Cigar Dream was a psychologist. An earth pony, he’d moved to the Crystal Empire shortly after its return. It was a move he made out of a belief that many crystal ponies would struggle to adapt to a world that had forgotten them for a thousand years. He counseled those struggling with grief for relatives long-dead, and helped those without purpose find new reasons to continue living.
When the first war came, he changed the focus of his practice, becoming an expert in traumatic stress so he could help those crystal pony veterans who screamed in the night. When the second, third, fourth and fifth conflicts came, he soothed the fears of the general population, who were consumed by anxiety that their nation would soon fall.
Eighteen years after he arrived in the Crystal Empire, when he was just realizing he was no longer a young doctor but was in fact an old doctor, he got his first changeling patient. Her name was Mirage, and she was fifteen years old.
She was one of Cheval’s clutch sisters—one of the other grubs that had been given to Cadence, who Cadence had in turn given to noteable crystal pony families to raise. Her parents were named Quartz Strike and Rose Cut, and she had two crystal pony sisters named Fire Stone and Heliodor. Her family brought her to therapy because they were worried about her.
Every time she turned into a pony she started crying, and nobody knew why.
Cigar Dream worked with her for years. He wrote a paper on her, with the first objective proof that changelings could suffer from clinical depression. When standard techniques proved ineffective, he experimented, and the two found ways to make her feel better. She began to heal. When the war broke out, she swore herself to the Crystal Empire without hesitation, and sought to join the army.
The army refused her, saying it would be too easy for her to be mistaken for a hostile changeling soldier. So instead she joined the nursing corps, studied medicine with all her free hours, and devoted herself to healing wounded soldiers.
When the secret police came for her, Cigar Dream hid her. He stuffed her under the loose floorboards in his office, and then had an Equestrian pegasus friend fly her to Ponyville, with her transformed into a book in his saddlebags. He never saw her again, but he hoped she was okay.
Years later, when the war was over, Cigar thought about going back to Equestria. He was a well-respected expert in his field, and his practice in the Crystal Empire had done very well, but it didn’t hold the charm for him it once did. He was single well into his forties, but he entertained the thought that he might find an earth pony wife yet.
He was sitting in his chair, smoking and considering the thought, when there came a knock at his door. Two crystal ponies were there, each dressed in identical camouflage uniforms. Their expressions were hard, and they carried weapons. “You will come with us now,” one of them said.
For a long moment, he stared at them. The smoke from his cigar curled up into the air. His dreams of finally meeting the right mare faded before his eyes.
“Finally caught me, did you?” he asked.
The two crystal ponies didn’t answer. They grabbed him by the shoulders and shoved him into the back of a waiting carriage.
The carriage had poor suspension. In the back, Cigar Dream felt every bump in the road. He hoped it wasn’t a long ride to wherever he was going to be killed.
He passed the time analyzing his own emotional reactions. He’d seen so many patients struggling to cope with death. Now that it was his turn, he felt almost disappointed his state wasn’t more dramatic.
But as he analyzed, he realized that the quality of the road under the carriage was improving. They were not headed out into the countryside, but into the uptown, where the roads were made of solid quartz and polished smooth. The carriage pulled to a halt, and the two ponies pulled him from the back.
He was outside the Crystal Palace. A wall that did not used to be there surrounded the entire square, protecting the Crystal Heart. It was topped with barbed wire, and manned around the clock by hundreds of guards. The palace itself, once an elegant spire, had been turned into a fortress. Weapons bristled from every balcony and battlement, and squadrons of pegasi circled it at all times, mindful for threats from above.
They brought him inside, to a series of rooms that seemed to be a luxurious apartment. There they sat him down, and told him to wait.
Flurry Heart arrived an hour later.
Her official title was the Warrior Princess of the Crystal Empire, but many ponies simply called her the Alicorn of War. She was eternally eighteen, no child, but a warrior captured at the moment of her greatest vigor. She had the strength of an earth pony knight, the agility of a pegasus raider, and the arcane power of a great mage. And she was armed.
It was her raiment. Celestia would never be seen without her hoofboots and crown, and Flurry Heart would never be seen without her battle armor and glaive.
“You must be Doctor Dream,” she said, taking her seat. She didn’t wait for him to answer. “I’ve heard you’re the most respected psychologist in the Empire. Let me be clear that I detest your profession and all other flavors of hoof-holders. But I’ve heard that you have a history of producing results, and I require your help. If you serve me well and discreetly, you will be richly rewarded.”
Cigar Dream’s mouth had gone dry. It took him several seconds to remember to nod. “What symptoms are you experiencing?”
