Actions have Consequences
Admiral Biscuit
Being a villain sucked.
Oh sure, there were lots of perks, lots of reasons a pony might want to be a villain. Having ponies tremble under her hooves, for example, was a great perk, especially since Cozy Glow was so small. There was also the appeal of vast magical powers, the opportunity to work alongside other villains, and the potential of nearly limitless power.
In her brief stint at villainy, she’d gotten a tantalizing taste of power, gotten caught, and gotten imprisoned in Tartarus. Tartarus sucked.
Had she been anything other than a villain, she might have seen the error of her ways and vowed to go straight once she got out of Tartarus, but of course she didn’t; she teamed up with two other villains.
Her last thought before being stoned was that she was never going to make that mistake again.
•••
Time passed.
At first, passing ponies spit on her or made rude gestures at her—not that she could see them, being petrified as she was. And then more time passed and fewer and fewer ponies could be bothered to do that. And then more time passed, and even fewer ponies really remembered who she was.
News reports became stories which became legends which would eventually become myth. In the winter, she was covered with snow and in the summer baked in the heat.
She didn’t know that sometimes Princess Twilight sat on the grass in front of her, nor did she know that in time, other statues were placed around her.
She couldn’t know that Princess Twilight thought of herself as a failure each time an intractable friendship problem became a new statue.
Years passed, and even the magical nature of her imprisonment was not complete proof against weathering. The sharp edges of her petrified form wore ever so slightly, softening her expression of horror.
Cozy Glow was unaware of the workponies who erected a scaffold around the statue, who very carefully chipped the stone away which joined her and Tirek and then carried her into the palace.
Ponies didn’t come to see the statues any more, so nopony noticed that Cozy Glow was missing. That was just as well; some of them might have panicked if they’d known.
•••
She had not known anything since being petrified other than a few moments of terror as her body stiffened, her futile attempts to escape and her resolution to never team up with other villains. Just as her brain tried to catch up with where she was now, her wings broke free and carried her on a brief flight, ending on the rug as her hind legs hadn’t quite unpetrified yet.
Cozy struggled to her hooves and looked around frantically. Last she could remember, she’d been outside and now she clearly wasn’t. Her two co-conspirators were nowhere to be found.
Am I back in Tartarus? That was unlikely; the room was too well-appointed.
Hoofsteps echoed across the room, and she turned her head to look.
An alicorn, one she didn’t know, approached. Her first instinct was to fight, and her second was to flee. Neither was likely to be a successful outcome, which left her to resort to her third option—act contrite, small, and helpless, and escape later.
“Cozy Glow.” The alicorn’s voice dripped with contempt. “You’re coming with me.”
“Do I have a choice in the matter?”
The alicorn’s ears flattened. “Neither of us does, I’m afraid.”
“I’m not coming.”
“Yes, you are. I’ve been appointed your guardian until you reach adulthood or until it becomes apparent that you’re beyond redemption.”
Cozy rolled her eyes. “And then what? I’ll go to Tartarus again and you’ll lose your throne?”
“My mother and Princess Twilight will both be disappointed, and I’ll see if I have better luck with Lily Longsocks. Oh, and I’ll probably turn you into stone again and keep you as a hat rack in my bedroom. I’ve been bugging the palace carvers for one, but they’re always so busy.”
“You wouldn’t dare.”
“Try me and find out. Now hurry up, we’re flying north.”
Cozy stomped a hoof on the ground. “I’m not going.”
“Fine.” The alicorn folded her legs under her and sat easily on the rug. “Hat rack it is. Could you do me a favor and keep your forelegs apart? Just in case I also need someplace to hang a dress?”
“You’re bluffing.”
•••
Flurry Heart wasn’t bluffing.
When Cozy Glow’s awareness next returned, she was inside a net bag, being carried under the belly of an alicorn. She had just enough time to look around before the bag flashed away under a burst of magic, and then she was falling.
She popped her wings out and hovered, one eye on the tail of the retreating alicorn, the other at the ground.
More properly, the lack of ground. It took her a minute to orient herself, to understand what she was seeing below. As far as she could see, there were no clouds, and there was no ground below, only open ocean.
