/x/x/x/
Scootaloo glares at the twin devices sitting before her.
One bears a missed call from Rainbow Dash. The other holds one text from Rarity. ‘Rainbow called me,’ it says, ‘Sunset is at her house right now so she must have had someone else make that post. I am so sorry to hear that your relationship with her has been damaged. Let’s try to forget about the hardships tomorrow and just enjoy ourselves, okay?’
“Of all the rotten luck…” she grumbles.
“You should have made sure Sunset wasn’t in Rainbow’s house,” Sweetie Belle spits. She is sitting with her knees tucked to her chest, clad in a lavender towel-robe. Her hair sits wrapped in a second white one. “Let alone her bedroom. Or her bed.”
“Well it’s too late now.” She falls backwards, landing her head on the pillow. “Now we’re probably fucked.”
Belle does not answer immediately. She merely glowers in silence, leering at the phones as well.
“We?” She eventually asks.
Scoot turns her head. “Well, yeah. We. As a team. Are fucked now. I’ll have to find a way to spin this, maybe find a way to explain it away. To say she was blackmailing one of us into posting while she was under deep cover. It probably has to be you since she wouldn’t be blackmailing me and also following me around town. So I’m gonna need to teach you how to use my lockpicks. And I need to figure out a way for you to have known Rainbow was gay-“
“You’re having ME post that!?” Belle snaps, incredulous.
“Well, it has to be you. because Bloom’s out of the picture. I mean come on. What do you want from me?”
“I want you to not saddle me with more things to keep track of,” Belle whines, burying her face back in her knees. “It’s already way too confusing. And Bloom hates me because I’m the one who messed with her email. It isn’t fair to just keep throwing everything onto me like this.”
“It’s just one more thing. It’s not a big deal-“
“Don’t tell me what is or is not a big deal!” She grabs Sunset’s phone and begins to motion wildly with it as she punctuates her speech. “You made me look through my sister’s friggin underwear photos. You made me steal Rainbow’s progress report. You made me hack my best friend’s email account. You made me do all of these things that I only did because you swore that it couldn’t be you. And now you want to make me take the blame for outing somebody? That’s not fair. What if someone outed me? Outed us? Mom and dad would kick both of us out of this house.”
“Everyone could already tell Rainbow was gay. But you and I don’t have rainbow colored hair. You and I don’t have the side of our heads shaved. You and I aren’t blatantly obvious about it. And Rainbow’s parents are going to be fine with this. They aren’t homophobic. Half of Rainbow’s friends are gay, and the other half literally use rainbow magic. She’ll be fine. She’ll get over it. It’s not a big deal. You’re freaking out over nothing.”
“It’s not nothing. It’s a lot more than nothing, it’s a lot of things! I’m having to sacrifice a lot, and it feels like you don’t have to do any. It feels like I’m doing all of the work now-“
“You have to sacrifice a lot?” Scoot scoffs and rolls her eyes. “You’re still best friends with Rarity. Rainbow told me that I’m dead to her. You stayed here all day watching tv with YOUR sister, meanwhile I had to go out in the freezing cold and break the law breaking into her apartment, which smells absolutely disgusting by the way, and take the phone.”
“Okay, yeah, but-“
“I’m sorry that I had to be the one to go do the leg work, I’m sorry that I’m asking you for the monumental Herculean task that is to just be quiet and let me do the planning, and I’m SO sorry that MY trauma is mildly inconveniencing you... and…” She looks down and takes a deep breath. “Look. I really am sorry that you’re suffering. But I physically can’t handle any more. I only trust you with this because I know that you’re strong. Stronger than me...” She looks up through her bangs. “I’m sorry that my mental health is a mess, and that it’s bringing you down too. I don’t want you to have to do all of this. And if it weren’t for Bloom, you wouldn’t be. But right now we both have to work together to get through this.”
Belle bites her lip. “I know. I just want you to stop being so mean to me.”
“Alright… I’m sorry I was mean.”