“Paranoia. I have difficulty trusting ponies.”
“Ah.” He rubbed his hooves together and wished for his notebook, if only so he had something to keep his jaw occupied. “Most ponies with paranoia-like symptoms don’t seek treatment. They don’t believe that they’re unwell. They just think they’re surrounded by very untrustworthy ponies.”
“I’m not a common patient, doctor,” Flurry snapped, a sharp edge entering her tone.
“No.” He croaked, his throat suddenly tight. “But was there a specific incident that made you believe you needed treatment?”
Flurry blew out a breath. “There’s a vacancy in the cabinet. We need a new minister of finance. I thought I’d have to pry my administrators apart to stop them from fighting for the position. But nopony wants the job. There’s a mare named Fairy Gold. Brilliant economist, sharp bureaucrat, and a very ambitious mare. She likes power and she likes money. And as soon as she heard the position was open, she had her own husband break her leg so she could use a hospital visit to Equestria to remove herself from consideration.”
“Mmm.” Cigar nodded once. “And why did she do that?”
“She’s afraid of me.” Flurry stiffened her spine as she said it, sitting up straighter.
“Afraid of you in general?” Cigar gestured. “Or afraid of something more specific?”
“She…” Flurry shifted in her seat. “Felt that… many members of the cabinet end up being… sent away, and—”
“Killed,” Cigar interrupted her. “You mean she felt that you’ve had many members of the cabinet killed.”
Flurry’s eyes narrowed, and her face twisted into a snarl. “They were plotting against me.”
“If…” Cigar felt hot under the firefly lamps, pinpricks of sweat breaking out over his body. “If they really were plotting against you, then you aren’t paranoid. You just have enemies. And if your problem is that ponies think you’re paranoid, you need a public relations advisor. Not a psychologist. Paranoia is when you believe ponies are plotting against you when they aren’t.”
Flurry said nothing. A croak emerged from Cigar’s throat. “If you want treatment, I am…” He struggled to speak. “I will be, happy to treat you. But no good ever comes of trying to treat a pony who doesn’t believe they’re ill. I can’t cure you, if you don’t want to be cured.”
“Silver Scales was a corrupt pony and a terrible minister of finance. He stole from the people and he would have conspired against me, given the opportunity. I do not apologize for demanding genuine loyalty from my subordinates.” Flurry’s words came out hot, and the snarl remained on her face. But as time passed, it slowly faded, replaced by something more hesitant.
“But…” she said, “having him beheaded may have been…”
Her eyes prompted Cigar to bail her out. But he refused, forcing her to say the word. Finally she mumbled: “Unreasonable.”
“Well. Well then. Let’s…” He cleared his throat. “Let’s start you on one session a week. Do you have an hour now?”
Sometimes, patients came to sessions because they needed medical help. Sometimes, they came because they wanted somepony they could talk to.
When the yak raised a statue of Yona in their capital square, and Equestria sent an expeditionary force to protect the yak’s independence, Flurry raged. She screamed obscenities into Cigar Dream’s face, smashed furniture, and threatened to drown Equestria and the north alike in blood.
“It’s Celestia,” she shouted, pacing back and forth across the floor in front of his chair. “She’s always hated us. Always! She tortured my mother by making her a ruler, then left us all to suffer under Amaryllis, and now that the yak are plotting against us in turn, she helps them.”
“Is raising a statue to a war hero really plotting against the Crystal Empire?”
“A war hero for the other side. A collaborator. I put her on trial,” Flurry screamed so hard her voice cracked. “I made her confess to war crimes against her own people!”
“Maybe so,” Cigar weathered the storm, “But is raising a statue of her the same as plotting against the Crystal Empire?”
“You don’t get it. This is how it starts. First, they honor Yona as a war hero. Then they start to say, if she was a hero, she must have fought for the right side. Heroes don’t fight for the villian. Then they say that we must have been the villains. And then one day,” she gestured sharply with a hoof, “years from now, when the Crystal Empire is weak and they’re strong, they’ll turn on us!”
“So you want to attack them. Occupy their nation.”
“Yes, obviously!” she snapped.
“For how long?”
“Until they accept they were on the wrong side of the war.”
“And how long is that?” Cigar asked. “When is it over?”
“It’s over,” Flurry snarled, “when all my enemies are dead!”
“Are the yak your enemies?”
Flurry’s horn glowed. Her glaive swung around, and pressed up against Cigar’s neck. “I don’t find your jokes funny,” she said.
