//------------------------------// // Cold (Simply Rarity) // Story: The League of Sweetie Belles // by GMBlackjack //------------------------------// Light flakes of snow fell from the overcast sky, lazily drifting through the soft breeze of a winter day. Hearth’s Warming Eve had come and gone and everypony was starting to look forward to when Winter Wrap-Up would clear the fluffy cold away. They wanted spring and warmth to return. Cinder wasn’t having any of that. Winter was beautiful. Maybe it was just because her home universe was in the middle of summer at the moment, but she loved the look of the snow as it fell in the streets of the local Canterlot. There was a light dusting of the fluff everywhere without an overhang, giving a slight crunch to every hoofstep. It was too fluffy to be slippery in most places, so she could just enjoy it. She smiled brightly - sometimes, simple was nice. Celia walked to her, her pointed hooves making a slight scraping sound as she moved. “I’ve discovered why we can’t find a trace of a Twilight in this universe.” She handed a newspaper over to Cinder. “We’re in the past.” “How far?” Cinder asked, perusing the newspaper. “...Dates change between universes sometimes.” Celia pointed a hoof at an article showing a unicorn at Princess Celestia’s side. “Sunset’s still Celestia’s student.” “Oh. Well, that would do it, huh?” Cinder folded the newspaper up, eventually turning it into a shield. She tossed it around, catching it in her hoof a few times. “Plan?” Celia shrugged. “Standard Equestria. I’m going to take Suzie to Celestia, see if I’ve still got the usual diplomatic charm or if I’m going to get us kicked out.” She chuckled as she examined one of her pointed hooves. “First time for everything.” “You’ll do fine,” Cinder encouraged. “What about me?” “You and Blink can hang around and do whatever. It’s Canterlot in winter. Get yourself something nice.” She winked before trotting off. “Did you get that Blink?” Cinder called. Blink revealed herself to be standing right next to Cinder. “You know, your knack for knowing when I’m here and listening is off putting.” “So’s your ability to turn invisible.” Cinder grinned. “Touche.” Blink yawned. “So, what do you wanna do?” Cinder did a small dance on the snow, moving her hooves around quickly. “Dunno. Walk around until something happens?” “You mean dance around?” “Yep!” Cinder tap-danced toward some storefronts. “You know, you’re not good at that.” “Yep!” Cinder repeated, smirking. “But it’s the snow Blink!” “For a fire pony you sure like the snow a lot. Shouldn’t this be more, I dunno, Cryo’s schtick?” “Cryo appreciating the weather and nature.” Cinder rolled her eyes. “There’s an idea.” “You know what I mean,” Blink said, adjusting her shades. “Yep! So…” Cinder sat down, looking around at the various shops. “Where to first?” “Antiques,” Blink said, jumping over to a large antiques store. “Who knows what kind of cool stuff you might find in there?” “On a normal Equis?” “Yeah! Come on!” Blink jumped through the front doors. With a sigh, Cinder trotted up to the Antiques shop. She opened the doors to find row upon row of old, mysterious treasure. And, as expected, absolutely no sign of Blink. Considering her situation, Cinder realized she had two options. She could spend her day trying to find Blink in a store filled to the brim with maze-like corridors of ancient, breakable treasure… or she could go out and wander Canterlot on her own, see what else she could find. Remembering the last few times she’d bothered to play Blink’s little games, Cinder decided she wasn’t going to play today. Let her sit in the store for a few hours and wonder where Cinder had gone. Bet she’ll feel silly realizing she hid in here for so long. Cinder left the store and kept walking. She didn’t really have any idea where she was going, but she knew she’d find something eventually. Her assumption turned out to be correct, but not in the way she was expecting. Arriving at one of Canterlot’s many balconies, she allowed herself to gaze out upon the winter wonderland that was Equestria. All the rolling hills were coated in a blanket of pristine snow, glistening in the light of the sun. Forests were patches of green speckled with ever-present white, and the smoke of cabin fires could be seen rising out of the canopy. Cinder grinned. She knew where she was going. Who needed this city? She had the simple joys of winter to experience. She