“How am I supposed to get back at you if nothing I do matters?!” Wallflower screamed, her voice cracking in anguish.
Sunset glanced back at her friends, who were still observing the argument with a slew of confused and apprehensive stares. As much as part of Sunset wanted to yell at Wallflower again, she thought better of it. She only had a few minutes to save her friends’ memories, a goal Wallflower certainly wasn’t making any easier.
“N-nothing... Nothing I do matters...” Wallflower whimpered, trailing off as she backed away. Her cheeks reddened as tears trickled from her soft brown eyes, and she glared at Sunset from within her anguished expression. “It's just like you said years ago—no one would even notice if I-I was gone.”
Sunset sighed, shivering at the bitter taste of her own self-resentment. She knew Wallflower had to have been a victim of her years spent bullying other students. Many of her worst jeers and insults were tailored to be as hurtful as possible to her target, and while Sunset didn't remember saying such a thing, she was far too conscious of her own horrid behavior to doubt Wallflower's words. The sincere pain Sunset saw in Wallflower’s eyes left her as intent at repairing the damage she’d caused as she was with getting her friends back.
“Well I was wrong,” Sunset said. She stepped closer, driven by mounting guilt as much as fear. She looked to the horizon, the fading embers of sunlight only adding to the weight of anxiety, and her priorities shifted back. The third day was almost over, and Sunset needed to get that stone now. “I’ll make it up to you, okay? I promise.”
Wallflower was silent, even as her breaths came quicker. She stared at the ground as her hands clenched and unclenched at her sides, and Sunset recognized the slightest trembling in her knees. Beneath Wallflower’s lengthy bangs of green hair, tears rolled slowly down her face, their trails glinting faintly in the dim glows of dusk.
Sunset bit her lip, her stomach turning at the prospect of antagonizing such a distraught girl even further. When she turned around, she saw her friends still looking on from afar, talking amongst themselves in hushed voices far too quiet for Sunset to hear. She pushed her trepidation to the back of her mind, even as Wallflower’s cries echoed softly in her ears. Sunset took a brief moment to remind herself that she had to do whatever was necessary to get her friends back.
Another glance at the sky only confirmed that she was running out of time. She turned back to Wallflower, who was now whimpering between shallow breaths. Sunset reached her hand out, as if to take hold of Wallflower’s own. “I know what it's like to be lonely, Wallflower. I can help you,” she said. “Please, just give me the stone so I can have my friends back, then we can—”
“No!” Wallflower’s sudden scream made Sunset jolt. “Get away from me!”
Wallflower stumbled backwards, her hand reaching into her bag. Sunset’s heart skipped a beat when she saw the smooth gray curve of the memory stone rising from within, firmly in the grasp of Wallflower’s shaky hand.
It was so close. If Sunset could just get a little closer, she could snatch it, and then—
“I said get away!”
Sunset froze on the spot. Wallflower was pointing the memory stone right at her, its cold gaze staring into Sunset’s eyes. The space between them fell into an intense stillness, as if the world itself had stopped breathing.
It was Wallflower who broke the silence. “You don’t want to ‘make it up to me!’” she shouted, her voice cracking. “You just want to undo everything I did! You c-couldn’t care less about me!”
“That’s not true,” Sunset said. She did her best to keep her words calm and measured, even as her heart pounded in her chest. “I want my friends back, yes. And I care about y—”
“Shut up!” Wallflower shut her eyes tightly, her freckled cheeks wet with tears. “J-just shut up! I know you don’t care about me—no one cares about me!”
At that, Sunset winced, the fresh memories of her own years of isolation weighing heavily on her mind. Even with her goal of breaking the memory stone almost in reach, she couldn’t help but feel awful for the now-sobbing girl before her.
Wallflower kept crying, her entire frame shrinking with every broken shudder of her lungs. “No o-one cares about me... Not even m-m-me...” She fell to her knees, clutching the memory stone to her chest like a child would a favorite doll. “Nothing I do matters... I don’t matter...”
