng of schoolkids, greeting them as she squeezed by, before vanishing into one of the five passages circulating the Hive from the Central Headroom. Thorax’s throne sat above it all, bare save for a lush backdrop of greenery and flowers.

Did he ever feel like he was screwing up in every way imaginable? Not a hypothesis Twilight wished to spoil his night nor her current glee with. She could go full-scientist on the kindly king of the changelings, grill him for a lesson in leadership. It’d been a while since she last reached “peak Egghead,” as Rainbow so lovingly called it. Thorax might not mind, either. Might accept it just as naturally and casually as he did this monumental request to accommodate Ponyville.

Twilight stopped in her tracks, wherever they were about to lead her. I still hadn’t thanked him for putting this together. The girls had worked themselves to the bone with Thorax, throwing this together at the last minute while Twilight “rested” (slept) her mistakes away. I need to find Thorax.

She wove between parting throngs of changelings and ponies—They look happy; oh, I hope Applejack didn’t promise every creature a moment with Starlight—splintering off into the various channels. Most, particularly the Ponyvillians, were eyeing the Hive and its residents with the wonder of a foal, many having yet to see a changeling until tonight. The last hour resembled the first hour of Canterlot High’s Fall Formal, but with changelings shying away from ponies as opposed to males and females. Similar social insecurities fueled both scenarios, namely that of uncharted territory.

Twilight sighed, smiling stupidly and not caring at all. Because Starlight, at last, knew she wasn’t alone. The core of her life, her relationships and her character, hadn’t lessened in the slightest because of this. Two aspects of her life that Twilight, if she were to guess, were the fears fueling her various actions and reactions toward her friends.

Those bonds which defined her were tighter than ever. That was something Hydia could never mutilate.

Starlight galloped.

Nowhere in particular or anything, like a normal pony, or towards something that would loosen this constricting of her lungs, like one with options.

She just galloped.

She galloped between pastel bodies furred and smooth, smiling at every pair of eyes pointed her way with a, “Hey there!” or a, “Thanks for coming!”

“Good to see you!”

Starlight galloped, their responses fading with the chatter-polluted air, the rush, until there existed only a heavy pounding, pounding in her ears.

“Hey, there! Thanks so much for coming!” To not raise any suspicion with prolonged talk, she added, “Gotta meet a friend!”

“Good to see ya!” She spoke, ran, recognized too much to acknowledge reality; that which existed solely within herself. Unknown to these ponies, who thought she was some selfless savior. “Sorry! Can’t talk! Gotta jet!” Who were presumed to have possessed malicious intent in crossing half the country tonight, by the only mare who would ever think such efforts were to feign pity.

That was painful to think about. They shouldn’t have bothered, she’d told herself as soon as Maud spoiled the surprise. If they didn’t care, they could have stayed in Ponyville.

Yeah, and risk social ‘suicide,’ as Pharynx would call it. That jerk. That stupid, correct jerk.

Starlight couldn’t decide which was worse: the fact that she was still questioning this, or that she might be right. Either way of thinking was “suicidal.” All of it was terrifying, and Starlight had no idea how to get out. She was drowning, buried under everything and everypony and their efforts and motivations likely or not.

It was too much to deal with.

And so Starlight galloped.

Or she did until rounding a bend, only to nearly collide with a pair of golden-halo eyes. “Oh, Starlight!” sung the melodious mare, rearing up so she’d collide into her soft, green coat, ensnaring Starlight in one monster hug.

She tensed up from ear to tail, and not because she was remembering the clammy vice grip of Hydia, far from it. “Please don’t touch me,” she enunciated. “I’m sorry, but—” I’m not much of a hugger.

“Whups!” Lyra released her, giggling. “Didn’t meanta invade your ‘bubble’ or whateves!” she said, recalling that oh-so-lovely scene Starlight made after first moving to Ponyville.

“I-It’s fine—”

“I never got to give Ms. Town Hero a traditional Heartstrings hug of gratitude, is all!” Lyra elbowed her.

“That’s all.” Like she’s obligated to say something to me. Heck, most of these ponies probably feel the same way. They hardly know me, let alone have spoken to me more than a few times.

Of course, she herself was to blame for that. Always choosing to spend time alone than with people, being antisocial. A weird loner.

“Ay!” Snap! Snap! Snap! Went the golden, stumpy claw that was so alike the witches’ that Starlight was still seeing them, slimy and mottled and warty and grimey long after Lyra’s illusion had dissipated. “Oh, crud, I broke ya.”

Her wife came up beside her, pulling Starlight out of the past. “Dear me, you actually did it,” Bon Bon remarked with a smirk. “I told you, she didn’t like being touched!”

“Yeah, but I like, wanted to show her how thankful I am! I mean it’s Twilight, Bon! She… she was my fillyhood friend back in Celestia’s School, and… and this mare right here… she...” Lyra’s voice broke, her brilliant, animated eyes glistening. She covered them with a foreleg before turning away. “Sorry. M’sorry, I’m not usually...”

Bon Bon stroked her beloved’s side in little circles. “There, there, Lyre-Love. She knows how much this meant to Equestria, it’s why she did it.”

Yep. And it was barely for the feelings of her friends but for the good of the country, thought Starlight. She was disgusting. A utilitarian approach, however valid, was not in line with Twilight’s teachings like she tricked herself into believing. I was probably acting in my own self-interests, too. Just like in Our Town, traveling to the past, my late friendship homework…

Bon Bon’s sad smile cut something deep within Starlight, or perhaps it was the loving, familiar way she maintained hoof-contact with the sniffling Lyra. “We’re both sorry, Starlight. And so incredibly grateful for your service to Equestria,” she said with a bow.

“Yep! And I’d do it again!” Starlight found herself saying. And walking. “I’d love to chew the fat, but somepony’s waiting for me.”

“Lucky them!” Lyra croaked, her voice melting into the continuous stream of ponies and changelings more preoccupied with each other than the pony who saved their beloved princess.

As it should be. It hurt to realize this, but her feelings didn’t matter. At least it’s proving more and more that my fears aren’t just mad conspiracies.  

There was an open path down the middle of the bug-lit corridor. Starlight galloped its lengths, sliding between familiar faces. There wasn’t a single one—pony or changeling—that she didn’t recognize. And every one of them had responsibilities greater than some party in the middle of nowhere; families which demanded their time and energy, or businesses that couldn’t possibly make ends meet comfortably within the out-of-the-way town of Ponyville—-the Apples, Cakes, even the Riches of all ponies stood as walking, talking, smiling reminders of that painful reality.

Smiling, save for Spoiled, who blatantly asked what in Equestria happened to Starlight’s horn, like she was some kind of freak. Filthy and Diamond scolded her, despite Starlight’s passing reassurances.

She was right, after all. Half these ponies didn’t even know Starlight. If one of the most plugged-in ponies didn’t know of her accomplishment, how many did before they were asked by Twilight and her friends?

But they “wanted to be here,” according to Twilight. “For her.”

You mean because of me. It’d look bad if they declined the idea, she thought once more, rounding a bend to where no ponies were ahead. Starlight understood. She felt okay knowing that. No one wanted to be the social outcast, after all. No one wanted to be the party pooper, nor the fragile little egg who needed to be treated with care.

And no one really wanted to be around somepony like that.

I ought to be grateful. A mental kick faltered Starlight, nearly making her freeze just to hold her face in disgust. She pressed on, mind and body. It’s because she cares, you reactionary fool. But she ought to know better! I mean, dragging it out in front of virtually everypony I know? Only a genuine fool would speak from the heart in her horseshoes.

A fool who’d call them sentimental idiots or opportunistic liars for coming here tonight. For wasting their time on a pony who didn’t deserve their admiration, their time, the breath needed to say, “We love you, Starlight Glimmer!”

Starlight staggered to a stop, bracing herself against a wall. Panting. Trying to calm her heart, mind, her wild emotions. I almost believed them when they said that, too. She still did—tears welled forth only to be blinked away, the emotion gone just as quickly.

“I hate this,” Starlight breathed. Her chest hurt. It hurt so much, it ached worse the more she thought about this, but she couldn’t just ignore it like she thought she could. It wasn’t so easy; she just thoughtlessly leaped into a half-baked plan like always. Always.

Always.

“I hate this so much.”

“St-Starlight?”

And Twilight… she’s afraid of losing me. The original me. And I’m—I’ve been—spitting in her face all this time. Oh, gosh, why am I like this? Why do I think she’s some kind of monster out to get me?! Twilight was a friend who lost sleep trying to put this together, praying it would make Starlight smile again.

And it was having the opposite effect. Starlight didn’t know how to change herself.

“Starlight, hey—”

A white-tipped hoof grabbed her by the shoulder, eerily resembling a grimy, foreleg-sized finger. “Go away—!” Starlight stopped herself just short of hitting a shrinking stallion in the face. His identity left her cold. Not him. No. Please. Anypony, literally anypony, but him!

She couldn’t bear for him to see her like this, even on a good day: hornless and stupid and irrational and—

“S-Starlight?” He cocked his head, auburn mane and goatee flouncing with cleanliness. “It’s me, Sunburst! Your friend... ” His smile was warm and it left her cold, only to be whisked away by dejection, and Starlight desperately wanted that tenderness to come back. “Oh, I knew it! You must think I’m some kind of—”

“S-Sunburst, oh gosh!” Starlight spoke as if she’d snapped out of a trance. “I—you startled me! I didn’t expect you there, I almost clobbered you. Ar-are you okay?”  

He fixed his spectacles, smile returned. “Oh, don’t worry about it. I-I’m the one who should be sorry, I shouldn’t have grabbed you! Considering—”

“Considering what?” Starlight wanted to hit herself. He’s just. Trying. To be a good friend. “I mean…!” She forced a cheeky exterior, easing Sunburst as she amended, “Kidding! Ah-heh, kidding…” Sunburst laughed like he wanted to be anywhere but here. “Um, thanks! For coming down. And for seeking me out like that.”

