Breathlessly, I climbed the stairs up the platform. The train station. It was the only place that made sense for Trixie to go to. Unless she decided to hoof it back to those cold streets of Baltimare. I’d never find her if that’s the route she took.
My head scanned the platform back and forth in the waning light of the setting sun. Many ponies gathered, but none of them wore a fashionable cloak. Did she really plan on walking all the way back in this frigid weather? Just the thought sent a chill down my spine.
I turned my attention to the ticket booth. Unlike the lazy boor in Baltimare, the ticketmaster met me with a smile. “Hello, Rarity!” he called out as I approached. “Taking another trip already?”
I shook my head. “No, not today,” I told him. “I was just…” I paused, taking a moment to think of a tactful way to broach the subject. However, the time it took me to try to think of a good way brought forth an uncomfortable silence, leaving me with little other option than to be blunt. “Could you possibly tell me if a mare in a stylish cloak bought a ticket for Baltimare a bit ago?”
He put a hoof to his chin. “Well, there was a mare a few minutes ago, but she got pretty upset when I told her that the soonest train headed that way wouldn’t leave here until tomorrow evening. I suggested taking the train up to Manehattan. They’ve got a much bigger station, you see. Thought maybe she could find a sooner train there.”
“So she went to Manehattan?”
He shrugged. “She bought a ticket, but the train isn’t scheduled to be here for another…” Pausing, he drew up a pocketwatch. “...twenty-three minutes.”
“Thank you so much,” I said. I barely heard some generic reply from him as I turned to search the station again. If Trixie bought a ticket, then she would surely stick around to take the train. But where could she be? Over by the loading platform, ponies stood next to their luggage and occupied the few benches there.
Trixie wouldn’t be there. Not in a crowd. She would find a place nearby where she wouldn’t draw any attention to herself. Turning away from the swathes of warm light, I looked closer at the long, dark shadows. It took several minutes, but I finally found her on the edge of the platform behind the souvenir stand.
Somehow, she’d managed to find the one secluded spot not shrouded in shadows. The red light of dusk illuminated what little I could see of her face as she watched the sun set. Try as I may, I couldn’t gauge her expression with her eyes hidden behind the cloak.
I decided to play it as gently as I could. There were twenty minutes or so still left to win her over, but if I pushed too hard she wouldn’t hear anything I have to say until well after the train left. Plodding over, I sat next to her and set my own gaze out over the serene view of Ponyville.
“It’s absolutely beautiful, isn’t it?” I chanced a glance over to find Trixie’s gaze locked on the town before us.
“I guess,” she simply replied.
Her lackluster response wasn’t exactly encouraging, but at least she didn’t ignore me or lash out. “Do you not like sunsets?” I asked, again keeping the conversation completely benign.
“Not really.”
“Are you waiting for Luna to bring the night, then?”
Trixie scoffed. “I hate the night.”
I shuffled a bit, the saddlebags weighing heavier on my back than they should have. “Why wouldn’t you like the night? The stars and moon are always so dazzling. Perhaps even more gorgeous than the most colorful of sunsets.”
Trixie sighed. Then, she finally looked over at me. In the dwindling light, I could just catch the shine of her eyes behind the hood. “Nights are lonely,” she said. “It's when all my fans go home to their friends and families. When the sound of applause is nothing more than a memory.” She sighed again, turning away from me. “A distant memory.”
Tentatively, I reached out, placing my hoof on Trixie’s. “You don't have to be alone anymore. You have a friend right here. There’s no need for you to go gallivanting all over the planet looking for a place to call home.”
Ripping her hoof away from mine, Trixie scootched away from me. “No. You’re wrong.”
“Trixie, I am your friend,” I nearly shouted as I pressed a hoof to my chest. Tempering my voice and tone I added, “Even if you don't see me that way.”
“That’s not—” Trixie sighed. “I’m not looking for a home. The endless road beneath the wide open skies is my home. It’s the home I was born into—the only home I know.” She turned her head away from me. “I don’t need a home. I need my old life back.”
I turned my gaze to the setting sun. It’s blinding light a mere shadow of the warmth it emanated previously. “Have you forgotten already how the fire burns?” I asked. “I suppose it’s something easy, in these dark, cold days.”
“What the hay are you talking about?”