Sunset held her breath. This was her chance to end things peacefully. She knelt down before Wallflower, holding her hand out once more. “You matter to me,” she said, smiling.
For a moment, Wallflower stared back in silence, her eyes wide and misty. She looked at the stone, then at Sunset, then at the whispering girls in the distance. She wiped her eyes and let out another shaky exhale. “I-I’m so tired of being alone...”
Sunset inched closer. “I know,” she said, “but you don’t have to be alone anymore.”
“I’m so, s-so tired... All the time...” Wallflower turned the stone over in her hands, staring into its colorless eye.
“I really do want your life to be better, Wallflower,” Sunset said. She watched Wallflower carefully, wary for any flinch that may indicate her lashing out. “Please, let’s help each other, okay? Don’t you want to be included?”
As soon as those words left Sunset’s lips, Wallflower stiffened up, her whimpers fading. She tried to blink away her tears, taking several deep breaths. The sudden shift left Sunset uneasy, and she wavered as she spoke up.
“Wallflower?”
Wallflower's brief composure cracked, and years of loneliness and misery flooded down her tear-stained cheeks. Her lips parted as if to speak, only to be drawn into a thin, silent line.
Then, in an instant, the space between them was filled with a brilliant blue glow. The memory stone’s engravings were illuminated with shining cerulean light, and Sunset recoiled. She stumbled back as all of her thoughts were scrambled by the fresh panic seeping through her veins, and she waited for the coming burst of Equestrian magic to assault her mind. After a few seconds passed without anything happening, Sunset barely opened her eyes, squinting at the scene before her.
Wallflower sat still, the memory stone still in her hands. Her long hair was billowing every-which-way, waving about in the rushing air like so many tangled vines. She stared unblinking into the impossibly bright light radiating from the stone's eye, her face sunken with a renewed, empty despair that made Sunset’s heart ache. The tears on her cheeks shone like sapphires within the blue haze of magical energy, but when she looked up at Sunset, her face did not betray the slightest hint of emotion.
Sunset shielded her eyes from the glow. Behind her, she heard her friends’ voices call out with a cacophony of shouts and screams. Still, the magic did not come, and the trepidation only made Sunset’s pulse beat even harder. It thundered in her ears between her every rapid breath—only to nearly stop when she at last realized what Wallflower was doing.
“Wallflower!” Sunset cried, reaching blindly forward. “You don’t have to do this! I can help you—!”
The only response Sunset received was a second wave of energy knocking her to the ground.
“Wallflower, please!”
Then, just like that, the blue glow vanished, and Sunset tried to get up. For a moment everything was still, but before she could speak, another flash of light left her reeling. When she opened her eyes again, her words died beneath a horrified gasp.
Thousands of ribbons were bursting forth from Wallflower’s forehead, shimmering with every color imaginable. Wallflower’s face twisted with pain as every thought, every memory, every piece of herself she’d ever known was forcibly torn out of her body. Her anguished cries fell into a single agonizing scream that echoed across the parking lot, deafening Sunset to every other sound in the world. The twirling storm of ribbons glowed brightly with magical energy as they swarmed together above Wallflower’s head. Her tortured screams at last died in her throat, leaving behind a breathless gasp.
Then, all her memories converged into a single verdant beam that was sucked into the memory stone, vanishing entirely. As soon as it did, the air fell silent and still once more, as if nothing had happened at all.
“Wallflower!”
Without a word, Wallflower collapsed lifelessly to the ground. The memory stone tumbled from her grasp, clattering across the asphalt before rolling to a stop in front of Sunset. She paid it no mind, instead scrambling to her feet and rushing to Wallflower’s side.
“W-Wallflower! Can you hear me? Wallflower!” Sunset grabbed Wallflower by the shoulders, struggling to flip her body over. The second Sunset saw Wallflower’s face, her breath left her entirely.
The soft brown eyes that had glared at Sunset only moments ago were now half-lidded and glossy. They gazed up at the ever-darkening sky, unseeing and empty. Wallflower’s lips were just barely parted, and impossibly quiet breaths came in and out. Other than the slow, slow rise and fall of her chest, Wallflower was completely motionless, as if she had fallen asleep and only her body’s autonomous functions remained.
