Trixie’s expression looked truly bizarre on her, and it took a few moments for Fluttershy to realize what it was: she was so apoplectic with rage that she couldn’t think of what to say. Trixie always knew what to say. It was often the completely wrong thing, but she always knew.
Rarity was still stunned. “I don’t know what you think you heard, Trixie, but…”
“What I think I heard?” Trixie stepped forward, crackling noises coming from her horn. “Oh, is that my punchline, since I’m such a biiiiig joke? Ha ha ha, Trixie’s deaf, it’s so funny?”
Fluttershy and Rarity glanced at one another. “What…?”
“Shut up! It sounded good in my head, just shut up!!”
Rarity pulled herself up, regaining her dignity just a bit. “You’re a bit out of control.”
“I am not out of control!” Trixie screeched. “This isn’t fair, you can’t use me like this!”
“Use you? Please…”
“I am not your rock bottom!” Trixie snapped fiercely. “I’m a professional! I’m super hot! I’m nice, now! You can’t do this to me!”
Rarity scowled like a Canterlot native, and it was the ugliest she had ever looked. “Really, darling. This is your problem, you’re so insecure. It’s not attractive at all.”
Fluttershy pulled back, almost in shock at what she had just heard.
“Insecure?!” Trixie snapped. “That’s… you say those things about me and then have the nerve to call me insecure?!”
“Well, I’m sorry if we don’t have the best impression of you after the things you’ve done,” Rarity retorted. “Perhaps if you hadn’t boasted so much, or if you hadn’t…”
“Don’t.” Trixie’s voice was suddenly ice. “Don’t. Mention. The amulet.”
“Yes, really, please don’t,” Fluttershy heard herself adding.
Rarity paused, looking annoyed a bullet had been taken out of her gun. “Your disastrous boasting when you first showed up was enough.”
“You! You!” Trixie fumed wordlessly for a moment before spitting out, “I wasn’t the bad guy, there! You were heckling me! Like, I’m sorry I dyed your mane orange or whatever…”
“It was green, and you know it!” Rarity screeched. “You talked Sweetie Belle into dyeing her own mane green two weeks ago, just to play some kind of prank on me!”
Trixie paused. “Okay, yes, fine, you got me there. She looks really good, though!”
“She’s my little sister; of course she does, but don’t you dare change the subject!” Rarity fumed. “You boasted, and it turned everypony against you! Fluttershy was there; she’ll back me up.”
Fluttershy, who had no clue what she was even supposed to be backing up, stared at Rarity fearfully. Fortunately but also very unfortunately, Rarity clarified: “When you act so badly that even the kindest pony in Equestria can’t defend you, then it’s time to stop lying to yourself, don’t you think? Starlight aside, you couldn’t possibly be so foolish as to think that anyone in Ponyville has a positive impression of you.”
Fluttershy felt like she was kicked in the stomach by Rarity’s outrageous cruelty. She had never seen her friend like this, never. Trixie, meanwhile, had been reduced to furious, teeth-grinding silence. Or, as Fluttershy could easily discern, the desperate feigning of furious, teeth-grinding silence meant to keep herself from noticing she was about to start crying.
Someone knocked on the door, and a moment later, Moon Dancer’s voice called out from the hallway, “Fluttershy, are you in there?”
“Y...yes! I’m fine! We’re all fine!” Fluttershy frettingly smiled up at Rarity and Trixie, almost desperate. “Right?”
The knocking continued, louder. “It doesn’t sound fine. Let me in! Or at least let Fluttershy out. You both know how much she can’t stand conflict!”
Trixie gasp-laughed, appalled and furious. “Conflict!” She grabbed the door with her magic and threw it open. “This isn’t a conflict. A conflict is between two ponies. This is between a real pony and a, a walking punchline.”
She stormed to the doorway, but Moon Dancer just stood there, looking baffled and concerned. “Oh, come on!” Trixie shrieked. “At least let me make my big exit!”
Moon Dancer still didn’t move, but it was already too late: Trixie was very clearly crying and everyone could very clearly tell.
Rarity took a step forward, looking like she wanted to throw up. “Trixie…”
“I read your stupid book.” Trixie muttered, grimacing down at the floor, sniffling in a way that made it very clear she was failing to keep herself from sniffling. “With all the lessons. You know what the moral of that whole Ursa Minor thing was, right? It wasn’t ‘don’t boast.’ It was the opposite. Twilight learned a great, positive, Celestia-certified lesson that she should boast.”
