Cheerilee was still sitting on the kitchen floor, her back against the counter and eyes closed when Applejack came in. Cheerilee let out a deep sigh and opened her eyes when she heard the mare stop in front of her. AJ’s mane was tied in a long ponytail with the usual red ribbon, and she looked like a weight had been lifted off of her shoulders.
“Meriwether’s gone…” The mare on the floor managed to croak out. Her throat was rough and dry from crying and hours without water. “Half of our food is ruined.” She motioned at the open door heading downstairs. “I-I’m sorry.”
“Hun, we got a lot more to worry about than food.” AJ held out her hoof, which Cheerilee took. The much stronger pony pulled the teacher up. “The way things are shakin’ out, we don’t gotta worry about food for much longer. Not in a good way, either.”
“What happened?” Cheerilee had heard the roars, it was impossible not to. It usually meant more bad news when those noises came. She hoped she was wrong this time.
“Just help me make breakfast, alright? Gotta feelin’ we’re gonna need it.” Applejack started down the stairs with a sigh. “We’ll tell y’all what’s goin’ on after, Ah promise.” There was a part of Cheerilee that hoped that was the one promise Applejack wouldn’t keep. The feeling in her gut told her it was bad news.
So the two mares went about the silent ritual of preparing breakfast. It was the same stuff that they had been eating for every meal, oatmeal. Plain, simple, filling at times but bland as could be. They had finished preparing and were filling bowls when Applejack produced a small bag of sugar from one of the cupboards.
“Ah was savin’ it for a special occasion…” AJ trailed off as she began sprinkling a little bit over each helping. “Figure the end of the world counts.” That only deepened Cheerilee’s curiosity and made her finally blurt out the question that had been on her mind.
“What’s going on, AJ?” The mare’s whole demeanor had seemingly flipped a switch in the hour or so since they last spoke. She had gone from frustrated and pent up, to seemingly calm and more or less resigned to some unknown fate. “I-I won’t tell anypony, I promise. But I have to know.”
“The princesses are on their way here.”
“Which ones?” Cheerilee could already feel her heart racing. They had been in this town with just one alicorn for some time now and lost so many ponies. What were they going to do with multiple?
“The rest of ‘em. Celestia, Luna, Cadance.” Applejack spoke softly, her voice even and devoid of all emotion. “Ah got Twi to lower the sun...she got it right on the horizon, but no lower. Ah don’t think they liked it all too much.”
“Th-the castle can withstand them, right?” Twilight had never attacked the castle directly, neither had all of the combined unicorns in town. That still had to mean something, it had to. “There’s no way they can get in.”
“No way we can get out with ‘em in town, either.” Applejack nodded as she went back to putting sugar in the bowls. “We’re stuck here and there ain’t no way out now. It’s...it’s lookin’ like the end, Cheerilee.”
The lack of food, alicorns closing in, and the unicorns outside still digging towards the pool. It all spelled doom for the ponies inside of the castle. The worst part was only Cheerilee knew about the pool, she was pretty sure that Sunburst had told nopony else. That burden was squarely on her shoulders, and she wasn’t sure if she should tell the rest or not.
The numbness in Cheerilee’s hoof spread up her leg and throughout her body as the severity of the situation settled in. It gripped her heart and squeezed like a vice, making her want to lay on the floor and curl up. Before, like with Trixie and when pushing Twilight, it felt like there was something that she could do. She could react faster or push herself just that little bit more to get out of that deadly situation.
Now there was nothing.
“Let’s go get the others and...and have breakfast.” Applejack had always been a fighter, even when she was a filly. To see that fight kicked right out of her was one of the most heartbreaking things Cheerilee could think of. Ever since she and Scootaloo had shown up here, AJ had been that driving force behind nearly everything. Even before that, she had been the pony going out and saving others.
Now there was just a shell, waiting for the end.
As they left the kitchen, that same type of emotional deadness hit Cheerilee. That fear and panic faded as she began to truly internalize what that meant. The thought of going outside to scavenge for food before was dangerous, now it was a death sentence. If the princesses didn’t knock the castle down in one fell swoop, they would either starve or be killed by their friends and family.
There truly was no hope.
