Letters From a Little Princess Monster

by Georg

47. Mirror - rorriM - Part Four

“Wake up, Twilight. We’re almost to the train station.”

With face firmly placed against the glass, Twilight Sparkle shifted positions and left yet another nose smear across the train car window. Her excitement was always tempered considerably during their trips to Fillydelphia, because as much fun as she had at the amusement park with Shining Armor and Cadence, Mom and Dad always looked so drawn and pale after visiting with Aunt Twinkle. Despite bringing books to read on the trip, she always wound up sticking her nose to the window to watch the scenery change and imagine what it was like for the ponies who the train passed, and that imagination always transitioned to slumber as the fatigue of early morning rising to meet the train caught up with the little filly.

“I’m up, Mom,” mumbled Twilight even though her eyes remained tightly closed against the morning sunlight. “M’gonna ride the Boomer this year. Allll the way. M’a big filly.”

“Only if Scootaloo is a good little patient.”

The world seemed to shift under Twilight, that is Monster as the elusive memories fled back into her mind’s fractures and crevices where they had been lurking before. She straightened up with a painful twitch of her cramped wings, one of which had been trapped under her body when she had fallen asleep against the window and regarded with bleary eyes the rest of her friends as they also struggled to wakefulness. The lingering traces of memory did not draw icy claws down her soul as before, but darted and dashed just outside of her perception like a moth attracted to a reading candle. Mom and Dad had both been there in her memory, as well as brother and sitter… Shining Armor and Cadence. The train, the car, the morning, they had all once been part of Twilight Sparkle’s previous life, a time of joy and sadness that was locked away inside her head, and the key to this set of memories was somewhere in Fillydelphia, whether good or bad.

The little filly that looked back at her from the reflection in the train window seemed so much like that innocent little pony of so long ago, all mussed from her nap and blinking to get the remaining sleep out of her eyes, but there was something different in the background. There were two train stops in Fillydelphia, one for the amusement park area, and one for—

“All passengers for the North Fillydelphia train station please prepare to depart. This station serves the business district, Theatre Row, and Starglider Memorial Hospital. Please have all bags ready when the train comes to a complete stop, and have a pleasant day in Fillydelphia.”

As the echoes of the announcer died away, Quick Fix hustled about, gathering Monster’s friends together and giving one last lecture before the door opened. “Now, I want all of you to stick together and not go running off anywhere, or so help me, we won’t go to Funland, and I mean it.”

“So if I misbehave,” started Diamond Tiara with a contemplative look at the rest of the small ponies, “all of us will just go back to Ponyville without going to the park, right?” There were little sparkles of mischief in her violet eyes as the little present pegasus smirked at the real Scootaloo and mouthed the words, “You owe me.”

The city would have been more frightening to Monster if little flecks of memory had not been floating around in the back of her head like snowflakes, drawing her attention to landmarks and buildings as Aunt Quick Fix and the rest of the little ponies strolled through the ‘business center’ on their way to the hospital and Scootaloo’s specialist appointment. A dog grooming shop caught her eye, reminding her that it had once been an ice cream store, and a shuttered sandwich shop reminded her hungry belly of delicious carrot dogs, done up to the top with hot peppers and cream cheese. Nothing she could see matched up exactly with her fragmented memories, which felt peculiar, as if she were looking into a mirror that reflected some other pony, a much nicer pony who deserved friends and family. The sound of earth spirits under her hooves were muffled, as if the concrete and steel were muting their song, but the air whistled through the signs and flags in a cheerful tune that distracted her from the darkness which continually threatened to claim her. There was little danger of that today. The happy chatter of her friends who were attempting to look in all directions simultaneously was a balm to her wounded heart, and lifted her head from a slumped examination of the sidewalk as they walked, even if she had found two bits and a piece of almost-new spearmint gum with most of the flavor still intact.

“You sure are a Little Miss Chatterbox,” whispered Diamond Tiara as she slipped back out of Aunt Quick Fix’s zone of attention and bumped up against Monster’s shoulder. “Looking forward to the amusement park with the rest of the freaks?”

“No,” whispered Monster while nervously chewing her gum. “Need to be here. Don’t want.”

“You too, eh?” Diamond Tiara spread her tiny wings and gave them a practice flap that lifted her hooves off the sidewalk for a moment. “If I didn’t have to go to the doctor to get my wings looked at, I wouldn’t, but I gotta admit, these are pretty cool.” She hesitated in her steps and lowered her voice to a bare whisper. “Don’t you dare repeat that.”