“Have you really forgotten your folly that landed you in that frigid, filthy alley in Baltimare? And here you are, chomping at the bit to do it all over again!” I took a deep breath, doing my best to temper my emotions. “Why are you so eager to go back to the same life that already ended so terribly for you once?”
A throaty chuckle left Trixie’s lips. Then she laughed. She was laughing! “What’s so funny?” I demanded.
Shaking her head, Trixie stifled her laughter. “Once, you said. Did you really think that I’ve only been burned once? I know every bit as well as you do that I’ll probably end up getting hurt again. Maybe it won’t be as bad next time. Maybe it’ll be worse.”
“I don’t… please help me to understand why you’re so eager to leave safety and security for what you know will end badly?” I asked, almost begging for some insight into that thick skull of her’s.
“There isn’t anything for me here. There never will be.”
“I’m here,” I reminded her. “Granted, I may have made a couple of… stumblings since we met, but surely you don’t hate me?”
She glanced over, giving me a glimpse into her cool, violet eyes. “No. And I don’t want to give that a chance to change, either.” Casting her gaze away from me, she met the horizon just as the sun dipped below it. In but a moment, the light of the moon overthrew the last light of day.
“Don’t tell me that you’re afraid of growing closer to somepony, or are you thinking…?”
“I won’t give you another chance to betray me,” Trixie coolly replied.
The fresh memory of me calling my friends in and exposing Trixie against her will flashed through my mind. “Is there really nothing I can say to make you change your mind? You’re just going to get hurt again. You know that.”
“I’ll get hurt here or there.” Sighing, Trixie turned her gaze to the stars above, inadvertently allowing her hood to fall back across her shoulders. I could finally see her expression. It was something akin to blazing anger. No, not anger. Determination. That same look Rainbow Dash had when she flew down to save me from falling to my doom. “The only difference is that over there, I have a chance to reclaim my old life. I have to go for it, no matter how slim the odds. I won’t give up on my dreams so easily.”
It was hard coming up with a retort to that. It’s not as though I didn’t want her to pursue her dreams. I just wanted her to find them without having to suffer so much again. And, I suppose, there was a small, selfish part of me that simply didn’t wish to see her go. “But why do you have to go so far to chase them? Why not start over a little closer to home?”
Turning back to me, Trixie raised an eyebrow. “Did you ever even pay attention to what it is I do?”
“You… uh, you do tricks. On stage,” I said, pointing at her.
“I deceive ponies,” Trixie replied. “I make myself look good with smoke and mirrors and little tricks. I lie to them and make myself seem beyond amazing.” She let out a bitter chuckle. “The same things Twilight did to save me from the Alicorn amulet.”
“I suppose that’s quite the… dire way to look at it,” I replied. “But what does that have to do with you leaving Equestria?”
“Tch.” Trixie scoffed. “And here I thought you were smarter than that. A lie only works if the audience is unaware of the truth.” Her gaze fell to the wood beneath her hooves as she sighed. “There isn’t anypony in Equestria that doesn’t know the truth about me.”
“Is there really nothing I can say to make you change your mind?” I blurted out the thought plaguing my mind.
Trixie shook her head. “I’m going to go and live my life on my terms, and I’m not about to let anypony stop me. And I’m certainly not about to give you any more chances to throw me to the wolves.”
Her words tore at my conscience. “I-I know that I shouldn’t have pushed so hard. I truly am sorry that I exposed you to my friends against your will like that. It was… a mistake.”
“No. It wasn’t.” I was about to argue with her that it was, but Trixie kept talking. “A mistake is a fluke. Something that wasn’t supposed to happen. Something that shouldn’t happen again.”
I sighed, filling the silence as I organized my thoughts. “I will admit that, perhaps, my judgement then was rather poor. But I—”
“Will do it again. So, I’m going to leave before you get the chance,” Trixie said, cutting me off. A slight lean forward, and Trixie stood. A deft sweep of magic pulled her hood up over her head. “I plan on leaving with the memory of a cantankerous, yet generous, mare, rather than another knife in my back.”
I let the cantankerous comment roll off my back with no small amount of effort. The thing I couldn’t let slide was that she truly thought that, after all of this, that I would still try to, somehow, take advantage of her. “Now you wait just a moment,” I said, stepping in her way and refusing to allow her to pass. “How can you possibly think that after all that has happened, that I would somehow betray you?”