“It’s no problem. Sorry for scaring you.”

Starlight waved it off. “Oh, I’m just jumpy right now. I’m glad you’re considerate enough to apologize for it, unlike some of these ponies. I know they mean well, but, sheesh!”

Sunburst nodded, looking quite the composed wizard these days as he stroked his beard. “You’ve never been a fan of hugs.”

“You were always the exception.” Starlight felt dazed with stupidity all of a sudden. “N-not that I’m asking for anything right now! Not that I’d mind it, but that was years ago! And we’re both, we’re both so different now. Our boundaries changed, first foremost. And… and I don’t even have a horn anymore! And, and—” Starlight shook her head. This was dumb. Sunburst knew she had no feelings for him. “Look, just don’t read into that, buster.”

Sunburst could barely contain his snickering. “I’m not! I won’t! But you sure are making it easy for a passerby to get the wrong idea.”

“Please. You’d like that, wouldn’t you?” Starlight smirked. “Having finally worked up the courage to touch a mare who isn’t Flurry Heart, oh, Stellar Flare would be so proud.”

Sunburst shrank back, muzzle flushed. “A-alrighty then.”

“I’m kidding! Kidding,” Starlight laughed. It had always been easy to get him going.

“Well, I am not!” Sunburst cried in a faux-Canterlot accent. In a swish of star-spangled blue, he whirled back toward the passage Starlight had emerged from. “If you’re the type to be vulgar,” he quoted to her delight, “then you don’t deserve the lavish comforts I can provide!” He trotted against the oncoming river of party guests, who greeted Starlight betwixt their own conversations.

She had to laugh. It was just like their last Gala when they went as each other’s ‘plus one.’ “Come back, Prince Blueblood,” she droned aloud, “I’ll have that dance, I promise!”

Sunburst stomped to a stop, missing her faux-dismay like the pompous royal as he screeched in the accent, “Nay! You’ve wounded my feelings, and now you will pay the price!”

Starlight gasped with all the horror she felt now, replicating that which she’d experienced at the Gala. “No, please! You don’t mean…”

“Yes,” Sunburst hissed, storming back. “You shall hear from my Auntie about this! You shall rue the day you spurned the hoof of Prince Blueblood, Starlight Glimmer of Sire’s Hollow!”

“Hey, you’re getting pretty good at that!”

“I’ve had a lot of practice! You know I saw him the last time I took Flurry to visit her aunts?”

“Jeez, I hope he didn’t admonish you for ‘plucking his dainty peasant flower,’” Starlight mocked in their dialect, skillfully hiding how she’d forgotten all about Sunburst’s last visit to Ponyville, coming off of social-political games with Canterlot’s upper crust.

It was the week Twilight fell ill, and the last Starlight saw of her bubbly baby niece.

Sunburst sighed, shamelessly relieved. “No, no. He forgot all about it, I think. All his attention was on Flurry Heart. E-everypony’s was actually.”

Of course he did, the jerk. He barely cared about Starlight beyond her appearance, something it seemed nopony ever noticed. And they definitely won’t now without judging her by that thing on her forehead. Not even Sunburst had ever complimented her, apart from a friendly, ‘You look nice’ before locking forelegs at the Gala’s start.

”‘Dainty flower,’” she muttered. “Still can’t believe the dope called me that.”

“Up-up! ‘Dainty peasant flower.’”

“Right! Right, how could I forget the taste of vomit in my mouth as he said that?” Starlight tittered.

“Can you believe he thought he was being suave? Or complimentary?” Sunburst shook his head in disbelief. “It’s just how they are, those capital types.”

“He was definitely being suave by their conceited standards,” said Starlight. “I’d have been dumb enough to take it as a compliment had Rarity not warned me of Blue-boy ahead of time.” It was enough to distract her from the fact that Blueblood was, also, the first ever stallion to ask Starlight Glimmer for a dance.

The second stallion to do so shook his head. “I wouldn’t call them ‘conceited’ per se.”

Starlight flatly told him, “Sunburst, they’re conceited. They think they’re better than everypony who doesn’t live with their heads in the literal-figurative clouds like the rest of ‘em. They judge a ponies’ worth by how trendy they are, not by their character.” If they did, Canterlot would see itself for the tinfoil-clad garbage culture it truly was.

“Canterlot in general is out-of-touch with the rest of the world,” said Sunburst. “Take it from someone who had to live there. It makes sense why the prince believed himself cordial—he recognized that you were beautiful.”

‘Were.’ Starlight blocked out the word and the ache in her chest. “No, no, I get it.” Despite his behavior, Starlight held no ill will towards the stuffy royal. It was only the prince’s reaction that got her going if she thought about it for too long. “Doesn’t change the fact that he thought I owed him a dance on account of being royalty.”

“Upstarted royalty, at that.”

“Technically, all the royalty of Equestria is made of upstarts. They just hide behind their massive age numbers.”

“Right,” snickered Sunburst. “Because Flurry Heart’s hefty three years of life hides her origins like some sorta ancient myth a la ‘The Mare in the Moon.’”

“Hm, point taken.” They chuckled together, gently as Starlight fell into the veil of vines stitched into a dense mesh against the wall. The Lounge, she realized. A quick gaze revealed an open-sky packed with as many stars as there were firebugs, and half as many equines and bugs mingling beneath. There was a bustling juice bar, a live band playing smooth jazz with gourd-crafted instruments, and clusters of either bean bag chairs or big, plush mushrooms occupying each corner, all of them in use by a pack of one of the two species.

“Incredible, isn’t it?” Sunburst’s eyes were on the same sight, eyes alight with the twinkles of firebugs. “To be the first pony-changeling Gourd Fest in history. Despite it being your, what, second? Third?”

“My second. Still,” Starlight sighed, forehead sharply twisting, “a shame it’s overshadowed by me.”

Sunburst looked like he just insulted her dead mother by mistake. “Oh. Oh, goodness, I-I am so, so sorry I didn’t say anything, Starlight. Or that I didn’t come see you as soon as I’d heard. It wasn’t until yesterday, honest! But that’s no—”

She held a hoof up, smiling as she was stabbed in the chest over and over again. ‘Till yesterday, huh? Cadance didn’t tell Sunburst because it’d distract him from Flurry Heart. Huh… That makes sense, actually!

At least Sunburst was a more loving friend than the Princess of Love. “I get it,” said Starlight. “It’s cool.”

“But I said nothing, even now when we’re finally talking! I noticed how sad you looked when talking to Twilight, and it just…” With a sigh, Sunburst’s glasses floated from his closing eyes, rubbed down in a manipulated fold of his cloak. His sorrow then impaled her where she stood as he replaced them. “It hurt to watch,” he croaked. “I remember how you’d always find a solution to our problems when we were kids. Regardless if it was a particularly good one, you would just… go for it, no matter how glum I’d gotten. And just the effort cheered me up… And yet,” he continued, smile crestfallen, “when my time came to step up, I was too scared to say ‘I’m sorry.’”

Starlight sighed, falling into her first friend for a moment, their forelegs entangling just as long. “Please, Sunburst, please don’t beat yourself up about this.” It was her fault for not seeking his comfort in the first place. How did that make him feel? “Your aloofness is part of what I always liked about you anyway.”

“I seem to remember that annoying you, past and present.” The near-disastrous weekend where he “stole” Starlight’s friends, having more in common with them, resurfaced like a bad taste in her mouth.

“Maybe on the outside,” said Starlight. “But inside, it was our thing. You know? Familiar, I guess… I-It sounds dumb, I know, but it’s like some part of you knows me well enough not to apologize, presuming what I wanna hear right now,” she said, smiling honestly. “Instead, we talked. We joked, like always. And you didn’t make one mention of my horn. I didn’t feel like a… a freak,” Starlight croaked, heart burning raw with realization: she’d never thought of it that way until now. And she did—it made her feel like a freak to have ponies stare at her and treat her like some prized sculpture. “Intentional or not, thanks for being my aloof goof of a friend.”

“Well, if you feel that strongly, I guess I’ve done something right here!” Sunburst leveled her with a stern look, one of deep concern. “I hope this isn’t emblematic of how you’ve been approaching the healing process regarding, ah…”

He nodded to her forehead.

“That isn’t healthy, Starlight. Simply not addressing what happened, pretending everything’s the same.”

Starlight cringed. “Yeah, I tried that the first couple days. Not gonna lie.” Even so, she was still crushed and compressed underneath a metric-ton of emotions neither of them, least of all Sunburst, had the desire to delve into. Especially since that might take the whole night, like that… dream… with Luna.

All over again.

“Uh, Starlight?” Sunburst cocked his head. “Why are you making your ‘eureka’ face?”

“Take notes from my experience as well as your own, Starlight: talk to somepony. Disclose your fears and dispel all doubts, lest you doom yourself to the same mistakes I’ve made.”

What a time to suddenly remember Luna’s parting words. Her heart still weighed heavy. Even if I could work up the nerve to talk now, it’s far too late and will definitely not be solved in the span this party will last. Sunburst has a baby to take care of, his own life! I can’t distract him from that! And there’s leagues between Ponyville and the Crystal Empire! And I need somepony I can come to at any time. Letters won’t be enough, I need… I need to hear a voice.

I need somepony to tell me right away that I’m not as broken as I feel. Whose opinion I won’t be waiting with bated breath for a week, terrified of how they’re going to judge my messy, ridiculous emotions.

Starlight shook her head. “I just remembered, I’ve talked about all this with somepony. More or less,” she added quickly.