“Won’t,” whispered Monster, hesitantly sticking her wings out from under her cloak before yanking them back in at the curious glance she received from a passing business pony. The chubby mare actually stopped in the middle of the sidewalk and stared as the little alicorn and her friends trotted onward, and for a moment, Monster thought she might dart after them, but eventually the mare turned and continued strolling slowly on her way while shaking her head.

The hospital did not really seem that different than all the other big blocky buildings in the city, except for the giant red X on the front lawn and a set of magical floodlights that would keep it lit in the darkest night, but the spirits of the air seemed to dance oddly in the currents that curled around the building corners. Injured ponies came here to heal, but not all of them survived their visit. Death and Life walked hoof in hoof through the corridors, from the wails of newborn infants to the wheezing of the elderly ponies who had little time remaining. Monster huddled close to her friends as Aunt Fix wove through the confusing corridors, up the stairs, and eventually to a small waiting room filled with other little ponies and their parents. She would have been perfectly content to continue huddling until the doctor’s visit was over and it was time to go, if not for the perky nurse who poked her nose into the room and called out, “Scootaloo and Twilight, the doctor will see you now.”

“Me?” Monster looked up and swallowed a lump before putting the old foals magazine back on the shelf and slinking down the hospital corridor after Quick Fix and Diamond Tiara. The small room that the nurse escorted them into seemed cold and sterile, with glass-covered pictures of wings in all stages of flight on the walls, as well as the muscle groups and nerves that allowed a pegasus to soar. While waiting, she climbed up on the examination table to study the pictures in great detail, hoping to find some clue to the frustrating flaw in her own wings as well as Scootaloo’s. Monster had just twisted around into an excruciatingly uncomfortable position with one wing held next to the photograph for an in-depth comparison when the door to the examination room opened and a somewhat greying pegasus stallion slipped in.

He had a pleasant face with a welcome smile, but his eyes only rested momentarily on Diamond Tiara before passing over to Monster as if the little alicorn were a first edition of the newest Daring Do book. Slowly retracting her violet wing under her cloak, Monster dropped back down onto the floor and scurried over to the big pony seats, with a bright magical glow lifting up Diamond Tiara regardless of her wishes and plunking her securely on the examination table in Monster’s place.

“Err… Right.” The pegasus managed to quit looking at Monster and turned his attention to Diamond Tiara with a beaming smile. “I’m Doctor Pinion, and I’m very glad to see you this morning, Scootaloo. I heard directly from Princess Luna that you lost your old wing braces.”

“You did?” echoed Diamond Tiara.

“Yes, I did. She’s got a magnificent set of primaries with the most developed…” The doctor blinked several times and cleared his throat while rustling his own wings uncomfortably on his back. “Well, yes. Professional curiosity. In any event, let’s get those wings of yours spread out here and see how much you’ve grown since your last appointment.”

“I don’t think Scootaloo… I mean I’ve grown so much as a feather in the last year,” said Diamond Tiara, allowing the doctor to spread her pinions and check between the feathers.

“She hovered yesterday,” announced Aunt Fix. “I’ve got pictures and everything.”

“Really?” The doctor peered at Diamond’s feathers with his nose nearly brushing up against them. “It sounds like those braces are doing what they were designed to do. You’re not preening very well, though.”

“Preening?” asked Diamond Tiara with her nose wrinkled up.

“Yes, preening,” said Doctor Pinion in a stern voice. “Just like we discussed the last four visits. If you’re going to be flying, you need those wings properly cared for. Upsie-daisy!”

The stallion boosted Diamond Tiara up into the air where she hovered in place over the examination table. Her unexpected flight was a little unsteady, and somewhat panicked, but her little wings beat solidly for several seconds until the look of elation on her face was replaced by concentration, then panic.

“Nice catch, Twilight,” praised the doctor as the plummeting pegasus was captured in Monster’s magenta magic and lowered carefully to the table, although by her tail. “Scootaloo, you’re over-thinking your wings again. What did I tell you about that last time?”

“What?!” Diamond Tiara lay flat on the table, panting and clinging to the paper-covered surface as the doctor opened up her wing again and flexed it several times.

“Good, good. Strong muscles there. You’ve really developed some power over the last few years, Scootaloo.”

“Scooter,” mumbled Monster. “She goes really fast.”

