Dinky rolled over in her warm bed, enjoying the coziness of her blankets. She was conscious, but didn’t want to get up yet. She just wanted to lie in bed and enjoy the feeling of warmth a little longer.
The scent of eggs frying and bread toasting caught the unicorn filly’s attention and she smiled, still keeping her eyes shut. Mom’s making breakfast, she assured herself and the scent of fresh muffins reaching her now locked in her belief.
The events she remembered were just a dream. She was in her home, with her mother, safe and sound. Even though their home was the small box of a house in the place where those mean ponies were forcing her mother to stay, it was still home as long as Dinky had her mother. Her beautiful, wonderful, loving mother.
She wrinkled her nose as she suddenly noticed something was different. The muffins smelled... odd, as if something was missing.
Dinky sat up and rubbed her eyes with her forehooves and opened them slightly, only for them to open wide, her heart jumping into her chest.
This wasn’t her room. The walls were covered in a blue wallpaper with star patterns. There were shelves and toys that she didn’t recognize. This wasn’t her room at all. Not even the one from before those mean ponies had forced them to move.
Dinky started to panic. Where was she? What was going on? Was that dream not a dream, but real? The sound of hoofsteps came from outside the white door several meters from the foot of her bed.
Dinky fought with all her hope that it was her mother, coming to tell her that they’d been allowed to leave that place while Dinky was asleep and that they were living in a new, happy home, away from the prying eyes of ponies that didn’t understand her mother or seem to care how much they loved each other.
The door opened and, for a few short seconds, Dinky was able to keep up the illusion that everything was fine and that her mother was wishing her good morning. But, that was shattered when she saw the blue unicorn mare with a white mane and tail, a silver horseshoe cutie-mark on her flank.
“Good morning, Dinky,” she said, smiling warmly. “Did you have a nice—?”
“Where’s my Mommy?” Dinky’s terrified shriek cut across her question as she leapt off the bed and stood, facing this stranger.
“Oh,” the unicorn looked a little unsure, then gave what was meant to be a calming smile. “Don’t you remember? This is your home now.”
Dinky’s terrified expression turned into a scowl. “Where’s. My. Mommy?” Her tone was cold.
The unicorn looked uncertain again. She coughed and seemed to regain her composure. “Well, the courts decided Derpy couldn’t take care of you anymore,” Her tone was steady, but there was also the smallest quiver. “I’ll be looking after you from now on. This is your family.”
Dinky’s face crumbled and her ears went flat against her head. The coldness and harsh expression she’d had before left as realization dawned on her. The dream. It hadn’t been a dream at all. She remembered now. She remembered everything.
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She had been sleeping, whilst her mother had been doing... she couldn’t remember what. She’d woken up a little when a knocking sound came from their door. She’d heard her mother talking angrily. Then, things had gone quiet. After that, she’d heard somepony come in her room.
She’d opened her eyes, expecting to see her mother, only to see a grey unicorn with a short-cut brown mane wearing a black suit and tinted glasses. The same mean ponies that had always taken her away from her mother, for hours at times, and tried to convince Dinky to leave her mother and go live with some other ponies. She’d refused every time, loyal only to her mother.
Were they here for that same reason again, to try and convince her to leave her mother? No. Something was different this time. They’d never come into their home to take her. What was going on?
“Dinky!” Her mother's startled, desperate cry made Dinky’s eyes widen. Why did her mother sound so scared?
“Miss Hooves,” the unicorn said in a flat voice, “please come with us. We are taking you to your new family, where you will be raised in a safe environment.” It took a few seconds for Dinky to process what those words meant.
“No,” she said in a quiet, quivering voice, shaking her head. She took several steps back.
“Do not make this any harder than it already is,” the unicorn said, just as flatly as before. “Please come quietly. It is for your own well-being.”
“No!” Dinky screamed, her horn flashing with a golden light, bolts of energy flying from it, zapping around the room.
There was another flash. This one an azure colour and the world went black. Dinky stared down at her hooves, her mind a whirling vortex of confusion, sadness, fear and anger, not sure which to focus on first.
The unicorn gave a sad smile and took a step forward, reaching out a hoof to hold Dinky’s shoulder. “No!” Dinky slapped the mare’s hoof away and took several steps back. “I want my Mommy! We belong together.”
The unicorn paused a little, hurt by her words.
“But, I’m your mother now,” she said softly, reaching out again.
“No!” Dinky slapped her away once more, tears streaming down her fear. “You’re not my Mommy. I want my Mommy. I want my Mommy!” Her horn began glowing a bright golden light. It grew bigger and brighter, expanding until it was a sphere of golden energy surrounding Dinky, like a force field.
“Dinky, stop!” the unicorn tried, struggling against the fierce winds that now pushed against her. They were coming from Dinky.
“I WANT MY MOMMY!” Dinky’s scream echoed. There was an enormous golden flash. When it faded, Dinky was gone.