“I don’t want you to apologize for it. You apologized enough earlier. But all the trauma and stuff isn’t an excuse to lash out at me with no consequences. You need to change your behavior. Otherwise a promise is just empty words.”
“Alright. I’ll try to be better in the future.”
Belle huffs. “You’ll try?”
“I will be better in the future, starting now. Better?”
She turns and gives the faintest hint of a smile. “It’s a start.” She turns and leans in closer. “And... I’m sorry too. I guess I was just being selfish. I glossed over the fact that you did go out and do a bunch of hard work. And that Rainbow doesn’t wanna associate with you at all anymore.”
“It’s fine. She’ll get over it. We just need to work harder to get them to think that Sunset is still the one doing it. It’s not like she has proof or anything,” Scoot says, sliding her fingers over Sunset’s phone. “She doesn’t know for sure. She just made a deduction that happened to be correct. But it won’t be the truth for much longer. We have the tech. We have the control. And we will decide what history will be remembered as. We will turn the truth into whatever we want. And as long as Rainbow doesn’t know for certain that I have the phone, we still have an out. We can still come out the other side better for it.”
Belle freezes and relinquishes her grip. “What about Bloom?”
Scoot’s face falls. “Well…” she bites her lip. “I guess that she eventually is gonna have to either choose to quit being friends with us forever, or just shut up and go along with the lie and pretend that she didn’t completely dick me over. I’m sure that she’s gonna pick the second one. Out of the two of you she is definitely the most impressionable. The easiest to coerce. It was really easy to get her to manage the account by telling her that she’s the one who made it in the first place so it’s all her responsibility if you think about it. Honestly, the fact that she’s mad at you for taking back control of it is pathetic and childish. She was so hell bent on getting revenge on Sunset first, and she had the gall to whine because she saw a consequence to her own action? Please. But whatever. I can postpone my friendship with her for a little bit as long as in the end Sunset gets hers…” She looks up to find Belle staring off into space, a puzzled look on her face. “Hey, uh. What’s up?”
“If you had to choose between getting your revenge and keeping your friendship with me,” she tentatively asks, refusing to make eye contact. “Which one would you choose?”
Scoot slowly slides her legs off the bed.
“Are you gonna make me choose?” She asks, voice cool and sharp as a razor to the skin.
“No.” She says. “But you might have to.”
“I don’t see why I can’t have both, unless you suddenly wanna start pretending to care about that manipulative sociopathic egotistical bitch.”
Belle stands up.
“You know, she never used sexuality or gender or whatever as a weapon. Not once. Not ever. Nobody at CHS ever did. Ever. At least not from what I can remember. Maybe they did over at Crystal Prep, but never here. Sunset never stooped that low. She played us against each other for our actions, not for who we were. And nobody has ever killed themselves either. You’ve broken one of those records, and you’ve almost broken both of them now. You’re becoming worse than she ever was.”
She turns and looks Scoot dead in the eye.
“I won’t help you hurt Sunset anymore. Not after this.”
“So that’s it?” Scoot growls. “You’re giving up on this? On me? After everything we talked about earlier? That’s bullshit. If you really were my friend, and if you really loved me, then you would stay by my side through this and not abandon me!”
“It’s not about love, Scoots!” Belle puts her head in her hands. “I don’t even know who you are anymore! This is turning you into a monster. I’m not going to stop you, and I’m not going to lock you out of the account. And I will love and support you through the personal stuff. But I am not going to go any further on this path you’ve chosen, waging this digital war with our friends and family as collateral casualties. I am not going to take any more blame for this. I can’t handle any more guilt. I can’t handle hurting anyone else. But what I can’t handle most of all is hearing you talk so dismissively about Applebloom. We were both friends before we ever even met you, and now she’s out of my life because of you. You want Sunset dead so badly and it’s because she’s evil, she’s manipulative, she’s a sociopath, she’s egotistical, she’s a bitch. But you’re fighting fire with fire. You’re being just as evil if not worse! You’re manipulating me, and you’re talking about Bloom like she’s a bad dog, and you’re acting without any care for Rainbow’s feelings, and worst of all you’re being a huge hypocrite.”