“I bet she does. Well, Scootaloo, the nurse will take you and your aunt down the hallway to the measuring room and we’ll get you fitted for a new set of braces. It’ll take two or three days to get them fabricated and shipped to your home, so until then, try not to sleep on your sides and crimp your growing feathers. Then the nurse will give you and your aunt that little lecture on preening again, and hopefully this time it will stick, you rascal.” He ruffled Diamond Tiara’s mane with one hoof and boosted her down onto the floor before letting the nurse escort them out of the room.

For a long moment, it left Monster all alone in the examination room with the doctor, or at least until he called outside the hallway and another nurse slipped into the room, which seemed to be a great relief to him.

“Um… Twilight…” Doctor Pinion paused, his eyes flickering from Monster’s lumpy cloak to the pictures of wings on the wall. “If it would not be too much trouble, I was wondering…”

“You want to look at my wings too?”

“Yes,” he declared in an outrush of breath. “You see, I’ve never studied a growing alicorn’s wings before other than a few pictures from Princess Cadenza’s private files in medical school lectures. It’s a severely neglected field of research since there has only been one data point in the records up to now. In fact, Princess Cadenza’s early difficulties with flight were the reason I got into this field in the first place. I know Princess Luna was very insistent about keeping your identity as Twilight Sparkle a secret from the public… Err…” The doctor’s eyes flickered to the nurse standing by his side and he gave a deep sigh. “Oops. I probably shouldn’t have said anything.”

Monster nodded, twisting one hoof uncomfortably in the hospital carpet as memories of Cadence shifted and surged around her. As far as Monster could remember out of the jagged fragments of memory that were not too painful to touch, those elegant two-toned wings had never lifted sitter… Cadence into the air, not when Monster was a little filly named Twilight Sparkle being attended to in Canterlot or even during those tortured times in the Everfree Forest.

With the smallest touch of her magic, Monster lifted the bright yellow 5F1C cloak off her back and placed it on the chair before spreading out her trembling wings. As much as she wanted to know every single possible detail about her new body, preferably in a book with detailed operating instructions and several pages of checklists, there was one thing that stood in her way far more than the rest of her problems. Monster looked up at the nurse, who had been almost motionless since first coming into the examining room and gave her a brief nod.

“Don’t worry. Show him.”

“Are you sure?” The nurse knelt down to look Monster in the eyes. “I can tell you’re terrified.”

“Yes. Need to. Some secrets good. Need kept. Like mine. Yours is bad. He should know.”

“Very well.” There was a flare of green magic and a changeling stood where the nurse had been, looking at Doctor Pinion with her head cocked to one side. “I’m sorry, Dusty,” she started in a slightly buzzy tone. “Twilight Sparkle is correct. I should have told you earlier.” The changeling nurse turned her head back to Monster and smiled, just a little, with as much reassurance as she could muster, even though the little alicorn was facing the floor with her eyes tightly closed.

“Change back please,” whispered Monster, keeping her eyes shut until the glare of green fire had faded from the small room, and a compassionate hoof brushed back along her stubby mane. “Thank you.”

“No, thank you, Twilight Sparkle. Were it not for you, the changelings would still be loathsome parasites, stealing love wherever we go, and we would not be free of our terrible curse. I’ve worked for Doctor Pinion for ten years, feeding off the love that parents feel for their injured or crippled children, and I regret every moment.”

“No.” Monster lifted a hoof and placed it against the disguised changeling’s chest. “You took love to survive. Healed ponies. No debt. You took. You paid. Don’t be sad. Be happy. Featherweight takes pictures of happy times so we can live them again. Go look at pictures of the little ponies who came here to be healed. Feel the love from the ones you helped. Mourn the ones who died. Live.” She sat back on her rump and placed a second hoof on Doctor Pinion’s chest, eliciting a somewhat startled blink from the physician. “He likes you.”

“He’s married,” said the nurse with a naughty smile, gently lifting the small purple hoof off her chest. “Now come on. Let Doctor Lovesalot take a look at your wings, or he’ll mope around the office for the next year all depressed about missing his research opportunity. And,” she added with a wink, “I’ll make sure he sends you a full copy of his notes.”