Sunburst’s eyes practically popped out of his head. “Y-y-y-you have? Who?! Why’ve you not told anyp—”

Her hoof impeded his words. All she said was, “Princess Luna,” and Starlight knew Sunburst would understand why she’d keep this private.

Unless he figured she was lying, and realized she just forgot, but that was ridiculous. It was ridiculous to have up and forgotten a visit from Luna.

Yet Sunburst gasped like a mare, never the presumptuous type (perhaps that’s what made him easy to talk to right now). “You had a lucid therapeutic dream with the Princess of the Night? Ooh, I am so jealous!” he cried. “Oh, what was it like? How did it feel? Was the advice she gave you helpful? A-answer that one first, of course. Apologies.” He cleared his throat, pushing back his spectacles. “Proceed,” he finished sagely.

Starlight took a moment, reeling from the fact that Sunburst was a Luna fancolt. “Uh…” And that he cared. “Well…” Sunburst was here, Sunburst cared. He was concerned. He was willing to listen and talk, just as Luna advised! But…

But it wasn’t enough. But there wasn’t enough time. But he might not understand.

But I can’t ruin his night! Starlight realized instantly that he wouldn’t mind. Would he though? Twilight said I won’t, but she barely knows me anymore! She doesn’t know the garbage going on in my brain! It’d poison Sunburst’s night, too, it’d be all he thinks about! And he’s here to see a changeling holiday with his own eyes, to experience it, and his stupid crippled ex-best friend is in no way relevant to that equation! But how do I dodge his question—?

“Yo-yo, nerds!” Rainbow descended on them with a bulbous purple cluster. And then it clicked—and Starlight felt herself smiling fondly.

“I should’ve figured you would be into fruitball,” she said.

“Heck yeah!” Dash touched down, tucking the big boysenberry underneath her foreleg. “I’ve been pegging guys left and right, and not one’a them got me yet! I’m undefeated!” she bellowed. “Woof! Aw, yeah, this is fun! Way cooler than buckball! You eggheads wanna join?”

Sunburst stammered. Starlight shook her head. “I’d be useless, Rainbow.” The pegasus faltered in her amusement, she inhaled ready to reply. “I’m sorry! By the way… For, just now.” Ruining her good vibe. “And for the other day.”

“Pssh!” Rainbow rolled her eyes, smile renewed. “You worry too much about the little things. C’mon, it’ll be fun!”

Sunburst and his messy hair, crooked glasses and wobbly smile stepped into view. “What do you say, Starlight?”

She looked to either pony. Their smiles. Their hope—anxiety fueling them. A fear Starlight would make another scene? Ruin the game with a magical accident? My horn hurts and it’s kinda scary because it shouldn’t. So she very well could.

“I…”

Sunburst stepped forward, concerned. “Starlight? Is everything okay?”

A swelling pressure was promptly blinked away. “Yeah! Yeah, no, I’m just… thinking! About the level of my ability.”

Rainbow chuckled. “Ya don’t have to overthink it, dummy. Just have fun!”

Manure. Pure manure. Rainbow loved winning more than anything. “Uh… I think I’m good!” Starlight grinned. “Yeah, no, I’m good! You two go off without me, though. I’m gonna busy myself with something less…” Risky. “...Intensive.”

Sunburst didn’t move to push his glasses up to his huge eyes—uncomprehending, for how could the strong Starlight Glimmer be so afraid of failing a game?

For many reasons, Sunburst. Reasons you don’t need to waste your time worrying over.

Rainbow didn’t seem to care as much. Almost like this was expected, she shrugged with an easy smile and said, “M’kay. I won’t force ya if you don’t wanna.” Her wings slammed downward, kicking up dust and wind and herself a foot off the ground. “But if you change your mind and find your battle spirit, I’mma dominate this fruitball thing till eleven. Sunburst, you in?”

“U-uh…” He cast a worrying glance over to Starlight. She wore a smile, forced a nod. He didn’t need to stay with her. Sunburst turned to Rainbow, smiling wearily. “Sure, why not?”

“Great! Seeya in the Gamer Chamber. Tunnel Five!” And she was off, gone in a flash of cyan.

Sunburst turned to Starlight. “I-is everything o—?”

She pushed his cloaked backside before he could turn fully. “Go, you over-analytical dorkwad!”

With a chuckle and something else he said, Sunburst vanished down Tunnel Three. Starlight sighed with relief—Sunburst was the last pony she wanted to bother with her problems.

“I gotta say,” remarked a country drawl from behind, “ain’t never seen another pony so danged thankful to avoid spendin’ time with ‘er friends.”

Starlight could just pretend she didn’t hear her and leave. But her forehead twinged dully, shifting toward her left temple as if leading her around to where Applejack stood, whose gaze widened slowly upon locking eyes. Starlight must have looked like a mess. She lacked the strength to try the impossible and fake it with her.

“Interested in takin’ a load off, sugarcube?” Applejack turned, revealing a tray with two stone mugs on top.

Of all the ponies. Starlight cursed her luck. She didn’t realize they had missed each other until now, on this night no less. It had to be the living lie detector spell....

Starlight made a smile. “Sure! Why not?”

When you spend your whole life battling the habit of lying, within yourself and your kin, you gain an extra sense of sorts that’s able to sniff out manure before fully grokking it. Something in Applejack’s brain just lit up when that smell wafted her way.

Not that she was looking for lies, hankering a sniff of manure, but Starlight sure did reek of it. The lying sort, that is—not the earthy stuff that told of a day in the fields, your muscles barking for a long soak in the tub.

Nope, the nastier of two seldom dirtied Applejack. Pa had often told her that a lie was just the truth muddied up, so it was easier to be honest from the start and avoid the trouble. A lesson which never truly stuck until after he and Ma were gone, and Big Mac dang-near got his eggs scrambled over at Ponyville General because of a mix-up with the Riches. From then on, Applejack tried, and often failed, to pass her wisdom unto others. Over time her friends remembered their history, at least, and were more open than ever.

Starlight, though… Fluttershy’s gabbed with oysters more open than this frightened filly.

“So! Why I’d gone and avoided everypony!”

Starlight was wetter than AJ after a hard day’s work. “Yeah, Starlight, that’s what I’d asked.”

“Part of me always appreciated that bluntness of yours. The honesty,” she confessed, like it was some secret.

“So you’ve said many a time,” Applejack replied, smiling. Her brows furrowed and she asked with all her heart, “But what’s got your tongue, Sugar? Not them magic varmints that went and robbed ya, I hope.”

“It wasn’t a robbery.”

“As Twilight’s assured us up and down.” Almost like she was tryna convince herself. “Pardon me for doing my duty as your friend, but I’ve been thinkin’ those storybook monsters only you and Flutters had seen hide n’ tail of did somethin’ to ya’s. By words or some curse, I dunno. But it’s a might suspicious and mighty sad to think about.”

“Wh-what do you mean?” Starlight tried to ask casually.

YEE-haw! I’m on the right track! But Applejack wasn’t going to jump the gorge unless certain she could make it. But by this point, any progress felt like a mile of distance crossed. “Like the two o’ you can hardly speak of ‘em. And when ya do, you in particular’r acting like what they did was justified. Deal or no, that ain’t what I’m after!” she said as Starlight was ready to object. “I’m just thinking that there’s something… more, about these varmints that you ain’t telling me. Fluttershy, well, you know how she is… how she’s been.” That poor filly, she could still hardly keep it in when the subject came up. But she was getting better, stronger.

“But you, Starlight, you’re as knowledge-hungry as our Twilight and more blunt than I! So what’s got you being all quiet and distant from us?” Starlight squeezed her eyes shut, a spitting image of Fluttershy with her dams about to burst.

“That was a lot, I apologize,” AJ said, placing her stetson above her pounding heart. “But can’t you see what this’s been doing to us?” She continued as Starlight nodded quickly, “You’re avoidin’ your friends over this, and that’s got us a might worried like you wouldn’t believe.” Starlight was looking more regretful by the word. “I ain’t tryna corner you, hon, I’m just dyin’ to help ya.” And that was a fact; Applejack’s heart ached every which way it could since Starlight screamed like that, realizing her horn and her magic was gone forever. “And if I’m being frank, that’s what it feels like I gotta do to get ya to open up.” Twilight stressed up and down not to pressure her, but desperate times came for desperate measures, and Twilight didn’t become Princess of Friendship by instincts alone, besides.

“I… Applejack, I’m sorry!” Starlight’s pupils quivered something awful before collapsing on her dinner plate. “But I won’t tell you.”

For land’s sake, why’s she so danged tongue-tied? Pa had always said, ‘An honest pony never avoids your eyes.’ Those who did so might very well be lying to themselves—a fear the others who’d spoken with Starlight like the reliable friends they were—had voiced countless times already.

Applejack would not be the next. “Bottling it up ain’t healthy, Starlight. You ain’t never gonna heal your heart if ya keep picking at the scabs.”

“Gross,” Starlight muttered. “And so, what, deciding to handle it myself, telling you that you’ve got it all wrong?”

“So, what, you really are just doin’ this to yourself?” Anger climbing, Applejack slapped her hat unto the table and said, “Shoot, girl! What’s got in your head that’s makin’ ya go and think that’s better than talking to your friends?”

“Like you would understand.”

“Pardon?” She knew Ma and Pa were long gone. Starlight was smart, and empathetic to a fault. She ought to know Applejack didn’t just shrug her shoulders and move on, like Starlight wanted others to think, and AJ herself did half her lifetime ago.

“Regardless,” Starlight continued, “you think that’s me rolling around in my own misery? Out of habit—like picking at a scab I can’t not pick?”  

“You’re reading into my countryisms, sugarcube. I’m only saying that you ain’t letting yourself process this right.”

“Oh, I am.”

Applejack couldn’t take it anymore. “So threatening your friendship with Twilight?” She glanced left down the table, where ponies and changelings ate and conversed. She hissed closer, “That’s your version of a healthy healin’ process?”