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Derpy finished tying the noose hanging from the ceiling light. She’d fashioned it from the sheets of her bed.
It had been a week since they’d taken Dinky from her. A week since they’d taken the light from her world.
Derpy had tried to move on, if only to please the nurses that insisted she should be happy that Dinky was with a nice family. But how could she? She was Dinky's family. Dinky belonged with her and nopony else.
Her Ponyville friends had come to talk with her, to try and give her a little bit of cheer. Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy had let her cry into their shoulders and had done their best to comfort her.
Even Princess Twilight Sparkle had come to visit, giving her apologies that she hadn’t been able to do anything. Twilight had known how much Derpy and Dinky loved each other and did to the best of her ability to convince the courts Derpy was where Dinky belonged, but to no avail.
Derpy had thanked them all, giving a weak smile every time, but when they left, it vanished faster than you could blink. She didn’t see a reason to go on anymore. Her muffin was gone. The one thing that mattered in her life had been taken from her and she’d never have her back, so why bother? What was the point of life without her Dinky?
The answer was simple. There was no point, not anymore.
Derpy took one last look at the night sky from her window. Luna had made the sky very dark tonight. There were barely any stars and the moon was hidden behind dark clouds, making the night gloomy. Just like Derpy felt. Her ceiling light was the only thing brightening the darkness, and that wasn’t much to stifle the blackness enveloping her.
She flapped her wings until her head was level with the noose. She slowly lowered her head to it, getting ready to tighten it and let her wings droop.
All at once there was an enormous flash of golden light from the corner of the room. The flash startled Derpy and she fell back, landing on her flank with a small, “omf!”
Rubbing her now sore flank, Derpy looked to the corner. Something was there. Something foal-sized. Derpy was about to smile, when she realized the fear of death was just making her see things. She lowered her head, her ears drooping, tears in her eyes.
“M-Mommy?”
Now she was hearing things. Why did life have to be so cruel? She’d already lost her daughter. Did life have to rub that in during her last few moments?
“Mommy!” Derpy heard the sound of running hoofsteps and felt something run into her and hold her tight.
She opened her eyes and looked down. A small, grey unicorn filly with yellow eyes and a mane and tail of the same color was hugging her tightly and looking up at her, tears streaming down her face.
“M-Muffin?” she asked hesitantly.
“Mommy!” the small, solid illusion cried out happily, hugging her even tighter. “I love you, Mommy!”
Derpy’s mind finally caught up with what was happening. She wrapped her forelimbs around her daughter and held her, tears leaking from her eyes, trailing down her face.
They stayed that way for several minutes, a mother holding her daughter, never wanting to let go again as each other’s body heat warmed their sore hearts.
After a few minutes they loosened the embrace and Derpy looked down through bloodshot eyes at another pair of bloodshot eyes.
“I missed you so much,” she whispered, and held Dinky closer, wrapping her wings around the most precious thing in her world.
“I missed you too, Mommy,” Dinky sniffled, burying her head in her mother’s grey fur, then leaned up and nuzzled her mother’s neck lovingly.
Derpy looked up at the window and tightened her grip ever so slightly. “Don’t worry, Muffin.” She said gently. “I won’t let them take you away again. We’ll always be together. Forever.”
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An hour later, two figures slipped through the grounds of the Assisted Living Home, staying to the dark, saddlebags strapped to their sides.
They paused in the shadow of a generator as a guard walked passed, a torch held in his mouth, lighting small patches of the darkness wherever he pointed it. He was an earth pony with a silvery-grey coat and a short, blue mane and tail. His yellow eyes surveyed the area, looking rather bored, to be honest.
The two figures waited until the guard had walked behind another corner, before they headed for the gates and stopped in front of them. It was wire, tall enough that most pegasi living there wouldn’t be able to fly over it.
The smaller figure leaped onto the taller ones back. The taller one's extended her wings, one on either side of her back, and rose slowly into the air. The smaller one held onto the Pegasus's neck as they rose above the fence’s line and went over it. After that, the now airborne figures rose into the sky, not looking back as they flew off into Luna’s night.
The Princess of the night watched the two, though she made no move to stop them. She did not want to put them through the heartache of a mother losing her daughter. She knew what that was like and didn’t want to see these two go through it.
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Nurse Tender Heart sighed as she finished making the bed of room 508. It had been a month since it had been occupied and she was getting it ready for its new resident.
She looked around the bare, empty room. She’d been worried about Miss. Hooves ever since her daughter had been taken away. Derpy had not ate, nor slept and refused to speak with anypony.
She’d always just sit in the middle of the room and stare at the photos of her daughter, sometimes holding one in her forehooves, looking down at it, as if, by looking at it, her daughter would magical appear in the photo’s place.