ran off to find the quickest way down Canterlot Mountain. ~~~ “She just went into the Antiques store,” Cryo reported. “Her amazing quest must be in there!” “...I don’t think she’s on an amazing quest,” Curio said. Cryo turned to glare at Curio. “She’s been in this universe several hours and nothing’s happened. That’s not how it works. Something goes down. Always! And we’re gonna be there when it does. And we are going to be great.” “Aren’t we supposed to be on a mission?” Sriracha asked, munching on one of her peppers. “Like, exploring, or…?” “We’ll get to that,” Cryo said, waving a hoof. “Just gotta do this quick…” “Mattie?” Sriracha asked. “Are w-” Mattie lazily opened an eye. “Mate, she’s got it in her head that she needs to do this, let her get it out of her system. And prepare for everything to crash and burn later.” She yawned. “Got another one of those death peppers on ya?” Sriracha tossed her a pepper. She caught it in her mouth and immediately started crying and whimpering. “That… hits the spot…” Cryo rolled her eyes, turning her attention back to the Antiques store. “We go on three. One. Two. Three!” She ran as fast as she could across the street and into the Antiques shop. Sliding through the front doors, she held a hoof high in the air. “My nemesis! We meet again under the mo-” She stopped herself once she noticed the only pony she could see was the cashier, who was fixing the loud pony with a death glare. “Don’t mind her,” Curio said, sliding into the store. “She just gets excited. Think we can have a look around?” “...Sure,” the cashier said, returning to his magazine. “So, clearly, they’re hiding from us…” Cryo deduced. “She was with Blink,” Curio admitted. “Hide and seek then?” Sriracha asked. “I could use the aerosol…” “Leeeeet’s not cover the entire store with painful pepper powder,” Curio said. “Let’s do,” Mattie smirked. Curio facehooved. “To find Blink, you have to be creative. She can make herself completely invisible, but in situations where the danger isn’t alarming, you can find her by listening and looking for evidence of her. For instance, see this scrape here?” She pointed at a spot in the ground her visor was highlighting. “This is from a hoof about her size, heading this direction.” “Good work!” Cryo beamed. “Let’s find the ghost!” She trotted in the direction Curio had indicated, right into a section filled with lots of fine china. Mattie frowned. “Cryo, it might be a-” Blink appeared next to Cryo and shouted “BOO!” “-trap.” Mattie rolled her eyes and Cryo instinctively shot a beam of ice out of her horn, hitting a plate of rare china larger than most ponies. It fell over and shattered into dozens of pieces, tipping over numerous other dishes as well. Curio’s telekinesis managed to keep more from breaking, but the damage had already been done. Several valuable, perhaps priceless plates were no more. “Blink!” Cryo shouted. “How… Why!?” “You were snooping,” Blink said, nonchalantly examining her hoof. “What did you expect, for me to make it easy? Come on, you should know better.” “It is a dangerous game you play, ghost. But I am up to the ante! Your sneaky shenanigans will fall to my icy cri-” “Ahem!” Blink and Cryo looked up from their confrontation to see the cashier glaring at them. “Ma’am, are you going to be able to pay for what your kids just broke?” Cryo looked for Mattie - but she was inexplicably nowhere to be found. Instead, the cashier was addressing Sriracha, the only Sweetie of adult appearance in the group. She had the decency to lower her ears. “Uh, how much?” “Three thousand bits.” “W-WHAT!?” Sriracha gasped. “I… Mattie had the card a… I am going to kill her…” The cashier frowned. “I’ll have to call your bank, since I can’t have you le-” “Every-Sweetie run!” Sriracha shouted, tossing a pepper into the cashier’s face. It exploded, getting the spice into his eyes. He let out a scream and fell back, holding his face with his hooves. The Sweeties didn’t wait - they rushed out of the Antiques shop as fast as their hooves could carry them, scrambling onto the snowy streets. “He’ll call the cops you know!” Blink shouted. “Uh, I, uh…” Sriracha bit her lip. “Challenge accepted!” Cryo laughed. “Now we’ll show Cinder h- wait. Blink, where is she?” ~~~ Cinder found herself in a forest, a half-inch of snow crunching under her hooves. Behind her, Canterlot was easily visible, but distant enough that it didn’t dominate the