Starlight glared, bright and sudden-like. “You’ve no idea what Twilight was ready to do! I had to save her from making a stupid decision.”

“Like you?” Applejack wondered at the interesting choice of words.

Starlight’s burning gaze persisted, even as she said with sinister calm, “You think that saving Twilight was stupid?”

She wished Starlight didn’t word it that way, but… “Naw, just that it seems it’s how you’re feelin’. More’r less.”

“Well I’m not!” she cried, a little too hastily. She flushed and shrunk into her shoulders when hushed by Applejack.

Real or imagined, she could feel stares this poor girl definitely didn’t want—ever, but especially now. “I didn’t mean for this to get so heated,” said Applejack.

“No, I’m sorry,” her friend uttered quickly. Avoiding her eyes. “I’m just… sorry. I don’t know what’s wrong with me, a-and—” Tears beaded her eyes. Applejack reached across the table, elbow in the grease of her plate, to grab Starlight’s hoof, her awe and attention.

It was like nopony’s touched her in days. This poor girl, what was going on in her heart? “Breathe in,” AJ instructed, watching as Starlight reluctantly inhaled, “breathe out.” She did so. “Keep a cool head, now, sugar. You’re fine, you’re fine!” AJ gently assured her as tears and her muzzle fell away. “Oh, Starlight, what’s going on with you?” she fretted. She was so fragile, like little Apple Bloom that time she was bullied. It made her big sister-instinct sick to her stomach, just as it did now. “You can talk to me, hon, you know you can.”

Starlight gasped sharply, wiping away her eyes. Cheeks flushed. “Just leave me Applejack, please.”

“You know as well as I that that ain’t gonna happen.” Starlight buried her face in her hooves; cries echoed hollowly within. AJ could only stroke her foreleg, unable to give her a hug that would remind her of them witches.

I feel like I’m just making it worse. Twilight stressed for them not to force anything, but times were desperate and Starlight needed a friend who would drag the truth out, kicking and screaming. That’d make it a whole lot better in the long run. A whole lot better.

It had to. Had to, dang nabbit!  

“Starlight? I’mma let you cool off for a minute, cuz I’m still famished.” She nodded, face still buried. “When I get back, we’re gonna have a nice, long chat. You hankering for anything?” A shake of the head. Applejack felt gutted, not hearing so much as a peep from her forward and talkative friend. “Not even a slice o’ my family’s apple pie with whipped cream?”

“No. M’good... Full.” Despite having nothing but eggs. A pony needed three meals a day to keep herself going! “I ate before coming here.”

“Thought you was starvin’,” mused Applejack, acting humored. “As soon as we got to this here Gourmet.” By way of Tunnel Two, or something. Applejack just followed her nose and led them right, to Starlight’s genuine amazement. “Said you could eat whatever’s sauteed in them spices. Heh, even if they were rocks!” Starlight didn’t move. She didn’t smile. Applejack would say she messed up if she had a smidgen of an idea as to how. “Starlight, hon, is this a pride thing? An’ I don’t mean dinner, but, well, everything! And that ain’t nothin’ to be ashamed of! Y’know, I myself’m quite familiar with—”

“Thank you, but I’m good,” Starlight rudely interrupted. Didn’t even have the respect to look up from her spotless plate. As if that meant anything: a couple carrots and celery left nothing in the way of a mess—something the Apples believed any good meal should leave behind.

Applejack sighed before getting up. “Alright, then. Be back in a jiffy.”

“Sure.”

Golly. What kinda friendship problem is so darn… impenetrable? She knew better than to make a dog drink water it didn’t care for. AJ disliked that very much, because the fool animal would hurt itself if it didn’t. But that didn’t give her an excuse to force these things down anypony’s throat.

It was hard, but that was life.

Failing, though, that was easy. Losing oneself in work was even easier: waking up at the crack of dawn, cracking down trees, cracking down forks from biting too hard because all AJ could hear was the crack of Starlight’s voice, the pitch of her scream rising as she realized second by second that her life was changed forever.

Those apple trees took the worst of her abuse, splintering into jagged stumps not unlike the poor girl’s horn, rather than those witch-things’ faces. Granny told her to take the day off, but farm work was family work, and family took priority over everything. Except friends were family, too, and Applejack was left with this burning hatred she couldn’t expel: for herself, for failing Twilight and Starlight, and the varmints who went and broke them both.

That’s right. Both. Not that AJ would breathe a word of that to Twilight, what with everything going on. Being a little fractured, though, that was justified in these circumstances. Expected.

But Applejack was supposed to be the dependable friend, and she was useless in helping either of them. So much so that she didn’t think Starlight wanted her wisdom if she hadn’t sought it already.

And that, right there, was mighty self-pitying of Applejack.

When Granny, Mac and Bloom called for a house meeting last night, explaining this idea where they’d bake pies night and day for a changeling party, Applejack saw her chance. She didn’t realize she was waiting for it, but she did then: a chance to be the friend Starlight needed—-deserved—-after everything she’d done last week and beyond.

A chance to make up for being caught between grief and rage and all-around exhaustion, jumping from Twilight’s sickness to Starlight’s everything, while Pinkie and the rest were hard at work tryna salvage what was broken by Hydia—a forgotten piece of Applejack’s foalhood she left in the oven to burn ignored along with her self-pity.

Here, now, Applejack had her chance to stand tall, dust herself off, and do right by her friends.

It’d been easy, losing herself in her work, being a coward… a bad friend. But Applejack much preferred the hard right way instead of the easy wrong way.

After all, if life were easy, she would still have Ma and Pa, and Starlight a horn.

Wait a sec… How long had I been standing here? Applejack blinked, like she was seeing the Gourmet for the first time, when really it was this situation. Everything before her—the empty plate sitting in her foreleg, the two-dozen picnic tables packed with patrons—cast in the same toasty glow by way of a nifty firebug canopy snapped into existence. Everycreature’s chattering erupted around her, Applejack’s nose teased by the sizzle of fryers, the savory smells of pies and sweets, soups, and roasts wafting above the buffet line she was standing in.

Just thinking.

Daydreaming like the danged bumpkin she was written off as instead of keeping her eyes on her aching, breaking friend

And Applejack felt so, so stupid for missing the obvious signs. The parallels between them.

Sure enough, when she turned back to their table, Starlight was gone. Her plate remained, and her untouched mug of hot cider.

“Gosh darnit.” Applejack grabbed and threw her hat upon the ground. “Gosh darnit!” she cried, to the surprise of the changeling before her and Carrot Top behind.

“Yesss-ah,” Trixie gasped, a viscous sweetness electrocuting her taste buds as she clapped her stone cup face-down. “Well, well, it seems nunna ya got anything on the Great Trixie! C’mon already, drink like your life depends on it. Drink!” One by one, groans, gasps, and the mutterings of sore losers at her table wove between the weighty womps beating sonorously against the air. “Yeah, yeah, pay up already,” Trixie shouted over the music.

Mandible, Lily, Daisy, and Roseluck cast their acorns in the middle, a pile which zipped toward Trixie’s awaiting forelegs through her gorgeous sunset-pink aura. She snuggled her bounty, tingly with victory. She inhaled deep, the faint, nutty smell a heavenly break from the citrusy aroma stinging her nostrils.

“That was unreal, how’d you do it?” asked the most skittish of the sisters.

Trixie smiled, her little game finally easing even Daisy up. Granted she was fueled by one whammy of a sugar rush, being first-time drinkers and all, but hey, it worked! And it was Trixie’s brilliant idea, after all.

Four sets of eyes, one of which a glowering like the halves of a lime, ogled her like she had a broken horn or something.

Right! They were waiting for an answer. “I’m sorry?” Trixie leaned in. “Music’s too loud,” she lied.

Roseluck snorted, sniggering into her forelegs as Daisy held her forehead in despair. “Trix-ie!” she whined, massaging it.

“Ohhhh, that was a little too much sugar.” Lily was barely audible over Vinyl Scratch’s grating rhythm. “I’m feeling kinda… shleepy… girlsh.” A great yawn, and then the table jingled with the impact of Lily’s blonde head.

Mandible chittered, her shoulders bouncing. “I thought all you ponies ate were cakes and pies,” she remarked.

“Grass, hay and flowers balance it out.” Daisy circled the rim of her granite mug. “Lily here lives a sugar-free lifestyle, though.”

For a second they watched her snore, Lily’s namesake dropping from her ear a beat before exhaling.

“Does that serve a higher function?” Mandible pointed, centimeters from touching it. “Is it… some sort of pony mating call?”

It took Daisy a second to realize she was being asked. “O-oh! Um, well, no. Not really. She likes the way it looks, though.”

“Uh, me too,” grunted Mandible.

Friend or lover-hunting, Trixie cooed into the air regardless, howling like a fool too high on sugar to care.

“Hey! Uh, shaddap! Quiet, or you’re givin’ me twenty!” Trixie couldn’t help but giggle harder, delirious. The flustered bug’s hoof blasted forth into Trixie’s belly.

“Oh-h’oh!” she laughed, gasped, and groaned all at once. “Don’t touch Trixie’s tummy, you brutish bug!”

Daisy’s own giggling fluttered from across the table, her one conscious sister propped on a foreleg beside her, eyes half-lidded, smirk the pinnacle of dopey. Roseluck said, “You should tell Lily thatcha think she’s a cutie pie. She’d like that.”

“I didn’t—” Mandible blinked, then stood up. “I am getting more nectar. Please, do not leave.”

Once she was out of earshot (which, in this noisy place, was as soon as she left the table), Trixie hummed at the two happy sisters. “A ‘please?’ Goodness, Muscle-For-Brains really likes you girls.”

Daisy adopted a sheepish look. “Does she? I thought we were an-n-noying her.”  