Both mares wandered upstairs and went around waking up the others and gathering them up to head downstairs. It was still early and some of them had surprisingly not woken up from the alicorns’ roars. Mainly Elytra, Rainbow Dash, and Scootaloo. Once she had woken up the filly, they both went into the changeling’s room. She was just as Cheerilee had seen her last, on her side with her leg coated in that gunk.
“Ugh…” Scootaloo stuck her tongue out in disgust as she stared at the appendage. The filly was situated on Cheerilee’s back, her good hoof between the mare’s ears so she could stand and see everything. “I can’t believe she uses her spit for that.” Maybe at another time Cheerilee would’ve laughed at that, but not today.
Sweet Celestia, Scootaloo. Her parents were never around, her caretakers were most likely dead now, and she was stuck with her teacher at the end of the world. Now she was going to die here...with no family.
Cheerilee did her best to push that grim thought down. She suppressed the tears that started to form and instead let all of that emotion form a frown on her face. She couldn’t break down, not before everypony else knew.
“Hey Elytra, wake up.” Cheerilee nudged her friend with a hoof. The bug groaned and batted the hoof away as she rolled over to face the wall. “C’mon, breakfast. Afterwards AJ has something to talk to everypony about.” She felt so lifeless, like the knowledge that everything was coming to an end had crushed her more than the food disappearing.
“Help me up, please…” Elytra grumbled out as she extended a hoof out. Cheerilee took it and helped pull the changeling to her three good hooves. It took a few moments for her to get used to having only three points to stand on rather than four, and even then she still leaned on the pony beside her. “It’s a bit too early and I have no energy to fly, so can I just lean on you?”
Cheerilee nodded and began to walk, taking slow steps so Elytra could keep up without falling over. Every once in a while she could feel that chitin-covered muzzle lean into her neck a little more, but she just didn’t...care.
For most of her stay in the castle she had been filled with this vague sense of dread that constantly haunted her. There was always that fear of needing to go outside, of putting oneself in danger and possibly facing the unending horde beyond the safe walls of the castle. Then there was the pressure of knowing the unicorns were going to get in eventually, that they were all going to die one way or another. All of that had been held back or suppressed with the promise that once Twilight was back everything would get better. She could fix this and make everypony safe again.
Now it seemed that wasn’t the case. If Applejack was that hopeless about the situation, it meant that she knew Twilight couldn’t do anything about it. It meant that the alicorn was broken and there was nothing to save them now.
“Hey...the sun is down!” Scootaloo nearly hopped off of Cheerilee’s back as she pointed to one of the windows on the wall. “When did that happen?!” The excitement in the little pegasus’ voice was nearly contagious. Nearly.
“I think Applejack said Twilight did it.” Cheerilee mumbled as she continued to help the hobbled bug next to her to the stairs. “How are we doing this, Elytra?” She looked over, only to see a pair of worried pink eyes staring right back at her.
“Are...are you okay, Cheerilee?” Such a simple question, but so hard to answer. For the first time she felt liberated from her emotions in a way she didn’t think possible, not in this nightmare at least. She felt every emotion and all of them at once simultaneously. It was like her brain was overloaded and couldn’t choose one, so it chose none instead.
“Let’s just go eat.” Cheerilee muttered in response. She saw the worried look Elytra shot to Scootaloo, and she felt the pegasus on her back shrug. They would understand in a little while. Maybe they wouldn’t react the same as her, but they would understand.
They managed to get down the stairs very slowly, taking one step at a time and making sure that Elytra never lost her hoofing. It was slow and frustrating for the changeling, but they eventually got to the bottom. There were a few glares shot from the changeling to her missing back leg.
“Doesn’t...it hurt?” Scootaloo asked as she looked back at the slimy cast. “Like, shouldn’t you be laying down still?” Both ponies looked at the changeling for an explanation as to why she wasn’t screaming with every move.
“It’s missing, not broken.” Elytra hissed as she leaned on Cheerilee to catch her breath. “It doesn’t swell like yours would, and it doesn’t hurt as much. If I was younger I could just molt and get a new one...but I think that’s out of the cards.” It was mildly fascinating to learn more about the once-invaders of Equestria, but for how much longer would that knowledge be useful?
Elytra and Scootaloo kept talking about changelings and their habits while Cheerilee’s mind emptied once more. The trio kept on their walk towards breakfast, and when they finally arrived at the table they took up their usual spots. The only difference in seating were the members they lost yesterday and the fact that Twilight Sparkle was now seated at the head.