Her voice was harsh, almost raspy. This was Trixie offstage, something Fluttershy had never seen before. “No no, the lesson was ‘don’t boast if you actually suck.’ Don’t boast if you’re like Trixie. So if everyone hates me, well then. I’m sorry I suck so much, I guess.”
No one moved for a moment, but then Moon Dancer very slowly walked forward and embraced her. Trixie struggled to get away for a moment and then gave up.
“Noooo,” she moaned, feebly waving her head around. “If I have an actual friend, it’s ruining this whole thing! I want to be like ‘I don’t need anyone!’ and you’re just making that look stuuuuupiiiiid!” Her words were absorbed by elaborate sobbing.
Moon Dancer held her tightly and glared at Rarity. That glare was bad. Moon Dancer was wonderful in so many ways, but she had a tendency to wander into situations that needed defusing and to pour gasoline on all the fuses. “Rarity?” Fluttershy ventured. “I think we should, um, take a walk, maybe?”
But Rarity did not have time to respond. “She thought you were her friend,” Moon Dancer growled.
“Eek! Moon Dancer, please!” Fluttershy waved her hooves and wings around frantically. “Please don’t!”
Rarity, however, just stood stock still, jaw wide, staring helplessly. Fluttershy felt her energy ebb, and she settled down to the floor. “She’s not acting like herself. I don’t know what’s wrong, but please. She’s being mean, but you know she’s not a mean pony…”
“She’s not?” Moon Dancer interrupted, contempt oozing between the cracks in her words. “Are you sure? After Miss Pommel the other night, and now this? Don’t be naive.”
Fluttershy felt some spring snap in her chest at that, but Rarity lurched forward. “No, don’t! I couldn’t bear it if the two of you fought! I’m the one who’s been so awful. Don’t be mad at one another!”
Moon Dancer glared at her and then sighed. “Fine.” She turned to Fluttershy, looking genuinely repentant. “I’m sorry; I know you’re not naive. But I can’t just forgive this…”
“Doooonnnn’t,” Trixie wailed from within the embrace. “You’re just giving her what she waaaaaaants!”
“Um. What?”
“Ughh, use your brain!” Trixie pulled away from Moon Dancer, rolling her eyes. She sniffled once, disgustingly, but after that, her voice was clear as always. “She’s obviously trying to make everyone mad at her on purpose, because she’s guilty about starting all these relationships that aren’t going to go anywhere!” She marched up to Rarity and poked a hoof at her chest angrily. “So hey, screw around Pommel Girl in public, then act like a jerk in front of Fluttershy, ta-da, she’s the big villain. Which is what she wants, because she has a deep-seated discomfort about when things go wrong but there isn't huge drama!”
Everypony in the room stared at her in silence.
“I’m a professional counselor!!”
Fluttershy turned to Rarity in stunned wonder. “Is all of that true?” But Rarity was clearly not able to answer a question like that at the moment. She just sat on the floor, quiet.
“Moon Dancer was wrong,” Trixie snapped, glaring at Rarity. Her sobs were gone, but her cheeks were wet with fresh tears. “I never thought you were my friend. Because that would make me vulnerable to getting my feelings hurt, and I am too smart for that!” She actually stuck her nose up in the air, clearly trying to look smug and somehow pulling it off halfway. “But that still doesn’t mean you can use me as a prop in your little ‘Rarity’s bad at romance’ stage play.”
Rarity opened her mouth, but Trixie cut her off mid-inhale. “Do not apologize. Were you going to apologize?”
“...yes.”
“Don’t you dare apologize to me right now.” She turned and walked towards the door, then stopped. “Maybe later. Maybe. Get your act together, and then…. Maybe.” She glanced at Moon Dancer. “I am just so magnanimous. Isn’t it awe-inspiring?”
Moon Dancer rolled her eyes, but her amusement was obvious, too. “Just make your exit while you can, weirdo.” Trixie smiled back, softly, and it was another of those off-stage expressions Fluttershy had never seen before. Then she strode out of the room.