skyline. Furthermore, it was behind her, so she didn’t have to look at it unless she was twirling. She was dancing, though, and occasional twirls were part of that, but she didn’t mind the city. It reminded her that ponies existed and it wasn’t just her alone in this forest. Even if she liked the idea of dancing her heart out far from the sight of anyone, she knew better. She would just dance like there was no one watching. Skip over a frozen river, swing from a snowy branch, and, of course, twirl with fire on her hooves. She’d gotten really good at controlling her fire output, allowing it to touch her skin without burning it. Lighting her entire body on fire was still dangerous but she could control a few hoof-fulls easy, tracing melty paths through the winter air. It had stopped actively snowing. The sky was still that simple light gray that always came with snow clouds, and she liked it that way just fine. Some would call it dreary. She would say it brought the rest of the world’s colors out perfectly. I’m turning into my sister. Heh. Her ears perked - she heard laughing. Children laughing. Young children at that. And yet, it sounded familiar, somehow. She followed the noise to a path cutting through the forest. Having half-expected to find some kind of monstrous witch creature that lured ponies in with the sound of laughing children, she was more than relieved to see two white fillies dancing along the snowy path. They looked so beautiful, dancing like that. One was clearly a Rarity, with a curled purple mane and brilliant blue eyes, though she didn’t have her cutie mark yet. Cinder’s first thought that the other, younger one was a Sweetie Belle, but she wasn’t quite right. Her mane was blue rather than pastel pink and purple, and there was no sign of natural curls. Cinder shook her head - it would hardly have been the first time she came across an alternate Sweetie Belle with a different mane. For all she knew there were lots of Sweeties with blue manes walking around. She even thought she remembered a few back at the League. Deciding that wasn’t important, she returned to watching their dance. They pranced and bounced about in the most eye-catching way Cinder could think of. Who cared if Rarity was the only one who knew how to dance? The smaller Sweetie was just as into it as she was, and her haphazard bouncing nonsense was just as endearing. They jumped around with a large cloak between the two of them, the only possession Cinder could make out. Treating it like a third dancer. For all Cinder knew, that cloak may have been like a lifelong friend to them. She smiled. They clearly didn’t have much. And yet here they were, enjoying themselves in this beautiful winter day without a care in the world. When they finished the dance and bowed to each other, Cinder erupted in applause. Rarity’s smile vanished instantly, pulling her younger sister behind her. “W-who are you?” she said with a meek, yet dignified and well articulated voice. Aww, that’s so adorable. I can’t wait to tell Xenium I got to see her as a filly! “I’m Cinder!” Cinder said, smiling warmly. “And that was some amazing dancing. Really works with the snow and… well, everything! You were beautiful.” Rarity allowed herself to smile. “W-well, I am a pony of grace.” “May I know who I’m complimenting?” Cinder asked, even though she knew the answer. “I am Rarity,” Rarity announced. “And this is…” “U-unique!” the filly chirped with a slight slur, indicating that she hadn’t been talking all that long. The chattering of her teeth didn’t help matters either. “Yes, Unique,” Rarity confirmed. “Princess Unique!” She nuzzled the tiny unicorn. Unique…? Interesting… Cinder’s smile widened. “A princess, huh?” “Y-yeah!” Unique put the cloak on and let the back of it billow in the slight breeze. She struck a pose for Cinder. “Regal,” Cinder agreed. “Worthy of the best of royalty.” Rarity giggled, prompting Unique to follow suit. “You look cold…” Cinder observed. “Hold on a sec…” She used her magic to lift a dead tree branch into the air and snap it in multiple places dropping it on the ground in front of them. With a small flash of her horn, she lit it on fire. “There! I bet you two’d like to get warm, wouldn’t you.” Unique stared at the fires in awe. At first, Rarity looked like she was about to pull her sister away from the mysterious pony’s fire but she couldn’t resist the warmth herself. She moved closer and tossed her mane back, breathing