Starlight watched as Sunset Shimmer’s eyes stopped glowing, and she removed her hand from Zipporwhill’s wrist. There was a content smile on her face, reflecting the unchanging one on Zipporwhill. Sunset stood up, unfolding her body so that she would be at the same level as Starlight and Twilight as she turned to join them.
“She’s settling in really well,” Sunset said, marvel in her voice. “I wish I could do this as well as you. I don’t think I could have kept in her memories of Ripley without the pain of losing him.”
“Nonsense, Sunny. If you hadn’t, she would have found love and happiness in the dogs she had after Ripley. Just like she did in life. Who knows? Maybe it would've even been better that way.“
“Oh, I don’t know,” Twilight said, frowning as she nervously adjusted the glasses she didn’t need. “Is it bad that I wish she had been an astronomer instead of a dog groomer? We used to get, oh I don’t know how to say this, important people? Or maybe, people who really cared about what was going on in the world, and would know more about it?”
“I don’t think she has those people around her anymore,” Sunset said. “Because she doesn’t need to. She never wanted to run the world. She just wanted to be famous and important, and live in leisure and luxury.”
She looked back down at Zipporwhill’s body, and Starlight’s gaze followed. One file over from Upper Crust. One rank down from Chestnut Magnifico.
“So this is who is left in her life. Palace staff. People who are kind and pleasant and won’t ever feel the need to talk about difficult or complicated things, until she has a reason to take her anger out of them.”
“That’s almost more depressing, isn’t it?” Starlight said. “That people are just keeping up the system of the world that she created, but on their own now, without her needing to even do anything or make any decisions.”
She looked back up at Sunset and Twilight.
“But it’s interesting, you know? Seeing how human society adapts even after such a big change.” She gave a knowing look to Sunset. “Not too different from how ponies are, sometimes.”
Twilight smiled weakly. “Yeah, that’s interesting to think about…”
Twilight looked back down, but not at Zipporwhill, lying in peaceful repose. Starlight could tell that she was not looking at any of the bodies in particular, arranged in neat little rows and columns all the way up until where one edge of the Void met itself and looped back around. Instead, her gaze was unfocused, as if taking in the entire tableau all at once.
Then, without saying anything, she began to walk off. Sunset and Starlight exchanged a glance, before following her. They knew where she was going. Only a few paces away, along the edge of the grid of bodies until she got to a conspicuously empty spot, between the still forms of Pinkie Pie and Rarity.
“So, who’s next on the rota?” Twilight asked, almost off-handedly, as she stared down at the empty spot.
“Fluttershy is,” Starlight heard Sunset reply.
“Oh, that’s great! She’s really been getting into her writing. I think she finally found something to fill the rest of that void that settling in newcomers couldn’t.” Twilight kept staring at the empty spot. “She’ll have a lot of stories to tell.”
“Yeah, it’ll be nice!” Starlight said. “I mean, it always is. With any of you.”
Twilight turned around to give them a smile. But as the moments passed, the smile softened. Twilight wasn’t quite looking at either of them, but beyond them, at the infinite white void that stretched out in all directions.
She looked down at her bare feet, the material of her socks and shoes long lost to early experiments on the physics of the Void.
“I know it’s early, but I think I want to go back now. If you two are going to be okay.”
“Of course we will, Twi!” Sunset said, her voice reassuring. “It won’t even be that long before we’re scheduled to wake Fluttershy.” Sunset took Starlight’s strong hoof-hand in her right hand. “And you know, we always have each other.”.
A soft look in her eyes, Twilight took Sunset and Starlight’s free hand and hoof-hand to complete the triangle.
“I really wish you could come into the dreamlands with us, and not just visit with the Empathy magic. It’s close, but not really the same as actually being in there, you know?“
“Yeah.” Sunset said, giving both of them a squeeze. “Me too.”
They hugged each other, the three of them, all close and tight, Sunset making up for what Starlight’s shaky arm couldn’t manage. Then, they let go, though Twilight held on to Sunset’s hand and gaze for just a little bit longer than Starlight’s.
Starlight gripped the Memory Stone in her strong hoof-hand, and offered it up to Sunset. Wordlessly, Sunset gingerly took the stone, her soft fingers brushing up against Starlight’s frog-palm as she did so.
She turned to Twilight, who had already laid herself down to take her place, her eyes closed, her arms folded across her body.
Sunset knelt down to place a hand on Twilight’s side, and the Memory Stone glowed in blue, its magic to be shaped by her guiding mind in the simplest of operations: to seal away precisely what had been sealed away before, following the contours first laid down by Starlight all those years ago, adding to it everything that passed between the start of this latest awakening and this very moment. To return her to a world where she could eat and sleep and dream and have ambitions and realize goals and connect with the people in her life while doing anything else other than sitting in an endless and eternal void.
To return her to a world where things still mattered.
A world better than this.