//------------------------------// // Coronation Part 3 // Story: Coronation of Compassion // by Echo Breeze //------------------------------// It was quarter to seven in the morning when I arrived at Sunset's apartment. Nothing was out of the ordinary when I pulled up to the parking lot in Sunset's Camaro. I took the Camaro because my truck wouldn't start and Big Mac had taken his out early to take some fresh apples to market. I parked up in Sunset's spot and hopped out, hitting the lock button on the key fob after closing the door, and headed up to Sunset's apartment. What I saw when I got up to Sunset's apartment made me do a double take. In front of the door, sitting in a lotus position (yes, I know about such things), was Gilda. She looked up at the sound of my footsteps and smiled. She didn't use her regular grin that put me on edge. Instead, it was a genuine smile full of curiosity. "Uh. Hey there, Gilda." I said as I approached. "At wasn't expectin' you here." "I know. I wasn't planning on being here today, but something seems a bit off. I need some answers." she replied. I nodded and unlocked the door to Sunset's apartment. I entered and beckoned for her to follow. We sat down at the kitchen island. "What do ya wanna know?" I asked, putting Sunset's keys on the island. "Firstly," she replied. "I wanna know what is going on with this Anon-A-Miss thing. Is it her or not?" "Well ah can answer that right now. No she ain't. First and second week of winter break, she was in the hospital. She tried ta off herself." I replied. Gilda looked as if she had been punched in the gut. I know the feeling. It's how I felt when I found out. She took a breath and continued. Okay then, secondly. If it ain't her, then who?" she asked. This was not expected. Now, as the Element of Honesty, I was being forced to lie. There was no way I was going to tell her that the CMC were Anon-A-Miss. "We ain't found out yet. They stopped posting, and took down the page, so I think it's over now." I replied, hoping she wouldn't catch onto my lie. She nodded, seemingly satisfied with that answer. "Okay. Third and final question. Dash and Shimmer?" she asked. "They're now in a relationship. Dash apparently had feelings for Sunset before the whole Anon-A-Miss thing. Ah think the feelings were mutual for Sunset." I said, hopefully not pissing her off. She just nodded, a deep, thoughtful look on her face. "Is there a way for me to contact her? I wanna apologize for what I did." she asked hopefully. "There is, but it would have to go through Princess Twilight, and she was pretty miffed the last time ah saw her. It'll have ta wait 'till she gets back from Equestria." She deflated a bit, getting a downcast look on her face. I took her hand tentatively in mine. She looked up and I smiled. "Don't worry about it now. Ah'm sure she'll forgive ya, just like she did fer us." I reassured her. I thought I saw her blush a bit, but it was gone before I could be sure. She cleared her throat and stood up. "Thank you, Applejack. I need to get going now." she said suddenly. She grabbed a pen and a piece of paper and wrote something on it. "Here is my number. Call or text me when Sunset is back." I took the piece of paper from her and she left, closing the door behind her. I set the book down on a nearby table and began translating, using what I could remember about old Ponish. Twilight was next to me, furiously scribbling down notes on a piece of parchment with the quill she had in her raspberry aura. "From what I can see, Starswirl did some extensive research on this." Twilight said, stop scribbling. "Yeah. I have a rough translation of this paragraph here." I said, tapping the paragraph with my quill. "It says 'If a unicorn or alicorn suffers immense mental and emotional strain, their magic aura color changes to that of the last thing they saw before doing something irrational.' That may explain some things." Everyone gulped at that. I looked at the page, and saw that there was more on the page, but it was completely illegible. "There is no use dwelling on it now, Sunset. We must get back to the palace to finish preparations for your coronation." Celestia started. Before I could open my mouth to protest, she walked up to me and wrapped me in a warm embrace. "I am glad we found out what happened, and I couldn't be prouder of you, my little filly." The last remark made me blush a bit, but I made no move to push her away. All I knew was that it was going to be extremely difficult to say goodbye in a few days time. A half hour later, we walked in to see that the main hall had been decorated with banners and streamers in my color scheme, the banners emblazoned with my two-tone sun Cutie Mark. We walked on into the throne room, and set about getting the final decor done. I parked my Mercedes outside Sugar Cube Corner and climbed out, hitting the lock button on my key fob. I had gotten a phone call from Applejack saying to meet her and the others here, but wouldn't say why. I noticed that Sunset's Camaro was parked in front of Fluttershy's Prius, and thought it was odd for Applejack to be driving it instead of her truck. I shook my head and walked in.