in happily. “So warm…” “You two have been out here a while, huh?” Cinder asked. Rarity nodded. “Just moving on to the next town…” She reached into the pocket of the cloak and pulled out a small book - maybe a journal - flipping it open. “...Ponyville! That’s the closest.” “Ponyville’s a great place! I’m from there myself, you know.” “Really?” Rarity’s eyes grew wide. “Do… are all the ponies as nice as you?” “Most of them, actually,” Cinder said, sitting down in the snow. “When you get there you won’t have to be cold all the time.” “Yay!” Unique cheered. Cinder nodded. “The ponies are real nice. Let’s see…” Who can I talk about that was actually around when Rarity was a filly? Applejack’s a filly right now and… “The Apple Family’s great. They run an apple orchard at the edge of town. Granny Smith even helped found it!” “Wow. She must be old,” Rarity said. “She is,” Cinder said. “But she’s nice anyway. Then there’s… oh, Filthy Rich! Even though he’s one of those rich ponies you’d think would care more about their money than anything, he’s actually a pretty nice guy! I think Aloe and Lotus are around - they run the spa…” “A spa…” Rarity’s eyes sparkled. “I can barely remember spas…” “Spah?” Unique asked, unsure what the word meant. “Oh, you’ll love it Unique! Ponies dote on you to make you look fabulous! They, why, I say they might even make you more of a princess than you already are!” “Wooooah…” “But… ah, well, money…” Rarity frowned. Cinder shook her head. “Hey, if you stay in Ponyville long enough, somepony will get you in. I’m not sure if this is true, but I hear Aloe has a soft spot for miniature cactuses.” She winked. “You didn’t hear this from me, though.” Might not even be true in this universe, but hey, I can try. “But where will we get the cactus?” Cinder laughed. “Don’t worry, Rarity. I promise, you go to Ponyville… and there you will do amazing things. Who knows? You might even change the world, some day. Like the princesses you are.” Rarity’s smile returned. “Ponyville sounds great.” “It is. And I’m glad you’re going.” She tousled Rarity's hair. “Your hard journey is almost over.” She turned to Unique. “Yours too.” Unique beamed. Cinder stood back up. “Now, I have my own adventure and friends to get back to…” She looked back to Canterlot Castle, wondering if she really should have just left Blink like that. “You two princesses keep those smiles, you hear? Stay around the fire as long as you need. Won’t go out anytime soon.” “Bye, Cinder,” Rarity said, waving. “Keep smiling too!” “Bye!” Unique called. Cinder waved at them and trotted back toward Canterlot. Two fillies huddled around a fire under a large cloak. Unique yawned, nuzzling into Rarity as the fire warmed them. Soon, Rarity felt warmed. She glanced down the road, then looked down to Unique. The little filly was asleep. Rarity stroked Unique’s mane, getting lost in its folds. ~~~ “Blink, make us invisible,” Curio pleaded. “Nah,” Blink said, leaning against the branch of a large tree in the middle of a Canterlot park. “The guard is looking for us and a bunch of young white ponies that look identical are pretty conspicuous.” Curio narrowed her eyes. “Or you could get in contact with the rest of your team and get them to deal with this.” “Nah,” Blink reiterated, her smug smile growing larger. “Then tell us where Cinder is!” Cryo shouted. “Shhh, they might hear us!” Sriracha hissed. “This is just a tree.” Cryo quieted herself. “Blink. Cinder.” Blink shrugged. “Haven’t the foggiest. Thought she was with me. Then she left. Then you knuckleheads showed up, caused a scene.” “You broke the dishes,” Curio pointed out. “And Sriracha threw a pepper in his face.” “I’m so sorry…” Sriracha said, head down. “I wasn’t thinking, he was looking at me like I was in charge, and… I panicked.” “To be fair you are the only one here who looks like an adult,” Blink said. “I… well, uh… I am going to burn Mattie.” “She’d pay you to do that,” Curio reminded her. “...Actually, she already does. You give her peppers all the time.” Sriracha twitched. “...It’s so hard to exact revenge on somepony like her…” “Girls! We’re losing track!” Cryo said. “Focus - Cinder. We need to find her.” “Can you give up on that already?” Sriracha asked. “We get it, Cinder’s your nemesis. There are more important things than trying to find a way to show her up.” “Well, yeah, the fate of the world. But the world is not at stake, so…” Cryo struck a