Starlight squished her head between four different pillows, dozing fitfully. She had always been told memory manipulation magic could be exhausting and confusing, but she hadn’t expected how overwhelming it’d be. Things she’d wanted to forget were now neon-bright in her mind as if they’d just happened five seconds ago, but none of the context for them was nearly as fresh. As she slipped in and out of sleep, they kept replaying.
She’d done it three times. Three things had been horrible enough for her to justify erasing. Not horrible from guilt… she knew she couldn’t run from her sins that way. Not horrible from fear… everything even in the changeling lair had been bearable. Horrible from awkwardness. That sounded incredibly pathetic to phrase it that way in her head, but it was just undeniably true.
She had been fifteen and very angry, and so she had sought out the angriest music she could find. The lyrics of this music were all very deep and meaningful on account of all the anger, and anyone who said different just didn’t get it. Earlier that very same day, she’d defended them to her father: “You just don’t get it!” she had literally, in exactly so many words said. Then she had huffed on back into her room, where she promptly spent the next three hours looking into the mirror, practicing her expressions of bitter ennui and mouthing along, doing a very good impression of Henry Stallions, if she did say so herself.
The song she was on had been about isolation and mistreatment, which was very appropriate, given how horribly her father was betraying her by opening the door to her bedroom to ask her to show off some magic to him and his friends. When they saw how sincerely she was performing the lyric “Your hate is bleeding me / Hate hate hate / Bleeding bleeding blood” (which was a favorite of hers), he looked completely dumbstruck, and the rest of them were clearly trying not to laugh, to varying degrees of success.
She, sensibly, screamed, teleported into the bathroom, and locked the door until they left. She considered running away and living in the forest for the rest of her life, but eventually she decided to play around with that memory manipulation magic she’d been learning about.
Then there was the Rarity thing, which was still more baffling than anything else. The memories she’d deleted were good ones. She’d felt proud and warm about her mature communication skills and her ability to fling herself out of the closet so soon after realizing she was in one... and, well, Rarity had indeed known what she was doing, that last time.
It wasn’t the memories she’d wanted to erase, it was just the knowledge that it had happened. It just felt like it was wrong, and she didn’t even know if she meant “wrong” like incorrect or like immoral, but either way, as time passed, she just got more and more agitated about the whole thing.
Oddly, she felt kind of better now that she’d wrecked a brunch from it all. And come to think of it, it was a good thing she'd erased her own memory in the meantime. If it hadn’t, and if she’d done that with her friend and nothing bad had happened, then she might have gone around thinking it was okay. When you break the rules, things should go bad, and finally, finally the horseshoe dropped. It was a relief.
The third time she used that spell on herself, though, was the most upsetting. It was also the weirdest; she had no real idea when it had even happened. It was just this episode that now had popped back into her mind, hovering on its own like a helicopter.
The Crystal Empire was a welcoming place, but she felt like everyone was staring at her in harsh judgment for reasons she half-understood but she probably deserved. She tried to ignore it and just focused on the door she had just knocked on. If she was lucky, it wouldn’t open.
She wasn’t lucky. Sunburst stood there in the doorway, smiling at her condescendingly. “You found me,” he announced, and then he stepped back and let her walk in. She was surprised to see that he’d decorated his house just like his childhood home.
That was weird; he never liked his mom’s tastes, and it wasn’t at all like the other times she’d been to his house since he’d grown up. Maybe this was the first time, and he redecorated it just afterwards?
“Hey,” she said.
“Yes,” he replied. “We’d better get right to it, I guess!”
She looked at him blankly. “Get right to… what?”
Instead of replying, he turned and walked to a nearby door, swinging it open. His bedroom was on the other side, and it was dark and velvety in there. Again, not like his normal bedroom at all.
It occurred to Starlight that this may in fact have been a dream. She wasn’t sure what to make of that possibility; it would explain why Sunburst had never tried to talk to her about this, but it meant she was the kind of pony so upset by an awkward nightmare, she deleted it from her own memory.
They went into his bedroom; he faced her expectantly. “I guess we have to,” he said plainly.
She realized what he was talking about, her mouth falling open. “You… what? Why?”
“Because you found me,” he answered. “Got no choice.” His horn glowed, and the ceiling lit up with a facsimile of the night sky, beautiful, glowing stars. “Don’t want me to leave again, do you?”
She was on the bed, now, feeling confused. “Wait, Sunburst, stop! We can’t…”
“But you found me,” he repeated.