“Hypocrite?”
“I get that your mom dying was traumatizing, especially seeing it happen right in front of you. But her mom died too, and she almost saw Sunset kill herself right in front of her. Maybe she wasn’t abused by her dad like you were, and maybe she didn’t have to deal with the foster care system, and maybe she didn’t have nearly as rough a life as you have. But you’re ignoring the fact that she has it rough too. You’re ignoring the fact that maybe she isn’t as strong as you are, and that maybe she can’t handle watching someone die when she doesn’t have a good reason for it. Not like you. I don’t blame her for one second for coming clean for her part! And you’re acting like it’s the biggest betrayal in the world.”
“Because it IS a betrayal!” She hisses, crawling over the bed. “She ratted us out. And she’s doing it for personal gain. To make her grounding less bad. To ease her conscience. She didn’t help one single person besides herself when she went and blabbed to Applejack.”
Belle clenches her fists. “She helped Sunset.”
“I don’t fucking care about Sunset.”
“Yeah. I know. She knows. We all know. Everybody knows. You care so little about Sunset that you’re willing to hurt all of your friends to take her down.”
“I wouldn’t have to do any of this if she would just fucking kill herself already!”
“Why are you so obsessed with her being dead? Don’t you think that weeks of loneliness and pain is more than enough retribution? You’ve already scarred her both mentally and physically, and she’s still cut off from Rarity. Why can’t that be enough for you?”
“Because my pain didn’t last just a month. It’s lasted years. And it will last for the rest of my life.”
Belle sits on the bed’s edge and stares at the floor. “And don’t you think that if you make her kill herself, you’re gonna carry that weight too? Not just your mom, and not just Sunset, but all of the people you hurt along the way. Bloom. Rarity. Me. And now Rainbow. And every single person whose secrets Anon-a-Miss spilled. You’ve already caused everyone else so much heartache and stress, and now you’ve gone too far. I’ve been thinking ever since we were at Fluttershy’s apartment that maybe we’d gone too far already, but now I’m sure of it. And that’s why I can’t do it any more.”
Scoot remains silent.
“I love you,” Belle whispers. “You mean so much to me, and that’s why I can’t help you sacrifice your own morality. I love the person you were before all of this drama, but this person you’re becoming? I don’t love her. I’m coming very close to hating her. And I don’t want to hate you. There’s already so much hate in my life from everyone except for you, that it would ruin me forever if I lost you too.”
“Fine.” Scoot stands, grabbing her phone and Sunset’s. “I’ll do it myself. Since it apparently hurts you so fucking bad. Never mind what I want. Never mind what I need. Never mind…” she stifles a sob. “I just wanna avenge my mom.”
“Sunset didn’t drive the truck.”
“But Sunset watched it happen!”
“Do you want to avenge her,” Belle asks, a single tear falling down her cheek. “Or do you just want to hurt someone else the way you’ve been hurt? I don’t think that your mom would want you to-“
Scoot smacks her, a sudden burst of lightning flashing in her eyes. “Don’t tell me what MY mom-“
Belle immediately slaps her right back with the force of a freight train for all Scootaloo could tell, sending her sprawling to the floor. “Don’t you dare hit me, ever,” she warns. “After everything I’ve done for you, you don’t get to put your hands on me like that, you… you jerk! I invited you into my house, into my bedroom, into my bed. I begged and pleaded and did so many extra chores to get my parents to take you in, I have shared every single thing I’ve ever owned with you, and I did most of your dirty work for Anon-a-Miss.”
Belle leans in closely to Scoot’s cowering form and whispers, her teeth grit and her eyes wet.
“You. Don’t. Hit. Me. Period.”
“I’m sorry-“
“Yes, Scoots! You should be sorry! What the frick is wrong with you?” Belle readjusts her head towel before rubbing her sore palm. “Whatever your problem is, it better be gone tomorrow. Because I refuse to be abused by you. That is unacceptable.”