It took a little while for Aunt Quick Fix to gather up the little ponies afterwards. Twist had gone around the waiting room with her candy bag, making sure every nervous little filly or colt in the waiting room had a tasty distraction from their upcoming doctor's appointment, while Featherweight was flittering around the ceiling, taking ‘posed’ shots of the patients and their parents. He would make faces or fly upside-down in order to make them all smile, then make sure to get their addresses so he could mail them copies of the photos later.

The upcoming trip to the amusement park was a powerful incentive to get all of her friends together and moving in the right direction though, and in very little time, the whole group had left the hospital and was sitting on a trolley car, which was a little like a wagon with nopony pulling it along a set of rails.

“We’re going to Funland! We’re going to Funland!”

It was a catchy phrase, but after the five thousandth repetition, the words began to grate on Monster’s nerves, and even Aunt Quick Fix’s smile was looking a little plastic and forced by the time they reached the park and raced for the entrance.

“Look!” proclaimed Twist, bouncing up and down in front of a freshly painted sign. “They know we’re coming today!”

“Funland Park(LLC) Welcomes the Elements of Harmony,” read Monster. “Get your pictures taken with them at the Pavilion of the Stars, only ten bits.”

“I thought it was supposed to be a secret that we used the Elements of Harmony,” said Sweetie Belle. “We wrote that newspaper article and everything.”

“Ten bits apiece,” said Diamond Tiara thoughtfully while brushing one wing across the side of her face. The feathers had been carefully straightened and oiled by the nurse at the hospital, but they had already begun to pop up in places. “Can I borrow a manebrush from somepony?”

They all obediently stuck out a wrist for the colorful plastic bracelet with a glowing security rune that identified them as “Admit Party of Seven Minors and One Adult” that was applied by a rather bored looking teenage pony with several small gold rings running down the edge of one ear. Then all there was left to do was to walk through the giant gates topped with two roundish pony ears along with all of the rest of the bouncing fillies and colts.

Monster should have been afraid. No, she should have been terrified. The sight of those big iron gates stirred memories in the back of her mind again, mixed along with the tinny music floating through the air and the happy screams of little ponies. There was something there, but it did not bring terror to her heart as the thoughts of her family in Canterlot so far away. A tremor of anticipation, yes. An itch of curiosity at the thoughts of the odd sign at the front of the park, yes too. A sincere determination to avoid the ‘Pavilion of the Stars’ at all costs, certainly.

“I’m going on the Boomer!” exclaimed Featherweight the moment they got through the gates. “Come on, Scoots! You can sit next to me!” Colt pegasus dragged filly pegasus for several yards until realization set in, and he looked back at Aunt Quick Fix, who was shaking her head.

“I think the Boomer is a little big for little ponies like you,” said Aunt Fix, setting her most stern expression and nudging the two in a different direction. “Let’s go over to the Fun Filly section of the park first, and maybe we can go past the Boomer before we go home.”

“But it’s huuuuge,” whined Featherweight. “It’s got this giant ramp and a big center spiral and two loop-de-loops! Archer said she got sick as a dog and threw up for a whole hour after her dad took her on it. Pleeeeeese?”

Despite all the attempts by Featherweight and Scootaloo (in her current body) to convince Aunt Quick Fix, the whole group soon found themselves in a much tamer section of the park, with smaller rides that bumped and wheezed along steel tracks, and one circular river with a long boat that floated past little villages of singing tiny flutterponies. Well, the sounds played, but most of the little mechanical flutterponies only jerked a little or had their jaws twitch in general syncopation with the tinny music. Twist seemed to like the plastic slides the most, while Featherweight and Scootaloo played on the jungle gym and Sweetie Belle swung on the swings with Monster pushing. Apple Bloom appreciated lunch the most, going with Aunt Fix to a big wooden cart shaped like an orange and bringing back several trays with oddly greasy and crunchy food. They even went on the Little Boomer, which turned out to be a set of small metal cars on greasy rails that rode up a small hill, and then back down again. A second trip proved just as banal, and so did the third and fourth, although Twist got sick and had to go throw up in a trash can.

Visiting the Gift Shop proved much more to her speed, with an entire building worth of shelves and boxes filled with little plastic toys. Monster was slowly getting used to the concept of ‘buying’ things, and after a quick trip to the cash register to see how much one of the gems she was carrying would buy, she began to fill up a basket. There was Trixie’s requested hat, of course, and a ‘Spike the Dragon’ mask which caught her eye. She could not resist several Daring Do notebooks, and a clever mechanical pencil intrigued her enough to buy out the whole collection on the shelf. ‘Gifts’ were another concept she was getting used to, and to help her learning, she had each one of her friends pick out something for themselves too. The words ‘glow’ and ‘glitter’ seemed to feature prominently in their selections, with Featherweight actually buying the ‘Deluxe Princess Celestia Glowing Crown and Horn, Lights Up With Authentic Alicorn Sounds.’