“I did, but…”
He appeared in front of her, cutting her off with some sort of magic thing she didn’t quite make out, but which took her breath away. He was kissing her, and it felt like she didn’t want to move and was desperately trying but failing to move at the same time. She fell backwards, and he stood over her, looking down, impassive.
“Oops,” he said. “She found me, too.” He indicated the window with a nod of his head. She looked over and saw herself as a ten year-old staring in, looking absolutely gobsmacked.
Yes, right, this probably really was a dream.
“This is terrible. Too bad we have no choice.” Sunburst flung his cloak into the corner. When he turned back, he looked weirdly handsome and streamlined, like a drawing of himself, and Starlight felt the sickest, saddest feeling overcome her. It was unbearable, a sense of pure dread and hopelessness and acquiescence. It was maybe the worst thing she’d ever felt. The feeling did not dissipate as they began to kiss.
Starlight woke up suddenly. For a moment, she wasn’t sure if she was waking up from the dream or from the memory of the dream, but hazily, slowly, it came back to her: She was in a hotel room in Manehattan, the lights out, but late afternoon sunlight coming through the window. She was also not alone in her bed. Someone was spooning her, forelegs wrapped around her chest from behind.
Surprisingly, even after that dream-memory, she didn’t panic. In fact, when she noticed the azure fur on the forelegs and heard Trixie’s distinctive sleep-mumbling, she relaxed so quickly she almost fell back asleep. It was weird that Trixie was doing this… was she just worried about her friend? Had something else gone wrong?... but it wasn’t all that weird. It was nice.
“I’m not a fly swatter,” Trixie grunted. She wriggled around softly, then buried her face in the back of Starlight’s neck.
Starlight, not for the first time, reflected on the fact that she was not in any way sexually attracted to Trixie. Because with how close they were? With all their history and intimacy and shared commitments? That lack of sexual attraction was the only thing keeping Starlight from being hopelessly, ruinously in love with her best friend. Which would be a nightmare, obviously.
“No, gimme those back, those are my teeeeeth…”
She’d thought she might be attracted to Trixie, for a little while there. It was always a bit confusing that she wasn’t more upset about that, but now she knew the whole Rarity thing had happened and grabbed the attention of all her anxieties.
Weird. Everything actually kind of had worked out. She idly felt bad about hurting Rarity’s feelings, but they’d deal with that. She felt sleepy and safe and warm.
She snuggled herself back into Trixie’s embrace and let herself drift off again.
Pinkie spat out the pencil and took a step back from her sketchbook. The balloony writing stared back at her: THE PATH TO MATURITY IS DIFFICULT BUT WORTH IT!!
Banners were always the hardest part of party decoration, because there just wasn’t enough room to be too wordy, but the whole point was they were designed for this creature at this event, so they had to be specific. And the balance here was really hard.
She frowned. It was just too busy, especially with the diamond patterns she’d included. Rarity was a talky kind of pony, but she liked simplicity and elegance. Pinkie picked up her pencil, erased the words “THE PATH TO,” and regarded her design again.
The phone rang, and she sighed. Usually she was bugged by interruptions when she was designing, but this was going nowhere. Maybe Fluttershy was right, and huge, awkward conflicts were just not appropriate occasions for a party, no matter how hard she worked to try to put a positive spin on everything.
She picked up the receiver and mid-motion realized she was going to talk to a friend, even if it was one she hadn’t met yet. Phone calls were amazing because of that. So she was already cheerful by the time she said, “Hiya!”
The unfamiliar voice (so it WAS a brand new friend!!) hitched slightly. “Uh. Yes, hello, I’m just letting you know the room service you ordered is ready, and someone will be bringing it up to you presently.”
“Whaaaaaat?!” she squealed.
“Uh. Your… your room service? You did intend to order food, didn’t you?”
“You’ll just bring it all the way to my room?!”
“Yes. ...That’s the service.”
“I thought it was service because it was like the army!” Pinkie enthused. “This is awesome! You must be some kind of hotel genius!”
“...Um.”
“Oh! Hold on, I have to tell my roommate about this! Thanks!” Pinkie hung up and trotted up to the bathroom door. She knocked, hearing small splashes in response. “Ocellus!!” she called through the door. “How’re you liking the hot tub?!”
“Oh, uh, it’s great, professor! Thank you for suggesting it.”