Scoot lets out a full wet sob, which is followed by many more as somewhere in her subconscious a dam breaks.
“I didn’t mean to hit you…” she says between breaths. “I swear I didn’t mean to do that! I would never hit you! I just…” she puts her hands over her eyes as she frantically tries to bring her breathing back under control. “I’m so sorry…”
Belle crosses her arms and turns away.
“If you ever do that to me again,” she warns. “I will tell my parents. I will tell Rarity. I will tell Applebloom. I will tell Rainbow Dash. I will tell everyone. Don’t… don’t EVER hit me again.” She sighs. “I’m sorry I hit you back. And so hard. Are you okay?”
Scoot dares to look up at her, her hands shaking. Her throat tightens, her stomach churns, and nausea permeates her body. She can smell copper.
“Oh, your nose is bleeding,” Belle groans, grabbing a few tissues from the nightstand. “I must have got you right in it. Does it hurt?”
“A… a little…” she braces her hands on the ground as she allows her friend to dab at her face. She tries to pay little heed to the red dots that come away. “I swear I don’t know what that was-“
“You probably reacted to me talking about your mom,” she says, inspecting the wound. “I mean, you kinda just glanced off my forehead. It’s like your hand just did it by itself. You didn’t do it to hurt me. But, you still did it.” She grimaces. “I aimed for your cheek. I must have missed it. It doesn’t look broken or anything.”
“Is it still bleeding?“
“Not a lot.” Belle folds the tissues over and stands up. “I’m sorry I brought her up. But you know why I did, right?”
Scoot nods, her body numb. “Yeah…” she murmurs, rubbing her shoulder. “I mean. You have a point anyway… until you said that, I never really thought about how, like. If there is a god and stuff. And if heaven is real. That… maybe there’s a chance that I’ll get to see her again. But only if I go to heaven too.” She looks down into her palms. “But if heaven is real, then maybe hell is too. And if I get my revenge on Sunset. I’m probably gonna go there.”
“Scoots-“
“I don’t believe in god. I don’t believe in heaven and hell. I don’t believe in anything. So I don’t think mom is anywhere, watching me. She’s just… gone. All I have of her left is my memories.” She closes her eyes and leans back. “Bloom doesn’t even have that. She just has pictures, and stories. I guess I saw that as… that she was lucky enough not to get too attached. She was a baby. She doesn’t remember. But I was there. I saw it happen. I saw everything.”
Belle takes a seat next to her, but says nothing.
“I saw it crush her. One second she was sitting there, and the truck was behind the glass. Then the glass broke, and I closed my eyes for a second. It felt like I was flying for one moment, and then I slammed into the door. The door slammed into me. The lamppost hit between the glove box and the seat, and it pinned my legs together against the, uh, the middle part. Doctors said I was lucky that it didn’t hit me directly. Lucky. Right. And when I looked up, I saw… I saw…”
“You don’t have to say anything,” Belle soothes, reaching over to grab her hand. “You don’t have to relive that again. I get it. I know you didn’t try to hurt me on purpose. I know you just don’t want anyone else to talk about your mom. You need to get therapy. That’s why I’m not stopping you from keeping the blog going. That’s why I’m not telling on you right now. That’s why I don’t have a grudge against you, why I’m not scared of you, and why I still want to be here for you. You need support for the time that you don’t have any. Because that was a very traumatizing experience. It doesn’t excuse anything that you did to me, or to Rainbow, or to Rarity, or even to Sunset. But I can understand why you’re doing it. You need someone to be punished for a senseless tragedy.”
“Sunset caused it,” Scoot murmurs. “But I mean. I guess you do have a point. I was alone for so long before I met you girls. And now Sunset knows what it’s like. To lose someone you love. And it’s worse… mom would still love me if she was still here. But everyone hated Sunset. Some of them still do. And I tried to kill myself before too. I didn’t lie about that. So now I know that she knows what it was like, to be me. But even then, she still bullied me when I was going through the pain.” she softly groans. “But I’m still alive. And I’m in a better place now. Maybe I… maybe I fucked up. Maybe you’re right. Maybe I went too far. Maybe…”
Belle hugs her. “Maybe?”
