//------------------------------//
// Chaos (305) 
// Story: AlwaysDressesInStyle's Ponyville CiderFest '23 Interactive App Stories 
// by AlwaysDressesInStyle 
//------------------------------//

ENDING A (CHAOS): 

“Golly, I guess I could try this friendship thing.”

Minty gives Cozy a chance, and lets her make mistakes and learn from them.  It takes some time, but eventually Minty cares about Cozy, and Cozy actually reciprocates those feelings of friendship.  It’s a strange feeling for her, but she realizes she would genuinely miss Minty if something happened to her.  It’s a very different feeling than the one she had towards her frenemies, Tirek and Chrysalis.

No sooner does she think it, then she finds herself in Canterlot, falling towards the ground. She flaps her wings, and after taking a loop of her former prison, seeing the snarling changeling queen and the cringing centaur, she makes a beeline straight for Minty’s house in Ponyville.  In a world that knows and fears her, it’s the only safe place to hide.

Minty’s house is locked, but she knows where the forgetful mare keeps a spare key hidden.  “Oh Minty, I’m home!”  She flies straight towards the mare, tacklehugging her.

“Ooof,” Minty groans, reeling from the impact of the now very solid filly.  “You escaped your punishment?  This is great!  We can totally hang out and do things now!  How does it feel to be good?”

“Silly Minty, the requirements of my release only indicated I needed to make a friend, not that I needed to become good.  Now that I’m free, we could be evil together!  I always need lackeys to do my bidding.”

“I’m not really cut out for the evil lifestyle, Cozy.”

“Oh.  I’m not really cut out for the boring anonymous peon lifestyle.”  Cozy chuckles awkwardly.  “No offense.”

“You could try being a hero.”

“Where’s the fun in that?”

“So is this it then? You only used me to escape, and now you’re just going to go be a villain again?”

“I…  I don’t know.  I’ve become attached to you in a way I didn’t think I could.  I think that spell could tell the difference between genuine friendship and fake friendship.”

“Well, duh.  You’ve always been all about making false friends. You don’t think the princesses and Discord could possibly be stupid enough to not put in some kind of protection.”

Cozy gives Minty a look that says of course she thought they were that dumb.

“My life may be boring, but nopony’s ever turned me into a statue.”

Cozy taps a hoof to her face, lost in thought.  “There has to be a happy medium.  Oh, I know! There’s this spell… it pulls a single sock from the dryer every time somepony does laundry.  We could cast that, and make sure all the socks come here, to you.”

Minty opens her mouth to object, but stops.  “Tell me more…”