While Featherweight was showing his purchase off to Aunt Fix, Monster slipped over to where Scootaloo and Diamond Tiara were attempting to ignore each other. Scootaloo was pulling a rainbow-colored shirt several sizes too large out of the ‘Discount’ bin, while Diamond Tiara was attempting to fit a small golden crown onto her tangled magenta mane. The odd golden object yanked at something in her recent memory, of peeking out of the library window in the direction of the train station where mom and dad and sitter and brother—

“Twilight?” Scootaloo’s face was nearly touching her nose, with big blue eyes seeming so concerned and worried. An avalanche of memories smashed down on Monster, each as light as a snowflake but together driving all of the breath out of her lungs. The pink coat, the streaked violet of her mane, the worry. Without realizing it, Monster’s magic gently lifted the plastic crown out of Diamond Tiara’s grip and floated it over to Scootaloo’s bare head. It belonged there somehow, and a shiny tag that said ‘Princess mi Amore Cadenza Authentic Crown, 25 bits’ in both Equestrian and the squiggly symbols of Neighpanese caught her attention as she held it.

“Cadence,” breathed Monster. “Princess Cadence.” The crown fit perfectly on Scootaloo’s earth pony head despite the lack of a horn, although now that she was looking for the differences, her little friend was a far cry from the simple elegance of Cadence, as well as being several colors off in both mane and eyes. “Cadence brought me here,” whispered Monster. “Never wore a crown. Stood right there. Kissed Shiny. I bought…”

Nothing on the shelves matched her memories, which swirled like leaves in a strong wind, or snow in a — there it was. A snowglobe with a huge fancy castle in the background and ‘The Magic World of Funland’ written in glitter across the front. The little cork in the bottom had been easy to remove and the contents impossible to get back inside, leaving flakes of plastic and a greasy stain on the kitchen table the next morning. Mom had been angry. Dad had been understanding. Asked what she had learned. Nodded a lot. Deducted the cost out of her allowance, and credited her an equal amount for educational experience.

It was a memory that she could hold in her mind without pain. Monster held the snowglobe up and gave it a shake, watching the little flecks of plastic float through the glycerine and water solution while her mind floated in that peaceful time so long ago when her problems seemed so simple.

Diamond Tiara fumed despite herself as the little group left the gift shop, headed for the plebeian pleasure of a group photo at ‘Ye Olde Canterlottian Palace’ and matching t-shirts before any further foal entertainments opportunities. Admittedly, it had been somewhat fun so far to be running around with so many of Scootaloser’s friends and treated. She had never needed to carry her own money before. The words ‘I want’ substituted for any number of bits when Daddy or one of the servants was around, or ‘Charge it’ at any of the Ponyville merchants.

Quick Fix had given her a small bag of ‘Allowance’ bits to tuck into her mane when they first came into the park and had laid out the rules for the day in far more strict terms than Daddy ever had. Meals and group activities would be paid for by ‘Auntie Fix.’ Silly souvenirs and games were the responsibility of the individual little pony. She had then counted out ten bits for each of the other little ponies, even the little purple oddball, and let them go crazy in the arcade sitting in front of the Filly Fun gates until the bits were all gone.

It had taken five whole minutes, and all she had to show for it was a tiny pile of paper tickets. At least it was a larger pile than Twist’s single ticket, but it was dwarfed by the pile that Featherweight had accumulated at Skeeball, or the somewhat smaller pile that Sweetie Belle had accumulated at Match-a-Kitty. Still, they had not managed to spend all of their bits before Aunt Fix had been escorted out of the arcade by the management for opening up one of the broken machines and trying to fix it, and they had not even managed to trade in their tickets for some of the cheap plastic toys she had seen when they walked past the prize redemption center.

It was no big loss. Although there was a sparkly plastic tiara which had caught her eye.