She could barely make out Flurry Heart, who was still flying along as if she hadn’t noticed that she’d dropped her passenger. With no other option open to her, Cozy chased after her.
“That was mean.”
“Actions have consequences,” Flurry reminded her.
“What if I’d flown off in the wrong direction and then gotten tired and drown?”
Flurry shrugged. “Actions have consequences.”
“Where are we going?”
“North.”
“To the Crystal Empire?”
“Exactly.”
“Why didn’t we take the train?”
“It’s harder to drown you on a train and make it look like an accident. Now shut your mouth; we’ve got lots of flying still to do, and you don’t want to tire yourself out before we reach land.”
“You’ll—” Cozy began, and then bit her tongue. Would Flurry carry her? She actually wasn’t sure any more.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
•••
Being good sucked at first. She spent the first few weeks locked up in the tower, with only visits from Flurry Heart to break the monotony. Two guards stayed with her at all times, even stationing themselves outside the bathroom to make sure she wouldn’t escape.
Punishments were harsh and immediate. She refused to submit to the doctor and as a result, lost her blankets for a week.
She also kicked Flurry Heart and spent an afternoon as a hat rack. Cozy didn’t remember that afternoon, but Flurry took plenty of pictures.
Come the fall, she got enrolled in school, and promptly got picked on as one of the only non-crystal ponies attending. Without any magical artifacts, she didn’t really have much going for her, and while she could win a fight against one or two ponies, she didn’t stand a chance against a group of them.
It wasn’t too long before she was actually looking forward to returning home. At least Flurry Heart was fair—as long as she followed the rules, she didn’t get punished.
She learned to herd up with some of the other students, those who also got bullied, and the fights eventually stopped.
Her first Hearth’s Warming, she actually got gifts. All the Princesses had bought her something.
By spring, the guards were gone. She was trusted in her room again, and she didn’t have to be as careful about hiding the scissors she’d stolen from the school. There were still occasional room checks, but they weren’t as thorough as they’d been.
•••
Cozy couldn’t say when she’d reformed, when she’d decided that being the villain just wasn't worth it. One day, she’d been doing her homework and had been looking in the back of her desk for a fresh inkpot and she’d discovered the scissors she’d stolen from the school. She tried to remember what she’d meant to do with them, and couldn’t. Stab Flurry, maybe, but it was hard to imagine what the old Cozy Glow thought she could have accomplished with that.
“I might have been the only statue holding scissors,” she muttered, and set them on her desk to sneak back into the school.
•••
Her senior year, the entire class took a week-long trip to Canterlot. She’d been before, of course, but that was in the past. Bullies had used it against her, and potential friends had thought her bragging, so she rarely mentioned it.
They toured museums and the palace and got to meet Princess Twilight in the throne room. Cozy stayed towards the back and hoped she wouldn’t be noticed but of course after giving a speech about the value of friendship, Princess Twilight felt like she had to greet each one of them individually.
“Cozy . . . I’m glad you could make it back,” she’d whispered, and that was all she’d said.
•••
Cozy mostly didn’t break rules any more, and she certainly wasn't trying to overthrow Equestria as she sneaked out of her hotel room.
From above, even in darkness, it didn’t take her too long to find what she was looking for, and she circled around the statue, studying the two figures still trapped in stone. Flying closer, she could see the rough chisel marks where she’d been chipped free, and if she’d wanted to, she was sure she could have matched up the scars in her hind legs with the chips.
Would they ever be given another chance? Or had they already used all their chances?
Her mind flashed back to being all alone over the ocean, an image she could never quite get out of her mind. She’d always suspected that Flurry would have turned back and rescued her if she’d made the wrong choice, but what if she wouldn't? What if her last moments had been struggling to keep her head above the waves?
Being a villain had its perks. Ponies had cowered in fear of her, but she now knew that when she needed help, and when her only friends were those who she’d terrorized into loyalty—well, they weren’t likely to come rushing to her aid, were they?
Cozy took one last look at the statue and then flew off towards the hotel. Actions had consequences, and she’d be in trouble if anypony found out she’d left her room after curfew.