“Dig in, everypony.” Applejack was seated to the right of Twilight and gave the best smile she could. It convinced nopony.
Rainbow Dash and Rarity looked about as defeated as Applejack did. The former kept looking at her wings, which were bound to her sides with what looked to be the remnants of a sheet, and trying to move them as much as she could. The latter was doing her best to use her tail and mane to cover the majority of her right side. Her eyes kept shifting around and looking at the ponies around her, unsure if they were staring at her new scars.
“Sugar!” It seemed all of the foals called out as once as they took their first bites. Smiles crossed their faces, and the faces of Pinkie Pie and Discord, as they devoured their sweetened breakfast. It was a sweet moment that brought small smiles to the majority of ponies around the table.
“Where’s Meriwether?” Fluttershy asked demurely between bites of her own food. Applejack’s eyes fell on Cheerilee, which in turn caused every other eye at the table to turn to her as well.
“She…” It was the first time that the mare had felt something other than that numbing dread since Applejack told her the truth earlier, and this time it was nervousness. Telling the rest of the group what had happened wasn’t a pleasant thought. She was hoping that either AJ or Twilight would deal out that bad news. “...she left.” The chorus of gasps and mutters between the ponies that still cared filled the dining area. “She also...ruined half of our food.” That drew a much stronger reaction.
“What are we going to do?” Asked Fluttershy, her eyes filled with panic.
“We’re going to starve!” Rumble cried out.
“We have to go find some more!” Pinkie shouted as she pounded a hoof on the table.
“It doesn’t matter.” Twilight finally spoke for the first time since sitting down. The crowd quieted and looked at their princess with confusion and no small amount of worry. “I’m sure all of you noticed the sun is down...mostly.” There was a large dollop of shame coating that last word, the taste of it making Twilight flatten her ears. “I did it. I tried to set the sun to help and...and...Celestia, Luna, and Cadance are on their way to Ponyville.”
A cold silence washed over the room like a pillow being pushed down over a sleeping pony’s face. Recognition and realization hit next as eyes drifted from one pony to the next. Finally the questions started. All of them worded it differently, but they all asked the same question of the alicorn.
“What do we do?”
“I-I don’t know.” Was the only answer Twilight could give. The weight of the statement seemed to crush the poor pony princess in her seat. She slumped and let her head hit the table with a thud, making every bowl on the surface clatter. Her head came back up eventually and she looked over her friends and fellow Ponyvillians. “I just don’t know.”
“Well Discord could finish lowering the sun, right?” Scootaloo was the first to speak, surprisingly. “He’s done it before.” This only received a scoff and an eye roll from the draconequus seated by Fluttershy.
“I have not!” Discord put his lion paw to his chest. “The first time I was released I didn’t move the sun and moon, I don’t have that power. I moved the planet instead.” The table forgot their misery for one split second and groaned.
“That’s ridiculous.” Cheerilee muttered. To think that a planet would move instead of the sun and moon, just nonsense.
“You do know who you’re talking to, right?” Discord raised an eyebrow at the mare before turning to the rest of the table. “So no, I can’t help with that. Nor with much else beyond the walls of Princess Twilight’s Castle Playset. So unless you want me to teleport from here to upstairs, and even that is taxing with how slow this castle is filling up my tank, I can’t help.” He picked up a spoon full of oatmeal in his bird claw and shoved it in his mouth.
“Why aren’t you worried?” Diamond Tiara jabbed a hoof in Discord’s side, which was quickly swatted away by the chaos avatar’s long tail. “If you can’t even teleport, you’re just as screwed as the rest of us!”
“They’ll figure it out.” Discord jabbed a thumb at the Element Bearers with a grin. “They always do.” The confidence was admirable, but it didn’t seem like anypony else shared in that certainty.
“W-well what about that time travel spell Starlight used to mess up the timeline?” Dash spoke next, her voice devoid of any of the usual pride and bravado it usually held. “You could just go back in time and stop yourself, right?”
“The scroll with the spell is gone.” Twilight responded with a sigh. “Starlight might know it, but finding her and getting her in here before...before the princesses get here would be impossible.” A slightly more comfortable cadence slipped into her speech as she began talking about something other than their impending doom. “That and going back in time and changing it wouldn’t fix what’s happening here, it would only create another timeline. This one would still exist, and it would still be doomed.”