The group photo was a little more to Diamond Tiara’s preference, as all of them got to dress up in fancy sparkly costumes with peaked hats and wide skirts. Since her special talent was accessorizing, Diamond took control of the dressing, with the correct glittering fake jewelry added to each little pony and Quick Fix, who almost did not fit into the Royal Guard costume until Twilight did something to it behind a curtain. The little alicorn was the most difficult of the group to outfit, and took forever to get out of that garish yellow cloak. The attendants at the photo booth were a little startled at having a little pony with both wings and a horn, but Diamond smoothed things over with a haughty snort and an insinuation that informed ponies knew all about pegacorns, and a subtle dig at expecting Fillydelphia to not be so prejudiced. Although the action caused the reaction she was wanting, there was still a little chill in her heart to see the attendants fawn all over Twilight while Diamond was ignored in the shadows. Perhaps that was what Princess Luna went through every day before she went insane and tried to bring on Night Eternal. She could see the dark alicorn hopping up and down in the back of the crowd screaming “Look at me! Look at me!” while her big sister hogged all of the attention. Still, when the little ponies all lined up in front of the camera in their fanciful outfits and attempted to smile, there was something missing.

“Wait!” called out Diamond Tiara as she bolted from the little height-boosting box she was standing on and dove into the box of props to one side of the photo booth. Props with colored glass jewels went everywhere as she dug, heedless of the consternation of the booth attendants, until Diamond emerged from the box with a golden crown in her teeth.

“There!” she declared, trotting over to the cringing alicorn and plunking the golden mesh of wires on her head. “Every Princess deserves a crown.”

“I’m notta princess,” muttered Twilight as her horn lit up to lift the crown, only for Diamond Tiara to push it back down on top of her head.

“Yes you are,” said Diamond with as much force as she could muster. “For this picture, at least. It fits you. And do you see this?” She pointed at the mirror, where a meek purple princess topped in gold sat in an uncomfortable lump. “Five red rubies to symbolize your five friends.”

“Red symbolizes blood,” said Twilight, her back still hunched as she looked in the mirror.

With a swish of unaccustomed skirts, Apple Bloom stepped up to Twilight’s side and put a hoof on her back. “We knew it was dangerous when we pelted off after you that night, Twilight.”

Twist tripped while climbing off her block, but managed to get back upright and put a hoof on Twilight’s back too. “You needed uth then, and you need uth now, Twilight. Friendth forever.”

In a cascade of color and cloth, the rest of Twilight’s friends swept down from their carefully posed positions and surrounded the little alicorn in a group hug that Diamond found herself dragged into. It was weird as all get out, weirder even than the little purple oddball, but she did not fight the ongoing group squeeze, or even afterwards when the photographers got them all situated back on their respective marks.

There was something new to Twilight’s pose, a rising of her normally bent neck and a straightening of her habitually hunched back as if some invisible weight had been removed. The cheap plastic crown topped in little flecks of red glass seemed right on Twilight’s head, maybe a little large where it bumped up against her ears, but as something she could grow into, if given time to heal and the support of her friends. Afterwards, when all of the clothes had been hung back up and Quick Fix was paying for the photos (including one that the photographer had snapped during the group hug), Twilight seemed reluctant to part with her crown.

“We need to put that back in the collection for the next group, Miss.” The earth pony attendant lifted the crown, which separated only reluctantly from its purple placement. “If you want another one like it, the gift shop has a fine selection,” she added as she put it back into the box.

“No,” said Twilight with one long look back at the box as the lid was closed. “Not yet. Need to grow. Change.” Those violet eyes shifted to look directly at Diamond Tiara, or more correctly through her. “Thank you.”

“For what?” Diamond reflexively responded.

“Putting part of my life back.” The little purple oddball had slipped back into her garish yellow cloak at the first opportunity once the costumes had started to be put away, although her habitual slouch had not fully returned yet. “Memory is a huge broken mirror. I see parts in it. Sometimes two parts fit. Most of the time not. I was here before with Shiny. And C-cadence. We never got our pictures taken, but the snowglobe…” Twilight paused to light up her horn, and a thin slit in the universe opened to her side. The snow globe in question floated out just long enough to be shaken, appreciated, and returned before the hole in reality sealed itself.

“You said something about the Boomer on the train,” said Diamond Tiara, trying to get the image of that impossible rift in the cosmos out of her mind. “Did you ride the roller coaster with Shining Armor and Princess Cadenza?”

“Not sure.” That habitual slump of her shoulders returned and Twilight whisked her stubby tail back and forth. “More holes than memories. Missing parts.”