“No, no no no n-no no!” Sunset screamed, desperately shaking the totally limp girl in her grasp. “Wallflower! Wallflower!”
Sunset didn’t bother to wipe the tears from her eyes as she clung to Wallflower’s body, cradling her as she cried and cried. She heard the voices of her friends as they ran over, but their words were indecipherable beneath the sound of Sunset’s own sobs. She hugged Wallflower as tightly as she could, as if doing so would somehow impart Sunset’s own liveliness into the empty shell of a girl in her arms.
As her desperation reached a fever pitch, Sunset took hold of Wallflower’s wrist. Maybe there was something left, some part of Wallflower’s soul that Sunset could draw out with the power of her geode. Her eyes flashed white, and she held her breath as she awaited whatever fragments of Wallflower’s mind still existed for her to see.
She saw nothing, not even blackness. There was nothing left to see. Wallflower was gone.
The glow in Sunset’s eyes faded, and a trembling exhale left her as anguish and panic tore her mind into a frenzy. This couldn’t be happening. She wanted to help Wallflower, to right the wrongs she had committed against her, and now she would never have the chance. Sunset had forgotten this girl existed at all, and instead of making up for her past sins, Sunset had instead pushed Wallflower to... To...
Sunset gasped, a hitched sob cracking in her throat. Even if Wallflower’s body remained, her life was entirely over—and it was all Sunset’s fault.
“Sunset! Look at me!”
Her horrified reverie was shattered by a barking voice beside her. Sunset looked up, and through her tears she saw the girls who were once her friends clustered around her and Wallflower. Rainbow Dash was standing closest, her expression a mix of terror and fury.
“I said look at me! Who is she?” Rainbow Dash shouted at her. “Did she do this? Did you do this? Answer me!”
“I-I... I didn’t—”
“Don’t you lie to me, Sunset Shimmer!” Applejack spoke up, her green eyes flaring with anger. “I always knew you were low, but this?” She jabbed a finger at Wallflower, still lying motionless within Sunset’s embrace. “This is sick!"
Rarity glared daggers at her. “Whatever just happened to this poor girl, you will undo it this instant!”
Sunset blinked. She could undo it. In all her panic and horror, she had forgotten about the stone.
She could still save Wallflower. Above her, the last bands of light were vanishing beneath the horizon. She could save all of them.
“The memory stone!” Sunset’s head swiveled, searching the asphalt for the stone. She spotted it just beside Twilight. “Right there! Twilight, right next to you!”
“Huh?” Twilight took a step back. She glanced down, then bent over and gently lifted the memory stone in her hands. “What about it?”
“We need to break it! She used it to erase all her memories, but they're still—all your memories are still in there!” Sunset stammered, her words tumbling over each other as she spoke rapidly. She turned to Applejack, seeing the orange geode around her neck. “Applejack, you have to destroy it!”
Applejack looked back at her, apprehension plain on her face. She gestured to Wallflower’s lifeless body. “And how do I know this ain’t gonna do the same thing to the rest of us?”
Sunset whimpered, her lungs tightening in her chest. “Please...!” More tears filled her eyes. “Look at me, Applejack! Do you r-really think I’m lying about this?”
For a moment, all was silent. Applejack stared at Sunset, her expression entirely unreadable. Sunset clung to Wallflower a little tighter, repeating her silent pleading with every shaky breath.
Finally, Applejack’s eyes hardened. “Give it here, Twilight," she said.
“What?” Twilight stiffened up. “Y-yeah, okay...” She handed the stone to Applejack, who turned her gaze to match its unblinking eye.
“Wait, Applejack!” Rainbow Dash spoke up, her arms raising in protest. "You aren’t seriously... I mean... It’s Sunset Shimmer! Are you really just gonna take her word for it?”
Applejack held the stone in her hand, gripping it tightly. "I am," she said. Without another word, she gritted her teeth and crushed the stone to pieces.
Everything disappeared as blinding light filled Sunset's vision.