pose. “I will find her and I w-” “What are all of you doing in a tree?” Cinder asked from the base of the tree trunk. “Hiding from the cops,” Curio deadpanned. “Hi, Cinder.” “Aha! Cinder!” Cryo pointed a hoof at her. “At long last I have f-” “Did you follow me to this world?” Cinder asked, cocking her head. “Uh…” “She totally did,” Blink said, lazily examining her hoof. “Came here just to show you up in… something, I don’t know what.” Cinder looked at Cryo with a sad gaze. “Cryo…” “What? We’re nemeses! It’s how w-” “Cryo, why does it really matter?” Cryo blinked, unsure of where she was going with this. “I mean, at first it was just a fun little game. You go around with your ‘anime’ ice, laugh, and shout at things, and I roll my eyes and go along with it. But… I don’t think you’re doing that anymore. It’s like I’m your life-goal, or something.” Cryo narrowed her ice-blue eyes. “What are you saying?” “I’m saying that there’s other things to do than constantly seek to be better than somepony else. I just met two poor fillies in the middle of the woods, and they were happy. You could say they were the weakest, most insignificant things… but they might just be better than all of us constantly looking for something. They were happy where they w-” “Aha! I see!” Cryo jumped out of the tree. “This is not a battle of brawn or titles, this is a battle of… empathy!” “Cryo, no, i-” “I bet I can have a more meaningful experience than you!” She lifted her hoof into the air until it cast a shadow over Cinder. “Your experiences run warm and fuzzy, mine are cold and jarringly powerful!” Cinder sighed. “Cryo, stop. You don’t get the point. I’m trying to get you to stop.” “But then you win!” Cryo whined. “The whole point of this duality we have is to go back and forth!” “There’s no winner?” Cryo’s face contorted into a snarl. “Of course not! Do I have to explain everything? We are rivals! Rivals! We’re supposed to…” “...Compete with each other forever?” Cinder frowned. “...That sounds kind of shallow, Cryo. Shouldn’t we be living our own lives instead of defining them off each other? We’re our own people. We even have our own teams!” Cinder pointed at Sriracha and Curio. “I bet they can show you so much more. And they would see so much if you weren't chasing after me all the time.” Cryo’s ears folded back onto her yead. “Y-you’re just trying to crush my resolve! It’s… the hero’s test! Trying to break me!” She smirked. “I see your ploy, Cinder! It won’t work on me!” “Cryo, stop, this really do-” “I’ll have my experience in the forest! You can’t stop me!” Cryo laughed, galloping away. “Cryo!” Mattie edited herself behind Cinder, putting a hoof on her back. “Don’t chase her.” “W-why not?” “It’ll validate her. She needs to wander alone in the forest for a few hours to learn her lesson. She was going right bonkers, let me tell you.” “Is that why you vanished?” Curio asked. “Oh, no, unintentional side effect. I just wanted to see you squirm when I popped out of there. Was right hilarious, too.” She smirked. “Now, let’s go find those cops and convince them not to make me pay, hmm?” Cinder looked after Cryo. “...I worry about her.” Blink shrugged. “She’s got to learn life’s not an anime, not even if your Discord gives you the essence of one.” ~~~ Cryo skated through the forest, ice appearing under her back hooves as she pressed them to the ground. She covered a lot of ground with this method, looking far and wide for anything worth comparing to Cinder’s encounter with the two fillies. She hadn’t even seen a pony out here since she started. She’d been trying for over an hour. “There’s got to be something!” Cryo shouted. “Cinder just WALKED out here and found them! I can’t even find them! This isn’t fair!” She slammed her four hooves on the ground, creating an icy spire three times as tall as she was. Deciding this wasn’t enough, she let out a yell and ordered all ice to get as far away from her as possible. Her structure shattered and all the snow within a meter was thrown away, creating a shallow crater around her. Trees shook from the force and ice shards embedded themselves into nearby rocks. Nopony was around to see her display. There weren’t even any panicked birds. Just the trees, and they made a horrible audience. The snowfall had gotten heavy enough that it was already undoing her work. “Stupid… little…” She continued skating along, grimacing. This wasn’t how things were supposed to be. The