“Yay! Oh! And you know that room service we ordered? Guess what! They’re just bringing it to us!!”
Ocellus paused for a moment. “Yeah? Because, um, isn’t that just what room service is?”
“It is?!”
“Didn’t you know that?” Ocellus’s voice sounded baffled, for some reason. “I’m pretty sure you told me about it before we even came here.”
“I did?” Pinkie scrunched her forehead up in thought, then gasped as the pieces fit together. “Ohh! This must be why I kept asking Moon Dancer to hypnotize me, yesterday! So I could forget what room service is and have my mind totally blown when I found out again!” She giggled. “Forgetting stuff is great! I dunno what Starlight’s problem is.”
“Eeehhh…”
“Oh! Sorry! You shouldn’t hear about what’s going on in the private lives of all your teachers.”
“Yes. Thank you.” More splashing; Ocellus probably sat up. “Um, Professor Pinkie Pie, is it okay if they bring my order in here? I have the curtain drawn and everything. I just. I’m stressed out, so I don’t want to have to get out if I don’t have to.”
“Oh, sure! Just soak up that relaxation!”
“Um,” Ocellus continued, “and I think I might just go right to bed after I get out? Is that all right? I’ll just, uh, stay in here, and then I’ll get out and go into my room and go to sleep? And… I’ll probably be quiet because. Um. Because I’m so stressed out. But it’s okay: I’ll just be in my room, asleep! All night!”
“Sounds good to me!” Pinkie agreed, even though something actually sounded kind of weird about it. But before she could think about it much, there was a knock at the door. “Aaaa!!!”
She ran over and threw open the door. “Room service?!” she asked, grinning hugely.
The mare stared back at her. “Did you order the entire chocolate cake and the pint of ice cream?”
“Do I look like I ordered the entire chocolate cake and the pint of ice cream?!” Pinkie bellowed happily in response. The other pony did not reply, so she clarified: “Yeppers! C’mon in!”
The other pony walked in pushing her big cart, only pausing slightly when Pinkie began to chortle madly. “You really brought it all the way up here!”
The pony smiled politely. “Where did you want me to put this?”
“Oh! The chocolate cake goes in my tummy, but for now you can just put it on the table. And the ice cream is for the creature in the hot tub!” Pinkie trotted over to the bathroom door. “Ocellus, ready for your food?”
“Hold on, one moment!” There was a soft scramble of activity from the bathroom. “Let me get behind the curtain. Um, and one other thing: I was drinking a soda earlier! Is it okay if the room service pony takes the bottle to be recycled when they drop off the ice cream?”
“Of course,” the hotel pony called back.
“Thank you! All right, I’m ready, bring in the ice cream!”
The hotel pony picked up the ice cream and went into the bathroom with it, emerging again after a moment with an empty soda bottle in her teeth. She placed the bottle on top of her cart and turned to Pinkie. “Was there anything else?”
“Nope! I just hope you know that you’ve totally made our entire night!” Pinkie trotted over to her dresser and pulled out some bits. She’d forgotten what room service was, but thankfully Moon Dancer had left her with the memory that room service ponies should be tipped, which was nice.
Receiving the bits made the hotel pony relax, and she smiled gently. “Thank you. Have you been enjoying pride?”
“Oh, yeah!” Pinkie enthused. “The parade was great, and it’s always so, so, so fun to come to Manehattan! But I had a pretty easy job here, y’know. My friends are all having to confront all their personal problems. I’m just here to chaperone a student, and this particular student is super smart and super responsible and was never gonna be any trouble anyway!”
“Well.” The hotel pony walked over to her cart and nodded. As she began to push it, the soda bottle wobbled slightly, but it stayed in place. “We’re all very happy you’ve had such a good time staying with us.”
Pinkie happily waved goodbye as the hotel pony and her cart left the room. It was so great to make new friends.
She glanced down at her sketchbook, the thought of friends reminding her that she had several good ones who were probably miserable at the moment. A party probably wouldn’t be the right thing to do, but in that case, Pinkie was helpless, and she didn’t like that.
On a whim, she erased "BUT WORTH IT." That left a message which was nice and pithy, but it made life look like an ongoing struggle, which, duh, but parties were supposed to make everyone forget about that for a while!
No. She would buckle down and solve this problem. ...After she ate this entire chocolate cake, of course. Maturity was difficult.