Trixie waved. “Oh, she likes anypony willing to talk to her. There was this whole episode, right? Where she was getting all antsy because most of the changelings were still afraid of their old drill instructor, and Pharynx wasn’t making it any easier. My assistant and I made it better, but as you can see, the change definitely hasn’t done much for her washboard of a personality. Nor has she gotten over the fact that the Great and Powerful Trixie is still the best drinker in the Hive.” She could imagine Mandible owing up to her petulant vow, and training since the last Gourd Fest by chugging a mug of water every day.

And she still wasted her time! Trixie grinned like a fool; it’s nice being the best once in a while.

“Trixie,” Roseluck said suddenly, “I’ve been meaning to ask, but where’s Starlight?”

A blink. Trixie found her mug less judgemental. “How should I know? You’ve seen the turnout. She could be drowning in adoration and tears for all I know.” Trixie wished she didn’t sound so bitter. Especially because those suffocating her were probably making Starlight all sorts of uncomfortable. She didn’t want this. Twilight assumed she did.

Silver lining: she had ponies who wanted to fawn over her.

“I’m just surprised.” Roseluck smiled knowingly at her mug. “All week we’ve seen Starlight… and, well, she only looks happy around you and Maud Pie. That’s gotta be one special friendship.”

Trixie’s heart squirmed. Fast. “What’re you implying?”

“Wh-what? Nothing—”

“Because we aren’t an item. And Maudie likes stallions, besides.”

Roseluck mouthed ‘O-kay’ as she turned to her unconscious sister, combed her silky, bouncy blonde mane out of her face.

Let the judge and gossip. Trixie didn’t care. Nopony would ever understand what she and Starlight had, or Starlight and Maud, or even, to a strange extent Trixie still hadn’t fully deciphered, herself and the strong, silent geologist. They wouldn’t understand. They would try, conclude, and gossip, just like every pony ever has before Trixie truly became Great and Powerful with the love and support of her best friend.

Daisy’s eyes brightened suddenly. “Oh, yeah! Before I forget again, how’d you do that, Trixie? It’s insane, the way you gulped all that in a second.”

It wasn’t exactly one second, but…

“Practice. Experience… Oh! And, well, a magician never reveals her secrets, but let’s just say Trixie’s honed her body for years upon years, learning to take in water for her more death-defying stunts.”

“Holy smokes,” Daisy drawled, blinking just as slow. “And now you can just chug these big bowls in three seconds flat?” Her eyes snapped open suddenly, hoof rapping the beginnings of a dramatic ballad against the table.

“Uh, yes?” Trixie rose a brow. “Is there something you need to say?”

“I-I gotta go find Rainbow Dash! She’ll give you a challenge!” Daisy stumbled around and away from the roundtable, tripping a little before going off like a neon-pink bullet down Tunnel Four.

“Eh.” Trixie shrugged. “I’m always in the mood to shame Rainbow Dash. If she’s even founded.”  

With a snort, Lily picked her head up and looked around, blinking like she just woke up somewhere strange. “Wha’ happened? Where’sh,” she yawned, yawned, yawned… “oof, sheesh... Daisy? Where’d you put my sister, Trixie?”

Roseluck inhaled, supposedly buried within the cacophony of the Dance Lounge, only to be startled by the slamming of a tray with four bowls of nectar. “I’m back, gang,” said Mandible.

That was quick, Trixie mused. No way the meathead paragon of the Hive, second only to Pharynx, would fly to the Lounge sugared-up. She must have gotten these from Tarsal, whose white serving coat was seen gliding along the outskirts in Trixie’s peripheral every so often.

“Hey, what happened to the blindingly-colored earth pony?” asked Mandible.

Roseluck licked her lips, dragging an orange-filled bowl over. “Daisy went to find an actual challenge for Trixie n’ knock her down a peg.”

“Hey, I’m right here!” she and Mandible cried as one.

Trixie shook her head; the nerve of some ponies. It suddenly occurred to her there wasn’t a fifth serving. “You didn’t get me any?”

“Get one yourself, Trix. I serve new friends only.” Mandible smiled wryly, her tangerine carapace shifting with greens and purples of the special firebugs from the Frozen North. “And quit feeling so proud of yourself. It’s irritating. S’not like you actually won anything.”

That… was true. “First of all… I. Love. Acorns.” Mandible didn’t seem to care as Trixie magically beaned her noggin with every word. “Second, proving naysayers wrong is always a worthy endeavor in of itself.” The changeling hissed and snapped her fangs, nearly biting Trixie’s nose off.

The ex-captain of the infiltrators hooted like she just pulled a good joke. “Well, there’s nothing more to prove as far as I can see! Congrats, ‘stage-pony,’ your ability to chug nectar like a newborn grub is unparalleled.”

“Among other things.” The music, like a great dragon’s strangled bellow, overwhelmed any terror lingering in Trixie’s voice. It’s not like she really thought Mandible would bite her nose… again.

“I’d challenge you to prove that for once instead of just talking big, but I don’t wanna waste this party spectating your, ah, ‘magic show.’”

“Ooh,” Lily and Roseluck uttered softly, to Trixie’s climbing displeasure.

“So unless you can teleport a mug of nectar directly into your stomach, I’d say you oughta go find your next ego-boost.” Mandible shook her head. “What’s with you, anyway, Trixie? Challengin’ me to something so superfluous?” Trixie was done. “It’s like you’re tryna heal some kinda shattered pride.” Trixie stood. “Aw, c’mon, grubling! I was only teasing!”

She got too personal. Only friends could do that. “Hm? Sorry? Oh, wasn’t listening! The music’s too LOUD!”

Mandible waved her off, turning back to the daft sisters. Twilight, even Starlight, would take this opportunity to lecture Mandible about sensitivity or whatever, but she didn’t deserve that. She ought to learn the hard way, perhaps hurt her new friends by virtue of having an abrasive personality. That would show her, make her realize that most ponies, and changelings, didn’t have very thick shells to hide in.

As Trixie neared the dance floor and the mass of swaying partygoers, the pulsing air throbbed incessantly like a great, synthetic heartbeat. ‘Dance, Trixie,’ it told her. ‘Dance your worries, your dread, your aching heart away. You earned it after doing Prin-cess Twi-light’s job for her.’ That seemed like a good idea. Or it could’ve been every word Mandible had said, fueling her thoughts. The Cakes stopped her a moment, leading their wide-eyed foals whilst chatting with the pretty (even by Trixie’s refined standards) Elytra and… that one nymph who dreamt incessantly of baking and selling pony sweets.

Trixie was definitely going to dance. But first, she needed another drink or twelve within her. Enough for the sugar to carry her off in bliss, to forget Mandible’s rude words, and the fact that Trixie was intentionally avoiding Starlight while also feeling pettily angry enough to wonder why she hadn’t yet found her. They were dance buddies, dang it! Trixie wondered if she was actually here, but a sweep of the Disco revealed Tarsal and his sister, Tarsi, offering floating trays of various nectar concoctions to the patrons bobbing or chatting around the dance floor perimeter. Some white-hoofed jerk touched her shoulder before she could pursue them.

“Trixie! May we—?”

“What?!” She whirled, and to her surprise, it was truly one of the last ponies she expected to see right now. “Well, well, well. The first friend of my first friend has graced me with his presence.” Sunburst smiled, actually smiled, before opening his mouth. “Come with me,” Trixie shouted. Even if the bass drop muffled her, Sunburst heard it well in the way his cloak was telekinetically yanked.

He cried while being dragged across the dance floor behind her. “I can walk, thank you!”

Trixie dragged and dragged him until she dropped him in the center of sashaying pony-changeling cliques. Nearby the CMCs and some other kids moved their dance battle away from his splayed body. He peeled his snout off the painted stone and glared with the fury of a thousand nerds. “What was that for?!”

“That was nothing compared to what’s about to happen. Now, dance,” she ordered.

Sunburst flushed red in an instant, as if she’d asked him out on a date. Like he would even want that, much less deserve it? “P-pardon?” He picked himself up, gawking upon what was surely a splendid sight: Trixie’s gorgeous self against a backdrop of color-swapping firebugs.

“I said, ‘dance,’” she said threateningly. “If we’re talking about this, and don’t act like we aren’t, I wanna make it so I don’t waste my night just feeling sorry for myself and my best friend.”

Sunburst fixed his glasses. “Your priorities are sincerely skewed.”

“Thanks, judgy.”

“And how’d you know it’s about Starlight?”

Because they’ve never had one-on-one time otherwise. “You just told me.” Trixie winked.

Sunburst clapped himself on the forehead. “Okay! Fine, if that’s what it takes.” The ruddiness in his cheeks hadn’t waned. “I should warn you, this will be a little embarrassing. I’ve got four back-left hooves when it comes to this stuff,” he yelled over the music.

“Trixie doesn’t dance, period! Just let loose and have fun already!” She watched him start nodding to the beat, like her, and sway as tall grass in a gentle breeze. All the while concentrating really hard on her face. “You have a good sense of rhythm.” His body moved in time with every other soundwave. “Starlight hadn’t told me that.” Trixie began to swish her tail, buckle her knees in time with Sunburst’s bob-sway.

“Wait, she told you about my dancing?”

“Only that it was charming—in a dorky sort of way!” Trixie laughed, Sunburst groaned, dipping briefly in his dancing. Trixie noticed that his cloak was stained purple, nearly invisible amongst the pulsating lights. “Did you just get done stomping grapes?”

“Fruitball, actually. B-but that’s not the point!”

“No, no! Of course not! The ‘point’ is Trixie saw you running after Starlight as soon as the party started. And then you went and played fruitball. Why’s that, Trixie wonders?”

Sunburst’s eyes widened. “Wow. Nothing gets by you, I guess?”