“Maybe I need to tell the truth.” She pulls out her own phone. “About a lot of things.”
“Really?”
“I do need help. I just could never get it. Dad stopped paying for my insurance. So I don’t have any. I can’t get help. Not right now. But I know I need it. I thought I could deal with it alone, and just pretend everything is okay. I mean, yeah I have ptsd and panic attacks, but those are still manageable. Those only hurt me. But now, I’m… I’m hurting the ones I love. And I don’t just mean with rumors. I hit you. And…” she begins to tremble. “I outed Rainbow. Why the fuck did I do that? To hurt Sunset? How is that gonna hurt Sunset? And now she’s out of my life forever…”
Belle holds her tighter. “Maybe we could get my parents to adopt you or something? Add you as a dependent.”
“I don’t think I could date my sister. Even if she’s adopted. It’s still gross.”
“I think it’s kinda hot.”
“Ew!” the two share a laugh at the joke, before melancholy silence fills the room again.
“Would you really ask them to do that for me?”
“Of course. I love you; you’re like a sister to me…” she grimaces. “Although, maybe not, because we’ve kissed and stuff.”
Scoot sets her jaw. “I mean. We could always temporarily break up.”
“Huh?”
“Just for a little while. I’d rather have you in my life as my friend than not at all. Plus, I mean. It’s illegal anyway since neither of us are the age of consent yet.”
Belle whines. “But…”
“It’s not forever. It’s just… if we break up, and your parents adopt me, and we’re sisters for as long as I get the therapy and the help that I need, and then when I’m healthy enough to not do shit like hit you, then we can get back together again.” Scoot leans over to kiss her forehead. “I swear, waiting for you would be worth it.”
Belle leans in closer. “Well…” she murmurs, reaching for her hair.
“I’ll probably have to come clean to everyone,” Scoot continues. “Tell the truth. Figure out how to do it. It’s gonna suck but I’ve made too many mistakes along the way and it’s honestly shocking that it hasn’t fallen apart yet. It would be so much better if I do it on my own terms. And, maybe I can try to figure out a way to put the blame on someone else. Maybe on Diamond Tiara and Silver Spo…” she sighs. “No. God, I don’t even know. I don’t wanna do it right now.”
“You don’t have to do anything right now, I don’t think,” Belle placates, distracted. “At least not right this moment. Sunset is safe with Rainbow. Nobody’s in any immediate danger. Rarity is upset still but she’s being civil. You can probably wait until at least after we go to the mall. You should have one last good experience with Rarity in case everything blows up. And I want one too, since she’s gonna find out that I copied her pictures. It might be a good idea to wait until tomorrow at the least to do it.”
Scoot groans. “It would’ve been so much more easy if Sunset just…” she stops in her tracks. “No. No, I…” she sighs. “Yeah. I need, like. So many pills. Or something. Sunset never killed anyone. Except my mom. But even then… I’ve never tried to get revenge on the guy driving the truck. I mean, he ran out and he called the cops on his cell, and at the trial they found that the brakes just failed. It really was an accident. But, he still helped me. He still stuck around. And, I guess that’s why I hated Sunset. I couldn’t blame the driver, and I couldn’t blame god, so I guess I just had to blame Sunset. Maybe you’re right about needing someone to suffer. And Sunset was already so terrible to all of us for so long. I guess I just forgot that deep down, she’s human too. Or, uh, a unicorn, I guess.”
Belle pats her hand. “We don’t have to worry about anything at the moment. Right now, we should just get some sleep, and we can do the thinking about telling the truth tomorrow. And we have another week of winter break, since the high school starts up again a week earlier. So we can spend that week trying to make reparations.”
“Repa… what? I don’t know what that means, dork-tionary.”
“Fixing stuff. Really, you’ve never heard the word reparation before?”
“I don’t know why you need a big fancy word for fixing stuff when you can just say that.”