“But...there has to be something…” Rarity finally said something for the first time since sitting down. “The train that Sunburst arrived on is still here. We could all make our way to it and go somewhere else.” Murmurs of agreement shot through the group, only to be replied to with a shake of Twilight’s head.
“Just delaying the inevitable.” Twilight muttered with a shake of her head. “Trust me, I’ve looked over everything Sunburst wrote down about this and...and there’s nothing.” The princess got up from her seat and looked at the table one last time. “Enjoy what time we have left, please.”
----
Twilight walked out into the foyer of her castle with heavy thoughts and heavy hooves. It was like moving through oil. It felt like the very air was clinging to her coat and dragging her back with every step she took. The mere act of walking was excruciating.
She had seen the looks on the faces of the ponies in the dining room. They were defeated, scared, and hopeless. She was supposed to be there for them, she was supposed to be a source of hope and inspiration. She was supposed to fix this.
Instead of going to her room, her hooves carried her to the map room. The table was pushed aside, just enough for a pony to fit into the hole just below it. How long had it been since she had been down there? It seemed like it was right after the castle appeared.
“Twilight? Twilight!” Spike’s voice called out to her as his scaled feet pattered against the floor. “Twilight, you can’t just give up!” Eventually he came right up beside her, panting and huffing as he finally stopped.
“There’s nothing we can do, Spike.” Twilight shook her head and looked down into the hole, spotting that familiar spiral staircase that led into darkness. It was tempting to just go down there, sit by the pool and just...stop doing stuff. “It’s ho-”
CRACK-BOOOM
Her head snapped up in an instant as her ears turned towards the deafening sound. It was one she had heard before, one that made the even beat of her heart jump. Without thinking she turned and galloped out of the map room and towards the front door.
“No no, it’s too soon. They shouldn’t be here yet.” She said to herself as she sprinted across the foyer. The other creatures flooded out of the dining hall and soon fell in behind Twilight as she approached the door. “I thought we had more time…” The door was thrown open, and a wave of heat and harsh wind rushed in. Outside was a nightmare.
Three alicorns now circled above Ponyville. One was bright white with crimson stains smattering her coat, a mane and tail of pure fire billowing behind her as she shot rays of hot white magic onto the town below. Another was as black as night with a field of stars coming off of her back and lances of deep violet energy ripped buildings apart. The final alicorn was a color that the survivors had seen far too much of, pink with a myriad of ugly red blood stains gracing her coat. It looked like any of the viscera that had spilled into the streets over the past month. Her mane and tail were a mix of violet, rose and gold and just as ratty and wild as Twilight’s had been. Blue streams of magic flowed from her horn and turned the ground beneath it into glass.
Ponyville burned beneath the combined assault of the alicorns. Buildings disappeared and the very surface beneath was transformed into a shining hellscape. The trio of beams were working in a spiral out from the town hall, obliterating anything they touched.
“Mama.” Twilight turned to look back at the crowd. Shock, horror, and fear were apparent on every face in the crowd...except Flurry Heart’s. “Mama!” The alicorn foal yelled from Fluttershy’s back with her hooves reaching towards the pink alicorn in the sky. “MAMA!” She squealed again.
Cadance stopped firing and turned her head towards the castle.
“Close the doors.” Twilight backed up, her eyes never leaving the triple threat in the sky. “Close the doors!” Twilight put her hooves on one of the doors and started to push, while the others stood and watched. She heard the telltale sound of a horn charging up a blast of magic. “CLOSE THE DOORS!” She screamed as panic gripped her heart. Finally others jumped into action and helped. They all pushed as hard as they could, a blue beam heading straight for them.
The door slammed shut with a monumental ‘thud’. It was just in time, as the sound of magic impacting crystal came from the other side. It kept coming, and they could see the very crystalline structure of the castle turn red hot from the energy being poured onto it.
“Please hold…” Twilight whimpered as she looked on.
It seemed like a solid minute before the barrage finally ended. Smoke was pouring from the cracks in the door as the usually purple surface glowed red. Everypony stood in silence as nothing else hit the door.
“We are doomed…” Discord’s confidence finally gave out as his voice fell. He looked at the alicorn still standing at the front of the pack with the same defeated look as everyone else. “There really is no hope, is there?”