A familiar, irritating heaviness settled in Trixie’s breast for the first time since leaving Twilight’s castle. “Honestly, I’m pretty oblivious to most things.” Usually because she simply didn’t care—selfish, but that’s who she was. “Nowadays are a different story, though.”

“Because of Starlight.”

“Yeah.” They were muttering, yet hearing one another over all the chatting, the music, the laughing and the absent-minded brain power it took to keep bobbing like a pair of boueyies. “So what happened there?”

“Nothing happened! I didn’t comment on her… oh, gosh, Starlight!” he despaired. “It’s too sad to think about!”

“Focus, come on! What happened?”

“I told you, nothing! Goodness sake, Trixie, can’t you be a little bit sensitive?” Sunburst cried. “I’ve never seen such a grisly injury before in my life! And—and Cadance said she was looking into the cause? What cause?! Why didn’t Starlight ever pen me! And why aren’t you telling me anything about it?!” Sunburst’s eyes were wild with fear, concern, confusion—everything their friend didn’t need more of.

“Because of this. You’re a total spaz and you’d sooner be the magic scholar to Starlight than her first friend!”

Sunburst rolled his eyes. “Oh, please, you’re being presumptuous!”

“I don’t know what that means, but something tells me you’re wrong.”

“‘Presumptuous.’ It means you’re assuming how I’d behave if I knew the details of Starlight’s accident. And I’m not so insensitive I’d study her like some, some kinda anomaly!”

“Maybe not, but you’re total dolt who might unintentionally. And, trust me, what happened to her was no mere accident.”

“Then what was it?” Sunburst stamped his hoof, anchoring himself as a rock amidst a sea of ponies.

Trixie got in his face, joining him. “That. Doesn’t. Matter. Be. A. Friend. Can you do that, Sunburst? Can you do something so brainlessly simple, or is Trixie the only one capable of such an arduous task?”

“I was! I tried being her friend! But the conversation just moved to the topic of her horn, a-and she became this whole other pony! Like, she was looking at me like I was about to knock her block off...”

Hooves still gripping his cloak, Trixie pulled back. She couldn’t believe this. Sunburst was supposed to be smart. “Did you play it cool like I told you?”

“If by ‘play it cool’ you mean ‘act naturally,’ then yes, I did that. And you know how we changed topics?” Sunburst leaned closer. “Well?”

“Obviously not, I wasn’t there!”

“She made casual mention of this party being ruined by her.”

Trixie swallowed, an acute pain embedding itself everywhere. “That sounds…” Familiar. “Worrying. Did she… literally say that?”

Sunburst sighed, inaudible under the heavy, brain-pounding melody. “More or less. And you were so sure that she was getting better, too. Great observation, Trixie. Now, how about you hoof over all your data, so we can draw the obvious conclusion that Starlight isn’t even remotely fine?!” he cried hoarsely.

Trixie blinked, composing herself. Sunburst was just emotional—very emotional. For the first time in that which she’s known him. “Sunburst, I know how you’re feeling right now. I reacted the same way when I found out about Starlight! But you can’t jump to conclusions based on pure emotion—”

Otherwise you would make mistakes, not that he allowed her to finish: “My conclusions are based upon empirical evidence and virtue of knowing Starlight since she was a filly!”

“The Starlight you know has been gone for most of her life!”

Sunburst paced back, smiling upon the firebugs above glowing cyan, violet, gold, and cyan again—a wave of color surging across the Disco. “Trixie, the Starlight you knew—had—a horn… Understand? She objectively will never again be the Starlight you know! And if you think otherwise, you really don’t know her at all! And all your little theories are based around this desperate need to pretend everything is fine! Just. Like. Her.”

That was it. He could insult Trixie’s judgement, but he will not get away with slandering her best friend. I’m sorry, Starlight. Sunburst really isn’t the friend you remember. “Says the guy who barely reaches out to her!”

He pulled back, stammering. “S-says who?!” he cried.

“Says Starlight! She tells me everything, you stupid genius!”

“Evidently not! Otherwise, you wouldn’t be the only one arrogant enough to believe she’s getting better!”

“‘Arrogant?!’ Now you listen here—”

“I’m listening, go on!”

“Starlight will never get better if her quote-unquote ‘friends’ keep treating her like some kind of basket case! That’s all you jerks do, is handle her like a sleeping foal, and she sees that, and she hates that. It’s making her paranoid around you dummies!”

“Acting like nothing’s different is unfathomably more damaging in the long run—”

“Um, ex-excuse me!?” said a deep-voice stallion. Big Macintosh came with his foreleg slung around a purple-poofed unicorn, both smiling anxiously. “If y’all aren’t dancin’, do you mind movin’? There ain’t much room, and we’d requested a love song—”

“Oh, shut up!” Trixie snarled. There were more important things than this.

“Trixie!” Sunburst scolded.

“No, no! You be quiet, and you two, pipe down and wait for your song—the adults are talking!”

Big Mac and his apparent marefriend were stunned, then turned in a huff, the mare’s head resting against his tree trunk of a neck as they walked. They would be fine.

“That was really rude,” said Sunburst.

“Trixie’s in a rude mood right now.”

“We’re not even dancing anymore! We’re just taking up space!”

“Yeah! And this is the one place we can have this conversation without risk of eavesdropping, dummy!”

“‘Eavesdropping?’” Sunburst crowed. “What, like we’re hiding from our friends now? Is that the notion you’ve been nursing in Starlight’s head?!”

Trixie gasped, offended. “Trixie has said nothing of the sort, and she is offended by your accusation! Starlight herself is the one who is fed up with her friends, I’ll have you know! Starlight is the pony who believes her friends are smothering her! And just in case you haven’t forgotten, Starlight knows Starlight best. Not Twilight, not Maud, not even me, and most definitely. Not. You!”

Sunburst straightened, glaring fiercely. Then, in a whirl of silver and mottled lights, he walked away.

“Hey, I’m not finished with you yet!” Trixie followed him off the dance floor. “Hey! Glasses! Stop ignoring me!” He stopped abruptly at the mouth of the corridor, and turned, his burning stare unchanged. “What was all that about?” she asked.

Sunburst took a deep breath, brows furrowed still. “I wasn’t thinking about the fruitball game while playing it.”

Trixie blinked, awaiting for more. “Uh, oka—?”

“Instead, my brain was telling me, screaming at me, that I shouldn’t be there at all. I should be with Starlight. I should have explained to her, to the last detail, why I hadn’t come to her sooner. Not the spastic stammering I instead gave her. And then I felt responsible, because I was the one who chose to heed your bad advice.”

“Now, you listen here—!”

“And when we were done, I could have asked why she’d never wrote to me about her accident instead of feeling sorry for myself.” Trixie looked, really looked, and realized Sunburst wasn’t even here. Whatever was in the ground, he was there. “Instead, it was like Celestia’s School all over again—thinking my own friend was too busy to care about how I was doing. And she should be,” he added hastily, meeting Trixie’s eyes. “Yeah, she definitely should be. But I know Starlight was never, and will never, be like that.”

“Trixie, I thought these things, and came to these conclusions, because I have humility. I think outside myself and stare my flaws in the face, no matter how ugly they make me feel. Starlight has humility, too. Though I’m afraid it’s overshadowed by everything going on.”

“What’s your point with all this?” Trixie braced herself for an insult to her character. Because of course that was Sunburst’s conclusion. That was Maud’s conclusion, and even Trixie’s own in the dead of night with nopony but her thoughts.

“My point is, Trixie, you’re the reason why she isn’t getting better.” There was no hate in his eyes. Only pity. Pity! “Just think about that. I’m going to go find Starlight and apologize.”

And Sunburst turned for the tunnel, briskly pushing past pairs and trios of partygoers following the windup of a slow, smooth saxophone.

I’m… the problem? It made no sense, it sounded completely dumb, and it welled a pressure within, everywhere at once. Trixie wanted to puke her guts out. I’m what’s hurting Starlight? She shook away such thoughts and steeled herself, following in his hoofsteps. “The Great and Powerful friend of the Great and Powerful Starlight Glimmer doesn’t need a lecture from the dunderhead who abandoned her!” He ignored her. “You hear me?!”

Sunburst didn’t look back. “Enope! Sorry! The music’s too loud, I’m afraid!”

Trixie screamed like a windigo, ignoring the startled looks sent from all directions. I need nectar. Like, now.

“That’d be a little selfish though, don’t you think?”

“How even?” Pharynx snapped. Everything he said was as sharp as his attitude. “Your pony-food is frankly disgusting, Your Highness.”

“Why thank you,” Twilight deadpanned.

“That wasn’t a compliment,” the prince grunted. “Seriously, I tried the pie and I tried the hay fries, the hayburgers, the creamed corn and the salad. All those tastes were too meager for my palate!”

Yet Twilight’s mouth watered at the thought of them, despite the majority having long since been cleaned out—karma for getting caught up dancing with Rarity, and being bombarded with hugs and lovely words from a veritable army of changelings. It’d been a wonderful night.

“So because you don’t personally like our food, you’d deprive your people of prosperity and cross-cultural enrichment?” Pharynx, stunned, glared off to the side. Like that, his aura turned from prideful to shameful distaste. “Prince Pharynx,” said Twilight, stepping into his reluctant view, “is there a part of you that still dislikes ponies?”

“Well…”

He was ashamed enough not to answer, at least. It meant he was aware it wasn’t helpful, but he couldn’t help himself. “I understand, given our history. But your people will never grow if their diarchs reject foreign concepts.”

“We’re already friendship-loving pansies like you, what more do you want?”

“I want nothing,” Twilight answered calmly. “But I’d like your people to be happy, as well as our friends. And your people are my friends, like it or not.”