“Expanding your vocabulary isn’t the worst thing in the world,” Belle chides, bumping their foreheads together. “Well now you know for the future.”
“I have already forgotten what the word was.”
“Oh, whatever…” she rests her head in the crook of Scoot’s neck. “Do you really mean it when you say you wanna tell the truth now?”
“Well…” she sighs. “Look, um. There’s a few things I should probably tell you. A few things I’ve lied to you about. And I don’t just mean a long time ago. I mean today. Earlier. I said that my dad… you know. Raped me. And… he didn’t.”
Belle sits a little straighter. “Then why…?”
“To get you off my back and let me plow ahead with Sunset’s phone.” She swipes at the device in question, turning on the backlight and revealing the lock screen. “I mean he was still abusive. He still hit me. And he would forget to buy food, just beer. And he was always too drunk to drive me anywhere that I needed to go. But he never did… that… to me. At least not that I can remember. I don’t think I repressed it. If I was gonna repress something it woulda been the crash.”
“So you lied about being raped?”
“Yeah… not my proudest moment.”
Belle stands fully up. “You lied about being raped. To manipulate me. Is that what you’re saying?”
“I mean, yeah. That’s what I’m saying. Coming clean about lies-“
“That’s disgusting,” Belle snipes, backing into the wall. “That’s so gross.”
“Belle-“
“No, that’s…” she presses a hand to her mouth. “No.”
Scootaloo rolls her eyes. “I’m trying to apologize here.”
“I’m sick of your apologies. They don’t mean anything.”
“Okay, in the three apologies I’ve had tonight, I’ve done nothing bad worth getting mad at me about. I deserve better than to be glared at like I kicked your fucking dog.”
“The first apology wasn’t earned, because you lied to me about your dad raping you, just to get me to shut up and back off so you could out Rainbow. That’s your problem. You keep just doing things and hoping that your ends will justify your means and hoping I’ll forget about all of the terrible things you’ve done to me and the people I care about and just be your shadow. You don’t think about the consequences of your actions, and you treat people like pawns in chess. You’re so much worse than Sunset, it’s…” She puts her head into her hands. “It’s too much.”
“Belle,” she says, reaching out. But as her hand makes contact, she violently tears away.
“Don’t touch me.”
“Why are you being like this? A minute ago you were fine!”
“A minute ago I didn’t know you were the kind of person to lie about that. What else are you lying about? How can I trust you anymore after this?”
“That was it!”
“How can I be sure?”
“I-“ Scootaloo sputters as she tries to find words.
“That’s too much all at once. I can’t even look at you right now!”
“I didn’t even do anything that bad-“
“Not individually. Everything you did has a perfect excuse. But the fact that all of it happened in such short notice of each other says more than enough about what kind of a person you are right now. And together it all makes me not care about the excuses.”
“Are you fucking kidding me? You’re turning on me for trying to be better? What the hell is wrong with you!?”
“I’m not turning on you. I’m telling you that I’m disappointed in you. And…” she sniffles before wiping at her eyes. “I’m breaking up with you.”
“No you’re not-“
“You are sick. Sick in the head. And you need some serious professional help. And until you get that, I cannot let myself be in a relationship with you. When you’re physically abusive, and emotionally manipulative, and a pathological liar… this is not healthy for me. I don’t deserve this.”
“Don’t abandon me.”
Belle shakes her head. “I’ll still be your friend. Your sister. But not your girlfriend. I’m not abandoning you. I’m just looking out for my own best interest, and for yours too.”
Scoot rushes to her side and pins her shoulders to the wall.
“Loving you IS my best interest.”
Belle gently rests her hands on Scootaloo’s wrists. “This was your idea. You said that waiting for me would be worth it. Now… you crossed a lot of lines today. But not all of them. Please don’t cross the last line. Please don’t ruin our friendship. You still have time to make up for all of the bad that you’ve done. Nothing you’ve done so far can’t still be fixed.”
Scoot’s fists tremble for a few moments as she considers her options. She eventually sighs and drops her hands.
“Okay.”