Twilight couldn’t handle it anymore, so she just ran. She ran straight into the map room and sprinted down the stairs. She didn’t stop, despite her muscles and lungs burning from the effort, she kept running down the stairs until she hit the bottom. The door burst open as she barreled through it and into the crystal cave beyond.
The potent magic assaulted her sixth sense, sending shocks of energy into her brain. Her fur stood on end as she approached the edge of the glowing blue pool, where she finally sat down. She stared at her own reflection in the still surface of the mana and she wept.
It was all too much. Why was it all coming down around her at once? Why couldn’t she be allowed more time? Why couldn’t Sunburst be here? “Because I failed.” She answered all of those questions in three words.
Twilight Sparkle, student to Princess Celestia, Element of Magic, savior of Equestria multiple times over, Princess of Friendship, had failed. It wouldn’t just cost Equestria either, it would cost the whole world.
She had moved the sun enough for Equestria to stop burning, but what about the other parts of the world now? What about the side that was now eternally night? They would freeze. The side that now had the sun Equestria once had? They would now burn to a crisp. She’d really saved no one.
“Twilight?” The question, her name, was repeated over and over again from behind. Her friends were coming down the stairs, she could hear their hooves against the crystal steps. It reminded her of her first night in Ponyville a bit, when Nightmare Moon returned. They were worried about her and wanted to help.
Through everything she had done, despite all of the ponies she had killed both directly and indirectly, they still cared enough to come check on her. She wasn’t sure why and she knew she didn’t deserve such care, but she still appreciated it.
“Twilight-” Fluttershy said her name quietly.
“No.” Twilight shook her head and cut her friend off. “I’m not alright.” It was the question that everypony seemed to want to ask, and she knew the answer. “For the first time, we don’t have a way out. There’s no Tree to save us, no Elements, no power of love. It’s done.”
Another word wasn’t said, instead the alicorn was surrounded in the warm embrace of four ponies and a dragon. Soon the fifth and final pony joined in the pony pile as they poured their love into Twilight.
“Twilight, you’re the smartest pony in the whole world.” Spike had his face buried in one of her shoulders, his voice muffled. “If anypony can figure this out, it’s you.” Twilight opened one of her wings and wrapped it around the little dragon in response.
“Things always look dark for us.” Pinkie, who looked a bit more deflated than she had previously, chirped out. “But we always come out on top! Now isn’t any different.” The positivity was endless, and that hurt even more. Twilight wasn’t sure if it was genuine or if they just didn’t want to see her so down.
“It is.” Twilight shook her head. “We don’t have a plan. We don’t have anything to help. It’s just us.” She sniffled and wiped her eyes with a hoof. “No princesses or Elements. No magic mcguffin is going to save us, girls. I know it’s hard to think about...but this might really be it.”
As if on cue, the whole cave shook violently. On the far side of the pool, one of the walls vibrated until the earth and rock on the other side seemed to fall away. Through the cloudy crystal they could all see why Twilight was so hopeless, the horde of unicorns now stood on the other side with their horns glowing.
“That explains why the other alicorns started destroying the town...all of the unicorns were down here.” Twilight mumbled. Even in times like these she couldn’t stop from just...thinking. She couldn’t just cry.
“W-what are they doin’-” Applejack stopped as something clicked in her brain. “This is what they were diggin’ for the whole time…”
“You didn’t know?” Twilight was astonished. They knew the pool was down here, and they knew about the hole. It seemed easy to put two and two together. “They want to corrupt it, so they can get the last of the unicorns. They know about it because I did...and they knew Rarity was in here because I did.” The ponies looked on as the unicorns started to fire at the crystal separating them from their prey. “It’ll take them a few days to get through at the most without the help of an alicorn.”
“Don’t jinx it...please…” Dash pleaded.
“Are you sure there’s no way?” Spike kept himself huddled under one of her purple wings, his knees and voice both shaking. “No way at all?”
“What if we injected them with the mana stuff like we did you?” Pinkie asked. “Or if we put you in the mana pool and supercharged you like we did Dashie, I bet with all of that magic could fix this fast!”
“The rainboom…” Twilight’s mind started to race. “It cleared the air which let Discord come back, which means it negated the tainted mana or cleansed it.” She bit her lip as her eyes darted around the room.