“If I can get you a ride on the Boomer to help you find a memory and it helps me understand Scootaloo better, will you reverse the spell?” asked Diamond Tiara, trying her best to conceal a grin of triumph.

“Twilight!” called a voice from outside the photo store. “We’re getting matching t-shirts printed! Come on!”

“I-I-I think… Yes.” Twilight swallowed and some of the hunch went out of her back. “Yes.”

Monster could not understand just why getting something printed on a shirt, which nopony normally wore anyway, was such an important decision. They had all gotten pink shirts, but Twist had gotten ‘Sweetheart’ spray-painted across the front, while Apple Bloom had settled (of course) for the word ‘Apples!’ in a curvy script. Scootaloo and Diamond Tiara seemed to be engaged in some sort of primitive dominance display in order to one-up each other, with Scoots getting ‘Princess Diamond Tiara’ on her shirt with the added sparkles for an extra two bits, while Diamond had ‘Rainbow Dash Jr.’ written on hers in multiple colors that were supposed to glow in the dark.

The entire group had strongly rejected Monster’s first suggestion for her own shirt, which upon further consideration was probably a good thing. It had been an impulsive reaction to something she was wanting to wallow in for far too long, and although the name of ‘Monster’ was something she should shed someday like a discarded cocoon, she was going to take things one at a time. If the changelings were willing to forgive her destruction of so many of their kind, it was foolish of her to flog herself with that ‘other’ title, no matter how technically accurate it was.

She was a Monster in more ways than one, but she needed to be a good monster. There would always be bad monsters in the world, and without good monsters to fight them, they would destroy everything. She had been bad. Now she was good, or trying to be, with the help of her friends.

Bad. Forgiveness. Good.

Luna knew the path. She walked it every day since her return. It was far more familiar to her, as the Princess of the Night had once intentionally trod that path in the wrong direction, and now faced the same long, hard trek back to good that Monster was walking. Each step was a journey unto itself, a challenge overcome, a battle won, an enemy defeated, a friend made.

One step at a time. One day at a time. A little progress each day. Occasionally the slip backwards, but always the picking back up and stepping forward again on a neverending journey to a distant destination with every memory from that trip carried along, as it needed to be in order to learn from the experience.

Just as Luna would always know the touch of Nightmare Moon until the end of her long life, the little bit of Monster in her past had to remain. She could no more turn her back on that terrible part of her life than she could turn her back on her wonderful friends. The last few months had been a time of rebirth into a life she had never expected, and would never get the opportunity to live again. She had gone from a quaking filly hiding in a bush to conceal herself from the world, to a… well, a still trembling filly in the middle of Fillydelphia, facing her fears with her friends instead of hiding from them.

As she stood in front of the elderly stallion holding the spray brush over a blank shirt, another set of memories flooded through her mind. A memory of rainbow light filling the world as her friends held themselves close, just as they were doing now. Of a frightening dark alicorn who would have destroyed the world if Monster had not acted. Of a terrifying decision that she had made, with head lifted proudly and facing the threat.

My name is Twilight Sparkle. And you will not harm my friends!

“Awesome shirt, Twilight. Move a little closer to Diamond Tiara… I mean Scootaloo so I can get you both into the frame.”

Featherweight remained hovering while squinting through the camera viewfinder at Monster and the crown-wearing earth pony to her side. While Quick Fix had ducked into the bathroom with Twist for a potty emergency, Featherweight had decided to capture the occasion of their new shirts with a series of photos in the adjacent topiary garden. It was another of the weird things that Monster was still getting used to in this new life.

The topiary, not Featherweight. Although she was puzzled about why he had selected ‘Hot Shot’ for his shirt lettering, with a flash inside each ‘o.’

Topiary was bent and twisted trees formed into crude shapes that vaguely looked like animals, surrounding the three of them in a garden grove that pushed the noise and the disturbing colors of the amusement park into the background. The years had not been kind to the small park, with nibble marks and scratches that indicated years worth of small fillies and colts playing in their midst. She could vaguely remember the giraffe, and how over several trips the tree had never quite gotten the wire cage of the head properly filled. It now had a crest of leaves from untrimmed branches that made it seem as an untrimmed mane, or a lion with a really long neck. She was still considering using her magic to discreetly trim a few of the more obviously misplaced branches when Diamond Tiara came fluttering into the garden, so excited that she nearly could not stay on the ground.

“Twilight! I talked to Aunt Fix, and she said that the four of us could go ride the Boomer!”