Nurse Tender Heart had always liked Dinky Hooves. She’d been a positive little filly, who loved her mother very dearly. It had broken Tender Heart’s heart when she’d come in the day Dinky had been taken and found Derpy lying on the floor, wailing and sobbing at the fact that her daughter had been stolen from her forever.
A week after Dinky had been taken, Tender Heart had come into room 508 and nearly had a heart attack. Hanging from the ceiling light she’d seen a noose, fashioned from the sheets off the bed.
Thankfully, the noose had been empty. But when she looked around the room, she’d noticed all Derry’s things were gone. All the pictures Dinky had draw, all the photos that she had hung on the walls, Derpy’s saddlebag and the whoofknit one Tender Heart had sometimes seen Dinky wearing had all vanished.
It couldn’t have come at a worse time. The foster family Dinky had been sent to live with had called mere hours before the previous morning, saying that Dinky had disappeared in a flash of golden light.
Now, Derpy couldn’t have done that. She was a Pegasus, not a unicorn. She couldn’t do any magic that other pegasi couldn’t. And, when Nurse Tender Heart had checked after getting the call, Derpy had been sitting in the middle of her room, staring at her photos of Dinky, just like always.
Nopony knew where Derpy had gone. She’d left nothing behind and since she didn’t know which foster family Dinky had gone to, nor the fact that Dinky had disappeared (Tender Heart had decided not to tell her) she wouldn’t have gone looking for Dinky.
This left only one question: Where was Derpy?
The answer: nopony knew.
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Tender Heart finished fluffing the pillows and made to leave the room. She paused, taking one last look back in the room. She could easily still see Derpy’s frail, sobbing, defeated form sitting in the middle of the room, glazed eyes looking at a photo in her hooves, tears streaming down her face.
Tender Heart blinked and the vision of Derpy faded away, like a ghost. Good luck, Derpy, she thought as she walked down the hall, the smallest smile on her face. I wish you well in life. Please, be happy, wherever you are.
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“Morin', Miss. Hooves,” Sheriff Silver Star said, tipping his hat to Derpy as she trotted past.
“Good morning, Sheriff Silver Star,” Derpy replied happily, waving a hoof. “Lovely day.”
He chuckled. “Indeed it is. In no small part thanks to you.” Derpy blushed as she continued down the road, Dinky trotting right by her side.
It had been a month since they’d arrived in Appleoosa. The townsfolk had been very surprised when Derpy had landed in the middle of town, Dinky fast asleep on her back.
When Derpy had asked if there was somewhere the two of them could get some rest, an earth pony stallion by the name Braeburn had offered them a place on his apple farm until they could get on their hooves.
It was a nice place. It reminded them of Sweet Apple Acers, back in Ponyville.
Finding a job hadn’t been as hard for Derpy as she’d expected. Appleoosa had no weather ponies, which was why the roads were always so dusty, so she’d gotten the job without any questions. She’d also taken a job as a mailmare, just like back in Ponyville.
In a matter of weeks, she’d saved enough bits to by a small house not too far Braeburn's farm. She’d noticed he was quite smitten with her and, she had to admit, she was a bit smitten with him. Maybe he’d make a good dad for Dinky one day. She really could use a fatherly figure and Dinky liked Braeburn. Only time would tell.
Dinky was getting along well with the foals in her new school, as well. At first, nopony was sure about her, because there were no other unicorns in Appleoosa. But, after a while, the fillies and colts had warmed up to Dinky and she’d made tons of new friends. She was even learning how to use her magic with precision.
Derpy smiled down at her little muffin as they walked down the streets of Appleoosa. She and Dinky were wearing matching green scarves, much like the kind Dinky had worn when she’d taken part in the Sister Hooves Social.
Derpy was sad they’d had to leave their old home back in Ponyville and the chances of her meeting her Ponyville friends, or Dinky meeting her filly friends again weren’t too bad, but not too good either.
Braeburn had told her that Applejack might visit every few months or so, and sometimes she’d bring a few of her friends along with her, but not too often. They couldn’t send letters either. If they did, Foal Services would find out where they were and come and take Dinky away again and neither Derpy, nor Dinky wanted that.
But, here, in Appleoosa, nopony was trying to keep them apart. They all understood Derpy and Dinky and respected them.
Derpy stopped, pulling Dinky into a warm embrace. “I love you, my little Dinky Muffin,” she whispered softly, cradling her daughter.
“I love you, too, Mommy,” Dinky replied and nuzzled her mother’s neck lovingly. The two stayed that way for a while.
Life had been rough for the two ponies. They’d struggled to make due and fought back against all the rumours and gossip that had gone around about them before about whether Derpy was Dinky’s mother or not and whether Derpy was responsible enough to care for Dinky. They’d lost each other and then found each other and would never leave each other ever again.
Maybe one day, they’d go back to Ponyville, when Dinky was older. But, for now, they were happy, living their new lives in Appleoosa.
We’ll never be apart again, Derpy thought, looking up at the sky. After all, we belong together.