Pharynx rolled his eyes. “Alright, fine. So, say I agree—what does trading your food for our nectar have to do with that?” He wrinkled his nose. “Do you even know where nectar comes from, anyway? And would your ponies still wanna drink it after finding out, I wonder?”

“First off, I don’t own any ponies, Prince Pharynx, I’m simply their friend and as such an authority on all matters pertaining to the strength and sustainability of interpersonal relationships on a micro and macro level. As such an authority, I can assure you that trade is the backbone for all national friendships.” He blinked twice. “Second, and unrelated to my being such an authority, I’ll have you know that, yes, I’m well aware of nectar’s origins, and I’m sure most here already do as well.” She swiped a foreleg across an unexpectedly feeble demonstration: the legion of picnic tables lined up from wall to wall, empty and bathed in an amber glow from the firebugs above, with only janitor nymphs leading big panting dung beetles investigating the floor for discarded scraps, like they were puppies.

“You get my point,” Twilight continued. “And I’ll have you know, it’s not so different from the way we receive milk from cows.”

“Gross, you drink milk, too?”

Twilight sighed, scanning the lantern-dazzled buffet beside them, complete with assorted nectar cocktails, sweets, and even stews. She felt balloon-like, but the succulent-sweet aftertaste resting on her tongue begged for more.

“You oughta drink some before you take a nap on me, Your Highness,” Pharynx joked.

Twilight blushed behind her sudden yawn. The non-alicorn remnants of her were beastly tired—her joints stiff and her eyelids sticky with exhausted perspiration. She rubbed them again before answering, “Just, please, think about it. Your people will never get to enjoy the vast selection of pony cuisine they’ve clearly so enjoyed if you don’t have something to trade. Nectar is your only resource that has intrinsic value and applicability to our lives.”

“Sure, for getting fat.”

“You’re a charming diplomat, you know that?”

Pharynx snorted. “Hey, not my fault you pose this trade-stuff to Thorax. I’m just the royal aegis. My bro’s the one who gives a grub’s slimy butt about friendship with you ponies, so pester him about it.” His wings buzzed, faintly stirring a wind as they beat at a blinding speed, and he shot up like a fly, faster than any pegasus pony could. “Hey,” he called out amidst the firebugs, “you’re looking pretty tense. You wanna kick my tail at fruitball, one on one?”

Twilight couldn’t help but smile. I’d almost forgotten he doesn’t totally dislike ponies. “Thanks for the offer, but I don’t really do sports.”

Pharynx scoffed. “Yeah, I can see that. Taste ya later.” And he was gone in a snap, melting behind a screen of glowering bodies and melting into the night.

Quite a hard busybody, that Pharynx. But he loved his people fiercely, a quality that saved him from continued villainy like Chrysalis. Wherever she might be…

Twilight shook her head, banishing the slight fear beginning to squeeze her chest, before turning to a teal nymph leading her dog-sized dung beetle by a leash. “Sorry for loitering here with the prince,” she said. “Would you like any help?”

“Oh! Ha, naw, princess! You’re too kind, but we got this. Right girls?!”

“Yeah!”

“Woo!”

The teal nymph turned back to her, red eyes bright with buzzing stars. “We got this, thanks. I mean that, too.”

“Seriously!” cried the ‘yeah’ nymph as her beetle led them by, to the buffet tables. “Every-ling doesn’t usually acknowledge us, let alone offers to help. You’re a real sweetie, Princess Sparkle!”

Twilight blushed. “Oh, it’s nothing. I’m just a pony who wants to help.”

“Sure! But that just means you’re leader-material, not like that fathead, Pharynx. Ay! Come now, boy!” She jammed something that made a soft crunching sound, like trodding on leaves. “Don’t eat the tablecloth, Archimedes! Come on!”

“Oh, jeez,” laughed the teal nymph. “Enjoy the party, Princess. It’s almost midnight, you know what that means!”

“Oh, do I!” Twilight said, fighting the sinking in her stomach.

“Hey, sweetie, give Starlight my thanks, why don’cha?!” a green nymph, the ‘woo’ one, called from way in the backmost row. “She’s a bloody-danged hero, if there ever was one!”

Sure...

“There’s nothing Starlight wouldn’t do for a friend.” Nothing…

Even before… before everything happened. That was a guarantee. She didn’t need to prove anything, she still didn’t. Not that she was! But, she might be. Not that Twilight knew. She hardly understood what was going on in her best friend’s brain these days. Tonight was meant to end that. But it was almost eleven, almost time to find a partner and dress a gourd, and Twilight hadn’t seen nor heard anything of her friend since the festival’s beginning.

I suppose that’s a blessing in of itself. If her friends, who vowed to keep one eye open and an ear to the ground, hadn’t come to her about anything, it meant there was nothing to worry about. Unless, of course, they’re trying to cover for Starlight like they did the day her horn was stolen.

Twilight shook her head. They meant well, and even so, it never helped to mistrust them. She remembered the Storm King affair too well.

After some walking, the corridor opened up to a wide open space populated by sparse throes of ponies—most changelings were off in one of the five sectors of the Hive, decorating their gourds, leaving the Headroom open as a respite for ponies to sit on the flower beds, or the great mushrooms lining the space.

Twilight galloped, and she didn’t know why. Lyra and Bon Bon separated with a hello, giving way to slate dressed in turf and daisies. The opposite wall. Twilight’s head spun, everything feeling light out of nowhere. Couldn’t be relevant to the burn, the scorching in her legs or that within her belly, or the ever-tightening twisting and pulling in her breast.

I… remember gifting these. Back when the changelings were naive, Seaquestria was an unknown to the world, and Starlight was whole and could trust Twilight with all her secrets.

Twilight exhaled hard. The chains of little white flowers were especially soft-looking in this light. Yellow, even. Almost three years ago, every major settlement in Equestria (with some urging on her part), gave the newly-reformed changelings a piece of their home, so they might rebuild theirs. The daisy was Ponyville’s flower, and Mayor Mare had shared the idea in a manner not unlike Pinkie and Twilight coincidentally planning this party. Their efforts made it a town-wide affair.

Left to right, as long as three Ponyville huts, the Hive’s decor—the Hive itself—had clearly flourished in three short years of serious TLC. In times like these, for as long as she could remember, Twilight couldn’t help but compare herself to her peers:

What have I achieved in that time? Nearly plunge Equestria into shadow? Then slavery under the Storm King, because she forgot why she was princess in the first place?

And for all her teachings, had driven Starlight to nearly making the ultimate sacrifice?

Even days later, Twilight found herself blinking a blurriness away. She couldn’t help it. If Starlight had done that… If she were really truly irrevocably dead because of me… I don’t know. I don’t know. I might have truly lost my mind. Spike is telling me not to think about this and relax, but I can’t. I can’t just ignore the part my negligence played in leading to Starlight making this… this awful decision. Maybe, if I’d been a better teacher, Starlight wouldn’t have acted so rashly in the name of friendship. Maybe none of this would’ve happened, then.  

Starlight’s words from days ago haunted her still. ‘Because that’s what friendship is!’ It wasn’t though! Except, it sort of was. But only in certain ways? Twilight hated it, hated this, so what did that say about her as a teacher and a princess?!

Suddenly daisy-laden walls became a cotton candy-maned pony. “Hiya, Twilight!” Pinkie’s upside-down ‘frown’ rocketed into a ‘smile.’ “Boy, have I got one doozy of a doozy to tell you.”

Twilight’s heart plummeted, her woes shoved out of mind as they have many times. “A doozy? Th-the Doozy? It’s happened? Where? How? Why?!” Starlight. Something happened to Starlight. “Tell me what it is, Pinkie.” She squeezed her upside-down cheeks together. “Tell me. Come on, come on, tell me tell me tell me!” She leered closer and closer until their snouts pushed up together.

Pinkie giggled, bouncing off without so much as a push against Twilight’s back and landing skillfully before her. “Sheesh, Twilight! If it was something sad about Starlight, you think I’d have popped in like that?” she asked, impossibly coiling her neck so she was upside down again.

Twilight had almost forgotten Pinkie’s rule: ‘Enjoy the night, don’t worry about Starlight, and watch out for Doozies!’

“Oh, did I mention Starlight? Ha-ha! Who said I was referring to Starlight? It could be about the witches for all I know!” Twilight smacked herself on the horn. “Ah! I mean, Spike could’ve started a fire, how would I know? It could be anything! Not just those things, of course. I-I was just worried! About something happening…” ‘All night,’ was the unspoken conclusion that Pinkie clearly made from the start, having never lifted a smile. A quiet sign that Twilight wasn’t fooling anypony, nor even the slightest bit entertaining to her bubbly friend. “I’m sorry.” She was sorry for a lot these past few days. Twilight exhaled, rubbed her eyes until she saw spots. “No, obviously you wouldn’t have acted silly if this was serious. But still, you were frowning. And you explicitly said it wasn’t ‘sad.’ So… it is about Starlight. But what? Is she okay?”

She sounded like a worried mother. Spike would be gagging if on the receiving end of it.

“Oh, I’m sure she’s fine, Twilight.”

“You mean you haven’t seen her?”

“No siree! But I’ve been with Maud, like, almost the entire night. Because she’s shy, right? And she was with Thorax, and so was I, and they’re really hitting it off! So, Maud goes on asking these questions about the Hive and Thorax starts asking about her work, and I’m over here making food runs and playing a quick game or two or five-hundred of fruitball with Dashie and Thunderlane! Cut to four hours later, and it’s like, almost eleven, and Thorax is telling us more about the Gourding! He told us that nowadays, most changelings don’t even decorate their own gourd themselves, they do it with a friend because they—”

“They’re defined by each other, I know, Pinkie, it’s really wonderful. But what does this have to do with your Doozy?”