“Yeah, but…” Dash looked back at her wings. “I...I don’t think I can do another one, Twilight.” The group fell silent, that loss of confidence stinging them all. “Sorry…” The polychromatic pegasus soon found herself encased in a Pinkie squeeze.
“It doesn’t matter. Even if we could, it would just get tainted again.” Twilight sighed and pawed at the dirt. “It’s just a big feedback loop judging from what Sunburst thought. If you clear the air, you have to clear the Central Mana Pool or else they’re going to reinfect each other. We don’t even have a way to purge the air…” Her eyes drifted upwards, to the stalactite hanging from the ceiling that touched the blue pool below. “Do we…?”
“You have an idea, darling.” Rarity, despite being the most down of the other five Element Bearers, had a hint of hope in her voice. “What is it?”
“It’s…” Stupid was the first word that came to her mind, but that wasn’t right. It was foolish, but not stupid. “We still have the Elements, right?” The other ponies nodded in the affirmative, adding that all they were missing was Magic. “I might have an idea, but...I don’t know. It would work, but I don’t know if it’s worth it.”
“Whaddya mean?” Applejack stepped in front of the group and sat down in front of Twilight. “We’ve already done run out of everythin’, Twi. Ain’t no cost we haven’t already paid. We’ve been hurt, lost stuff or ponies close to us…” Rainbow’s wings and Rarity’s natural beauty flashed through her mind...as did Big Mac and everypony she’d killed. “Ain’t nothin’ else.”
“Our lives.” Twilight responded. Again, a silence followed. It was uncomfortable and heavy, punctuated even more by the growls coming from right outside the confines of the castle. “We could clear the air, but it would take everything we have.” She pointed at the stalactite that touched the surface of the pool. “That runs the entire length of the castle, right up to the star on the top. The crystal can hold a lot of magic and even radiates it, it’s why none of the unicorns even come close. If we...if we overloaded the spire it could spill out into the air.”
“How would we even do that? Why would it cost us...that…?” Pinkie obviously didn’t want to think about death, but they had to now. If they wanted out of this, then they would have to pay with everything they had.
“Because...because if we use the Elements we have and we stand in the pool…” Twilight was still doing some thinking on the matter, but she was sure it would work. “It will be enough power, I’m sure of it. But we would have to be in that mana pool for...for a long time. Minutes. If channeling that much power wouldn’t do it, then the exposure to that much pure mana would.” It would hurt, it would be the most excruciating thing they had ever felt.
“Will it save everypony?” Fluttershy asked quietly. “Will it save Equestria?”
“If we can get somepony to cleanse the Central Pool at the same time, yes.” Twilight was sure, if they could do both at reasonably close times it would work. It would knock it out of the system of the world and anypony within the initial blast radius of the castle...which meant the princesses and hundreds, if not one thousand, unicorns. It would be enough, it would have to be.
“Is it our only shot?” Applejack looked right into Twilight’s eyes. “There ain’t no other way, sugarcube? You’re sure of it?” Her voice wavered and tears were forming in those bright green eyes. “This is it?”
Twilight nodded.
“Ah need to hear you say it, Twilight. Look me in the eyes and say there ain’t no other way. Ah need to know you mean it.”
“There is no other way. We either starve, get killed by the princesses or unicorns, or I turn and kill you all when they-” She pointed a hoof at the unicorns attempting to break the crystal wall. “-break in.” Twilight stood up and faced her friends. “I-I’m sorry that I let it come to this...but this is our only hope.” She put her hoof out towards her friends. “I’m willing to give my life to save Equestria.”
Slowly, one by one, hooves started to join hers. Pinkie and Dash’s first, then Fluttershy’s. Rarity reached out tentatively and placed her non-scarred hoof on the pile. They all looked to Applejack.
The conflict that raged behind the farmer’s eyes was apparent. She was one of the last of her family, she was all her sister had left. Nothing was more important than family, and she knew first-hoof how devastating it was to lose family again and again.
“For Applebloom.” Her voice cracked as she put her hoof forward. “She deserves a chance, even if it takes all Ah got left.”
“I’ll...let everypony take a bit to say their goodbyes.” Twilight’s words were soft and gentle. She didn’t want to stir up any more emotions than she needed to. “I’ll figure out how we’re going to cleanse the Central Pool.”
Whatever it took, they were going to save Equestria one last time.