rival was supposed to be there, side by side, struggling with the nemesis. Not lagging behind and tripping over her own hooves! There were fights, contests, and stressful encounters. She would lose some, yes, but… She wasn’t to be pitied! She wasn’t obsessed! This wasn’t how things were supposed to be. She told herself that over and over again, even as the tears began to come to her eyes, freezing into crystals at the edge of her vision. This was supposed to be fun. Meaningful. It wasn't either right now. It was just… Cold. In her stupor, Cryo tripped over a campfire. She landed on her plot in the snow, shocked. Slowly, she turned to see cold wood that had been charred in a few places, but had been put out by the recent heavy snowfall. Cinder’s handiwork. Cryo looked around - those kids must have been somewhere around here. All she saw at first was a lump of snow next to the campfire. It seemed odd in shape, not a bush or small plant. At first she thought it was a rock - but then she saw the tuft of black fabric sticking out the top. Cryo’s face fell. She screeched to a halt in front of the mound and lit her horn. Banishing all the snow from the area, she found two white fillies clinging to each other under a dark cloak. The Rarity - she could never mistake those lapis eyes - turned her face towards Cryo. The filly in her hooves didn't move. She laid there on the ground, so still... too still... "Please," Rarity whispered. "Please... help. We're so cold." She looked down at the tiny foal. "She won't wake up..." Cyro stared in horror. Help? How was she supposed to help? Make an igloo? It'd be an icebox. Make an ice sled? But the ground was flat. She couldn't make other ponies immune from cold! "Please!" Rarity cried out, a tear freezing midway down her cheek. "Help us..." She couldn't. She wasn't Cinder. She couldn't do anything that would help. This wasn't supposed to happen! This wasn't supposed to be how it worked! Cinder would do something and she'd beat her! Or try... and no ponies died in the snow because her powers were worthless! Rarity wasn't answering now. She just lay there. And her sister... the not Sweetie... she lay so still... so still while Cryo just stood here being useless! Gotta find help. Cryo ran through her options. She didn’t have a communicator or dimensional device on her, so she couldn’t call for help or take them somewhere warmer. Running back to Canterlot to get the rest could take forever, even if she was skating. Move them? Was that safe? She was too weak to move them with her hooves, and using ice powers on a couple fillies freezing to death seemed unwise. Where would she even take them? Gotta find help. She launched herself into the air with her ice. Before she was all that high up she was able to see the nearest settlement: Ponyville. Sweet Apple Orchard was right there! She could get help! Landing on the ground, she created a dome of ice around the fillies - careful not to touch them with the ice, hoping that igloos really were warm enough. Without another word, she took off at high speed to the familiar farm. The Apple Family could help. Would help. And they would do it quickly. Cryo would make sure of it. ~~~ Mattie had dealt with law enforcement easily. Gotten most everyone off the hook and arranged for the Merodi Government to compensate for the broken goods. She and her team barely made it five feet out of the guard house before she stopped in her tracks, eyes wide. “Something’s wrong with Cryo,” she said. Sriracha sighed. “What, did she get herself stuck in a ditch?” Curio gulped. “That’s not Mattie’s ‘ugh’ voice... This is actually serious. Mattie, what can you see?” “We need to be there for her,” Mattie said. “Curio, triangulate her position.” Curio didn’t bother correcting Mattie’s use of the word ‘triangulate’. She brought up Cryo’s magic signature on her visor. “Ponyville. Sweet Apple Acres, if this is to be believed.” “Hold on,” Mattie said, channeling magic into her horn for a long-range teleport. “This might be disorienting…” With a flash of blue magic, they were outside the snow-covered Apple Family house. Even as far into the past as they were, Mattie was still able to recognize it. She rapidly knocked on the door. A sweet, butter-yellow mare opened the door. “Y-yes?” She looked strained. “Pear Butter, yes?” Mattie asked. “...Is Cryo here?” Pear looked back at the Sweeties behind Mattie. “...Is that her name?” “Yes.” “You