Belle presses her hands to the knot in the towel. “Okay?”
“We’ll break up. Temporarily. Okay? Temporary?”
“Temporary.”
Scoot sighs. “Can I just ask one favor?”
“What do you want?”
“Can we just have one more night as a couple?” She whispers. “One last evening together before we take a break. Something to look forward to. Something to remember you by?”
Belle nods. “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”
“But-“
“I. Don’t. Want. To.” She adopts a firm stance. “Respect. My. Boundaries.”
Scoot turns away and wipes the tears from her cheeks. “Fine.”
“I know you’re upset. But you cannot take that out on me. I am not your emotional punching bag. And I’m not your personal sex… factory. “
“F…factory?”
“You know what I mean! I don’t owe you my body, or my attention, or my romantic predilections. And until you stop being so, so… I don’t wanna say demented. But… Until you stop, with all of this everything that this is, then all we are is friends who might soon become adopted sisters. Okay?”
She huffs. “It’s better than nothing.”
“Alright.” She glances at the bed, and then at the master bath. “My hair’s dry by now. I’m gonna go get dressed. Is there anything else you need to tell me before we try to put all of this behind us?”
“No. That’s it.”
“Good.” Belle rifles in the nearby dresser for a pair of pajamas before heading into the side room. “Let’s try to have a good day tomorrow with Rarity, okay?”
“Sure.” Scoot flings herself loosely onto the bed and starts to scroll through MyStable. She winces as nearly every single post has something to do with Rainbow Dash. Eventually she just exits the app, her stomach queasy, and stares at the ceiling until Belle returns.
“You’re showering in the morning?” Belle asks.
“Yeah.” She sets her phone on the side table and slides under the covers before turning her lamp off, blanketing the left half of the room in darkened moonlight.
“Things will be better tomorrow.”
“Right…” she puts her pillow over head and tries to block out the rest of the world, to no avail.
Unremembered dreams follow her into a restless slumber.
/x/x/x/
Sunset opens her eyes to see a sea of empty white.
She cranes her neck to look around but finds that she cannot do so. No signal to move any part of her body manages to bear any fruit. Panic is the first place her instincts take her, but it does not take root. A quietly pleasant high fills every bit of her body that she is conscious of.
“Hello?” She asks.
A ripple in the fabric of this reality shimmers, and a curtain opens up. Navy blue shadows spill out of it, and a doorway appears.
Sunset falls to her hooves, and can now see and feel her legs. She takes a few tentative steps towards the entrance, but stops as she sees a pair of glowing eyes in the darkness.
“Where am I?” She asks.
A tall unicorn strides into the pale, an alicorn to be more exact. This doesn’t seem to be Twilight, and it definitely isn’t Celestia. Dark blues, purples, and black radiates from her body the way that pink, green, and light blue shone from Celestia.
“Are you Luna?” Sunset asks.
“You must be Sunset Shimmer,” she greets without moving her mouth. Telepathy. “We have heard a great deal about you from our sister.”
“We?”
A sad smile creeps across Luna’s face. “Forgive us our usage of Olde Ponish pronouns. It was commonplace a thousand and some odd years ago. Old habits die hard, we are afraid.”
Sunset falls to her haunches. “You’re one for three, Princess.”
“You really are feisty…” Luna circles around Sunset. “You are correct in ascertaining our identity. As for the location, this is a subsidiary branch of limbo. Your consciousness has been denied its ability to dream for a short time. Perhaps you have taken a medication from your world?”
“Yeah, I had two pills that were supposed to help me not dream.”
“Why have you elected to reject your dreams?”
“Because they’re all nightmares.” Sunset glances down at her forelegs, then does a double take as she inspects the silvery marks. “Huh, my scars are on my unicorn body too?”
“What nightmares have you had, may we ask?”
Sunset shrugs. “Being abandoned by my friends. Reliving the last moments of my relationship with Celestia. Killing myself. All that fun stuff.”
Luna nods. “A perfectly reasonable explanation.”
“Is there a point to this interrogation?”