His face had gone white as a sheet. A thin line of blood ran down the edge of her weapon. “I wasn’t joking. The last race that lifted a hoof against you was exterminated to the last child. The yak have raised their hooves against you. And so I’m asking. Are the yak your enemies?”
“I…” Flurry hesitated, then withdrew the blade from his throat. “No. No, they’re… they’re not.”
“I’d like to hear you repeat that. Please say, ‘the yak are not my enemies.’”
“The yak are not my enemies,” Flurry said. It seemed to make her uncomfortable. She stood in silence for several moments after, shifting her stance on the floor. “The yak are not my enemies,” she said again, unbidden.
Cigar rubbed at his throat, and his hoof came back red. “Why don’t we take a break? I think I need a bandage.”
“The changelings were different,” Flurry said as he rose. “They were monsters. They couldn’t be reasoned with.”
Then she said, “I’m not a bad pony.”
The next week, Flurry missed her appointment because a cabinet meeting went long. The week after that, she missed her appointment because she was busy searching for a new Minister of the Interior. Cigar Dream could see the ashen expressions of the ponies in the palace. Guards watched them at all times. A unicorn bureaucrat in a resplendent uniform cried softly at his desk.
When Flurry walked into the royal suite, she sat in her chair quietly. She didn’t rage or smash the furniture. Her glaive rested by her side.
“I didn’t used to be this way,” she said.
The scar on Cigar Dream’s neck hadn’t quite healed yet. But he said, “I believe you.” Then he asked, “Could you tell me your cutie mark story, please?”
“Everypony knows that. Cheval overthrew my mother, I thwarted her, my mother wasn’t fit to rule, blah blah.”
“Everypony knows that story, yes. But those events would have taken place over several days at least. Your cutie mark appears at one specific moment. What was that moment?”
“I, uh…” Flurry gestured at the wall. “I was in the throne room. My coronation.”
“Was that it? They put the crown on your head and your cutie mark appeared in a flash?”
“Yes.”
Cigar hesitated a moment, then he put down his notebook and pen. “A cutie mark doesn’t appear in response to external events. It’s internal. Something about you. Was there something about you that changed when they put the crown on your head?”
Flurry didn’t answer, and so he prompted her again: “What were you thinking at that moment?”
“That I wouldn’t be my mother,” Flurry said. “I… knew the journey ahead would be hard. And I knew I would have to do hard things. I knew there would be ponies who would call me a monster. But I would not hesitate to do what needed to be done.”
“There’s a phrase you use a lot. ‘It’s not over until all my enemies are dead.’ Is that what you were thinking at that moment?”
“I…” Flurry nodded, slowly. “I suppose. More or less.”
“And do you have any enemies left?”
“Yes, it…” She froze, then she shook her head. “No. It’s not like that. The changelings were a scourge on the universe. They needed to be crushed. I did what had to be done.”
“Respectfully, your highness, I didn’t ask that. I asked if you have any enemies left now. You have rivals, certainly. Petty irritations. Incompetent subordinates. But the changeling race is gone, and communism has failed. There are no nations left who seek to conquer us. So today, right now, at this moment, do you have any enemies?”
“I will, one day. I’m immortal. Creatures will grow to hate me.”
“Are you comfortable with hate as an emotion?” Cigar asked.
“I don’t…” Flurry clenched her jaw. “I don’t know what that means.”
“You said you didn’t used to be this way. Do you think you got along better with the bureaucracy when you could all hate Amaryllis together?”
“Hate can’t make a pony an alicorn,” Flurry said softly. “I’m good. I’m a good pony. I embody harmony.”
“We are harmonious with the changelings,” Cigar said, his voice tight. “We haven’t had a dispute with them in years. And with the International Party. There are no discordant notes in silence. Will we be harmonious with the yak next? What about the diamond dogs? What about Equestria?”
Flurry lifted her head. “You’re a sympathizer.”
“I had a changeling patient. One of Cheval’s sisters,” he said. “And you murdered her family.”
Flurry picked up her glaive.
She stared at Cigar, then at her weapon. “You should flee the country,” she said, “before I change my mind.”
Later, Flurry called Twilight to the Crystal Empire. Though long healed from her injuries, Twilight entered the throne room with a contemptuous sneer on her face.
“What is it, Flurry?” she demanded, “Looking for some quality time with your aunt? Or did you want to bend my ear about how your latest atrocities are all for the greater good?”
“No. No.” Flurry lapsed into silence, and stared at the floor for a long time. Long enough that Twilight became uncomfortable, and noticed the haggard expression on Flurry’s face.
Then Flurry said: “It’s over.”