her…?” “Sister,” Mattie said. “Bit of an adventurer. Can we see her?” “Yes, of course. She’s… been through a lot.” “I know,” Mattie said. “How…?” Mattie tapped her horn. As good of an explanation as any. Pear must have accepted it, because she led them to a guest room without any more words. Face downcast, she opened the door. Within, Cryo was sitting on the ground, almost motionless. She didn’t react to the door being opened. Were it not for her heavy breathing there wouldn’t have been an indication she was even alive. She was staring forward, dead-eyed. One of her contacts had fallen out, replacing the artificial ice-blue iris with her natural soft green. Ice crystals collected around her eyes as she refused to blink, absolutely fixated on the bed in front of her. There was a Rarity in the bed, covered in blankets and with a warm cloth draped over her head. Her breathing was weak and her lips were blue, but she was alive. She was the only pony in the bed. Cryo spoke with a voice none of them had heard before. A dry, lifeless tone with no energy in it whatsoever. “Cold and jarringly powerful…” She sniffed. “Guess I beat her.” Mattie turned to Curio. The message was clear - I’m terrible at comforting. You should go to her. Taking a deep breath, Curio stepped over to Cryo. She placed a gentle hoof on the icy mare. She had been expecting a flinch, or perhaps a sigh of relief from the mare. There wasn’t any response whatsoever. “Cryo…?” “Why did this happen?” Cryo asked. “They had fire. They were going to be fine. They were so close to town… She gave it to them! If… she’d be…” She shook, finding it difficult to breathe. “...You saved the Rarity, Cryo. If you hadn’t been out there… they still left.” “Who cares…?” Cryo asked. “I got what I wanted… an experience. A cold, dark... “ She closed her eyes, falling silent. “We care.” Curio put a hoof around her friend. “You were the hero today. There’s a Rarity that will go on to do great things because of you.” “Yeah.” Cryo’s words were honest, but empty. “Cinder was right.” “Cryo…” “Cinder was right. The world’s not just some big competition. There was no competition here.” Curio tightened her grip on the icy pony. Cryo’s rigid body finally loosened, and she met Curio’s embrace. “I’m so sorry…” “Shhh… it’s okay. It’s okay.” “I was so… so wrong. So arrogant. So fixated…” “And we had fun with you anyway.” Curio smiled sadly. “Why do you think we stick around?” Cryo let out a bitter laugh and buried her ice-studded face into Curio’s mane. Silence filled the room. “C-cinder?” Rarity groaned in her delirium. “...Unique?” Cryo twitched, pulling herself slowly away from Curio. “...Let’s go. Nobody tells Cinder about this. She… she should remember them differently.” She shivered, walking up to Mattie. “...Master?” “Yes?” “Thank you for coming for me.” Mattie sighed. “I let you go out there. I thought…” She glanced at Rarity. “I didn’t think this.” Cryo nodded in understanding, latching herself to Mattie’s leg. With a soft smile, Mattie levitated the small unicorn onto her back. “Take good care of the filly,” she told Pear. Pear nodded, wiping a tear from her eye. “Let’s go, everypony.” ~~~ “So,” Celia said, looking at Blink and Cinder. “Celestia’s taken care of. She’s asking us to not interfere until Nightmare Moon returns and her plan works out. Told her it works and that Luna returns. I may have also ‘implied’ that Sunset is a backstabbing ingrate, so I may have irrevocably changed the timeline.” Celia smirked. “I have no qualms with this. You two?” Blink shrugged. Cinder shook her head. “Good! Let’s go home!” She opened a portal back to Swip. “Did you two get up to anything interesting today?” Blink smirked. “Scared Cryo out of her socks and made Mattie pay for the damage.” “Some actual haunting? Blink, if I didn’t know you better I’d say you were beginning to act like a proper ghost.” “Ha.” “What about you, Cinder?” Cinder smiled. “I saw two fillies playing in the snow. They had nothing… but they were happy. I’ll cherish that. We see so much craziness out there… it’s nice to know that things can be simple.” Celia chuckled. “Sounds like you had the better experience.” “Oh, also, the fillies were the local Rarity and Sweetie. Xenium is going to hear all about how tiny she was.” Celia hopped through the portal. “Oh, call her now! I want to hear this…” The interdimensional Sweeties left the world, leaving the snow to fall in peace once more.