“This is part of it, wait!” whined Pinkie. A blink. Then back to smiling, eyes alight with dozens of stars buzzing above. “So now, it’s basically tradition to do share a Gourding with a friend! And I thought, ‘Wow, it’d be really nice if Starlight wanted to do one with you.’ You guys could make, like, a magical-themed gourd! But when I went to do that, Maud stopped me and stepped on me. Me tail, Twilight! Me tail! She never does that unless it’s urgent! And you know what she said?”

“Wh—?”

In a dull voice with a flat mane, Pinkie muttered, “‘Starlight. Wouldn’t. Like that.’”

Twilight heard this, and reeled. It… made sense. It was obvious in hindsight. She’d rather go with Trixie, of course, they’d spent more time together and she was the one consoling Starlight successfully through this hardship—if Rainbow’s vague report was any indication.

And yet, Twilight had the gall to feel offended. “Why wouldn’t she?”

“That’s what I said!” Pinkie said. “But Maud said it in a way that really made sense. She told me that Starlight would never get better if she felt cornered into doing something. She says that, that Starlight would do it, and she’d seem like she’s enjoying it, but inside she would be miserable! Miserable, Twilight! And doing something so fun and friend-y, too. And I had-a epiphany numero uno, and asked Maud, ‘Hey, well what about this party?’ And Maud said sure!”

Pinkie blinked, suddenly spaced-out. “And then, I realized,” she whispered, mystified. Another blink, and it was back to fast words but with a rare hardness in her gaze. “That’s what happened the other day with me and the Crusaders. That’s what Starlight’s been doing with Trixie and Maud! And you know what? I’m thinking it’s that same sorta train of thought whenever she’s telling us that she is a-ok. And to top it all off with one big cherry of garbagio: she’s doing that to herself!”

Pinkie leered closer, as if Twilight didn’t get it. But she did. She was just stunned.

“Doncha get it, Twilight?” Pinkie cocked her head almost ninety-degrees. “Starlight won’t ever be happy again if she doesn’t let herself accept that she isn’t! But she hasn’t. She says she has, but I don’t think she’s thought about it much at all. Which I totally get! But all this bad stuff is building and building to the point where confronting any of it makes her feel cornered and sad and leads her to not thinking about it even more! Like a, like a ball of dirty sheets that you leave in the corner, even though you know you should clean it: you don’t, because you have memories in those sheets that will be gone forever if you wash them!”

Twilight closed her mouth, then her eyes. This might just be a nightmare, that’s all. “So, this party’s pointless,” she realized. “And Starlight’s too afraid to be honest with… me. Or you, or any of us. And that’s the Doozy.”

“What? N-n-n-n-n-no. No. The Doozy was a party failing to make somepony happy. Like, what is up with that?”

Twilight exhaled like a bull. Calm. Calm. She’s just trying to help. She loved Pinkie dearly, especially for everything she did involving this absolute waste of a party.  

But Twilight was calm, like Celestia. “Pinkie, that isn’t funny,” she exhaled faintly.

“I’m not tryna be!” she said. “Parties bring ponies together and make them forget their woes and worries and wearies! A smile is guaranteed!”

“I remember Starlight smiling.” She remembered her crying, and thanking her, and promising to talk. But it was almost eleven, and still nothing. “I guess that was fake, too.”

Pinkie rolled her eyes. “Oh, psht! Naw, that was real. But she wasn’t smiling at the party but her friends. That I could tell for sure!”

“Then why is she—?!” The damage was done, Pinkie frowned which was basically a wince. Twilight shook her head; she ought to just stop talking forever, lest she accidentally hurt more of her friends. “Why is she doing this, to me, to us? Is it something I did, Pinkie? Did I offend her? Oh, I must have! I wasn’t a hundred percent on board with her decision despite it saving my life, so it’s no wonder she hates me now!”

Twilight’s face was grabbed and yanked into Pinkie’s. “Twilight. Look at me.”

“Eye yam,” she managed between squished cheeks.

“Are you Twilight Spessimist, Princess of Failure?” Pinkie’s eyeballs extended by the word as she said, “Who really, honestly, truly thinks the pony who was willing to give up her horn hates you because of some stupidly-awkward tension?”

When she put it like that… “No. That’d be ridiculous.” And to the one who thought it in the first place? “I’m ridiculous.”

“Nuh-uh!” They snapped back into her skull like a pair of rubber bands. “Thinking you’re ridiculous is ridiculously ludicrous!” Pinkie reared up on her hind legs. “All of this is ri-doo-doo-diculous! Just talk to Starlight, it’ll be fine.”

Twilight looked to the sand-dusted floor by her cutie mark. “This is starting to sound a lot like our last two conversations.” She swallowed. “I’m sorry, but I can’t do that, Pinkie. It could make things worse, it could push her away, or—”

“Or we can keep doing what we’re doing and leave Starlight in her mind dungeon until she won’t even eat cake anymore!”

Twilight’s stomach turned at the thought; Pinkie had seen it firsthoof, Starlight scarfing down sugar like her future depended on it, all to bury her pain in sweetness. “But if we make her open up, it’s like Maud said. She likely won’t grow from it, and that’d just deteriorate the situation further.”

“No offense, Twilight, but the situation’s lookin’ like a deflated souffle.”

“Unsalvageable?!” Twilight cried.

“No way! C’mon, Twi, you’re a smart pony when you aren’t Twilight Spessimist. Doncha know? You can still ice a souffle and enjoy its sweet delish-errific taste without it being the way you imagined it! But we gotta take what we can get and accept that it’ll be just a little different on the inside.”

Twilight was supposed to deduce all of that in a second. “Pinkie,” she laughed. Her heart rose, just a little, but enough to tell Pinkie she’d done her job and saved Twilight’s hope.

“Don’t you worry about a thing,” she said, smiling. “I’ll go get Starlight with Maudie, and then you two can have a nice little chitchat—”

“Wait, already? Now?!” Twilight pictured the screaming, the tears, the potential end in friendship as the walls closed in, suffocating her. “I-I’d extended the offer, true, but-but so much can go wrong and there’s so many variables that I still don’t know on Starlight’s end! She might not even wanna talk to me right now, Pinkie! No, she definitely doesn’t—she’s avoided me all night like she has all week!”

“Twilight.” Pinkie spoke so calmly, so quietly, that she had Twilight’s absolute attention. “Are you, or are you not, the Princess of Friendship?”

“I… am.”

“Awesome.” She smiled sweetly. Determinedly. “Now say it again.”

“I’m the Princess of Friendship.” She knew what Pinkie was doing. “And I’ll trust in my friends, and… take a leap of faith.” It’d been so long, so many years, since Pinkie built the foundations of this special, unbreakable trust within the depths of Froggy Bottom Bog.

“That’s all ya need!” Pinkie chirped. “Twilight, I know you’re all wounded up in a tizzy right now, but you so got this! You got us! We all wanna make Starlight smile again. So stop worrying like you’re the only one tryna help her, cuz we got two-hundred seven other faces here wanting the same thing.”

“I know. I do, I know,” Twilight said, nodding. “I’m just… scared, Pinkie. I’ve spent my life hypothesizing and basing my every action upon that. But… I have to do more than that. I sometimes forget that I didn’t get these because of anything rooted in some objective truth,” she said, wiggling her wings. “But a feeling. And it’s because of that feeling that makes me… terrified, if I’m being honest. Terrified of hurting Starlight. Even more than I have been.”

Powdered sugar and frizzy pink hair suddenly glomped Twilight in a hug. “Then don’t think about that,” murmured Pinkie. “Just think about how much you love Starlight and let your heart do the rest. Stop thinking with your noodle, and use that wing-winning ticker that got you Fizzy-Pop, Starlight, me and the girls.”

“I can’t always help that,” Twilight confessed, gently pushing her away. She maintained contact with Pinkie’s forelegs, folded against her breast. “I can’t help how I feel, Pinkie. Just like I can’t ignore the fact that Starlight’s like this because of me, or that—” Twilight squeaked, voice failing her. She blinked her tears away. “That my misguidance in the application of my title hasn’t exacerbated the issue.”

“The only thing you have to worry about right now is finding a quiet place for you and Starlight to chitchat, and maybe decorate your gourd, eh? Eh?” Pinkie added, elbowing Twilight. “Don’t fret! Maudie’s got something special that’ll butter up Starlight to some good old friendship sappiness. She’ll be in the mindset for yours, totally, for sure!”

“You really think so?” Twilight shuddered.

“You saw her gut reaction, Twilight, all of us did! Starlight was leaking joy from her eye-holes over this party. She loves it, I tell ya! She loves her friends, and what you tried to do for her. Even if she doesn’t love it a hundred percent, there’s a part of her that does, and we gotta pull that part of her into the light!”  

She ought to have asked Pinkie this sooner, ever intuitive about a pony’s happiness. Just another failing I’ll have to amend for. The newfound mission kept Twilight’s heart from descending into darkness.

“She really needed this party first, though. Didn’t she?” Twilight mused. Ahead, pairs of new friends and old, furred and shelled, milled between, funneling down the tunnel. By now everycreature was getting their gourds if they hadn’t decorated one already. “We both did, I think,” she added, touching her warming heart. “So many new connections are being made today.”

“A-greed! Yeah! Stick to that mindset like white on rice; think of all the good that came from this!” Pinkie turned and began bouncing away. “I’ll be seein’ ya, Twilight, I’mma go find Maudileena!” she called back.

“Okay! You’ll find me in here, probably!” Pinkie called out something that was smothered by the cacophony of friendship, faint electronic bass drums, and cheering from wherever that fruitball game was being held. “It’ll be fine,” Twilight sighed. “Everything will be just fine.”

Regardless of whatever lied upon the surface, at the core of her being, Starlight was touched, flattered, and moved to have been greeted, loved, and thanked by so many wonderful friends and neighbors.

Her family.

Nothing that the witches could do or threaten would ever change that.