“You showed up here unannounced. The point seems to be one that you decide upon yourself. We are simply investigating that which should not exist in our own reality.”
Sunset glances at the doorway. “Where’s that?”
“That is the tantabus.”
“The what?”
“It is of no consequence to you.”
“Alright.”
“You and I share a kinship,” Luna says, staring wistfully into the distance. “Twilight Sparkle has redeemed us both.”
“Oh yeah, she did mention something about that.” Sunset shrugs. “We should start a book club.”
“Book… club?”
“It was a joke. Look, Princess Luna-“
“Please, in dreams we are not the Princess.”
“Luna. Our conversation has been scintillating and robust, but I really just wanna go to sleep so I can wake up in the morning. Do you mind if I ask how I… get out of here?”
“You wake up.”
“And how long is that going to be?”
“There is a time dilation between your world and ours. Roughly speaking, it is approximately nine cycles to five. Therefore, if your body is to sleep for nine hours, we suspect you will remain here for five hours.”
“Great.” Sunset taps the ground. “You got any books or something?”
“Twilight Sparkle cares deeply for you.”
“Yeah. Is this going somewhere?”
“My sister also cares deeply for you. Despite all the harm you have done to her. She still looks upon you in a favorable light. A light that has kindled with news of your newfound exploits with friendship.”
“We gonna do something besides rub dirt in my wounds?”
“We do not wish to dredge up bitter and painful memories. If anything we wish to congratulate you on overcoming the thirst for power. And… to offer a warning.”
“Oh man, I was hoping for a surprise party. Wait, unless the warning is that cake and balloons are in my near future!?”
Luna sets a hoof on Sunset’s shoulder. “Great power is a gift that has been bestowed upon both of us. Power that both of us have abused with reckless wanton. And it is only through friendship that we both have been saved from the depths of loneliness and despair welcomed by our hubris and avarice. What little I know of your situation by way of Twilight Sparkle does not seem to be the most jovial of times. For that you have our apologies. You do not deserve the mistreatment you have received.”
“Well thanks. I do appreciate that.”
Luna pulls away and walks out a few steps.
“Soon may come a time where you are presented with the opportunity to have vengeance over those who have wronged you. You must promise us that you will not fall to something as petty as revenge.”
“I think I deserve a little bit of revenge. As a treat.”
“I thought the same once. My treat earned me the prison sentence of the millennium.”
“Jeez, you gotta make it so dramatic…”
“We feel you are not taking this with the seriousness it is intended to be given.”
“Look, Luna, it’s been a long day. A long week. A long month. A long life. I had shitty sleep last night. I had shitty sleep the night before. I’m tired as fuck and I just want to close my eyes and pass out for a little while. I don’t have the energy to care about dark omens of fate and destiny and all that other crap. If I promise you that I won’t get revenge on that bitch that very nearly killed me, can I be left to my own devices for a little bit before my body wakes up?”
“We only hope you will consider an alternative if the time ever does come when you are presented with the opportunity to tip the scales of justice in your favour.” Luna glances at the door which makes a very agitated sound. “We are needed elsewhere,” she says, looking back to Sunset. “When we leave we will seal the exit. You will be safe.”
“Cool. Thanks Luna… you, uh. You sure you don’t have a book or something?”
A swirl of smoke solidifies into a rectangular prism and lands at Sunset’s hooves.
“Here,” Luna says as she walks away. “This is a story that a friend of Twilight Sparkle’s has… strongly encouraged us to read ourselves. We hope it may pass the time quicker for you. And we hope you will take our advice.”
“Yeah, revenge is bad. Got it.” Sunset inspects the cover more carefully. “Daring Do and the Quest for the Sapphire Stone? Huh. Could be interesting. Thanks Lu- aaaaand you’re gone already.”
She squats down and grabs at the book with her hooves for a minute before freezing in place, slowly shaking her head, and opting to use her magic instead.
“Crazy-ass anti-dreaming pills…” she murmurs to herself as she settles in to read.
/x/x/x/