Trixie met me with an icy stare. “You already did.”
Finding my lips suddenly dry, I tried to find words to ameliorate my hasty actions taken in anger. “I… Trixie…”
“I trusted you,” Trixie said as she brushed by me. The sound of a distant whistle caught my ear as I spun around after Trixie. She still hung back away from the crowd as they mulled their way to the edge of the platform. I stepped up next to her, and she must’ve sensed my presence. “I should’ve known better,” she said, her gaze blindly staring out at the platform.
“No, I should’ve been a better friend. And I can be, if you’ll just let me,” I said, not bothering to hide the begging tone in my voice. “Just give it a few days. I promise if you stay you’ll see.”
“I’ve seen where that road goes,” Trixie replied. She shook her head. “I’m not going down it again. I’m moving forward. Moving on.” Turning, she set her steely violet eyes on me from beneath the hood. “And there’s no way I’m letting anypony stop me. The only place I’m going to achieve my dreams and be who I’m meant to be is beyond the ocean. You can bet all your shiny clothes and bits that I’ll get there, or die trying.”
Circles. Our conversations just kept landing us in the same place time after time. Trixie truly believed that her only hope for happiness was someplace far, far away that surely only existed in her mind. Why was she so blind to what was right in front of her? I could see it. How her eyes shone as she saw the cloak for the first time. The way she smiled as she tried on all the different, horrible, outfits. She could be so happy, right here in Ponyville. Instead, she could only see some utopia in her imagination that lured her astray like a siren’s song.
She would end up smashed upon the rocks, tattered and torn. I just knew it.
As the train appeared on the horizon, chugging toward the station, I spoke plainly, “Is there really nothing I can say to sway you? Nothing I can do to even make you consider something else?”
Her silence as she watched the train approach was all the answer I needed. Breathing out a bitter sigh of resignation, I reached out with my magic to find the buckles securing the saddlebags to my back. Setting them free, I floated them over to Trixie, placing them on her back.
Trixie turned back to look at the saddlebags. “What are you…?”
“A lady is always prepared,” I said, pressing a hoof to my chest. “I feared that I may not be able to change that stubborn mind of yours, so I prepared this.” A flick of magic, and I secured the saddlebags on Trixie’s back, tight enough to stay in place, but not so tight that they might ruffle her cloak. “Now, I don’t know if you’re proficient with a needle or not, but I’ve prepared just about everything you might need to repair your cloak, should anything unseemly happen to it. I even included some gemstones in case you decide that you want to add a touch of flair to it.”
“I… you’ve already done more than enough to repay your debt,” Trixie replied, turning her gaze back to the train as it slowed to a stop. A hiss sounded, and the doors opened with a mechanical thunk.
I shook my head. “This was never about any debts. I would have helped you back in Baltimare, had I the means there.” Reaching out, I placed my hoof on her shoulder. “I want you to succeed. I want you to be happy. And that… that’s why I don’t want you to go. I just—there’s this terrible feeling deep inside me that’s just screaming that this is a mistake. You going is a mistake.”
Trixie shuffled a bit, adjusting the saddlebags. “It’s a choice, not a mistake.”
“Then it’s the wrong choice,” I quickly replied.
Sighing, Trixie shrugged my hoof off and stepped away. “It’s the only choice I have.” She took a step toward the train. Then another, and another.
A panic welled up in me as Trixie began to walk away. This was it. If she got on that train, there would be no stopping her. The sense of dread in my chest redoubled as the thought that I may never see her again flitted through my mind. “No, it’s not. You could stay!” I shouted over the growing din of the throng of passengers getting on and off the train.
She stopped, but she didn’t turn back toward me. “I won’t.”
“Why! Because of me?”
Trixie’s form vanished into the crowd. The cacophonous chatter muted any reply Trixie may have made, but I swear I heard one word above the rest. Trixie’s voice echoed on the wind, “Yes.”
It was but a simple word, but it still cut me to my core. I just stood there, unable to will my hooves to go after Trixie or turn around and leave. My legs stood statue-still until well after the conductor made the last call and the doors closed.
One mistake. Is that all it really took to derail a budding friendship? Is that all it took to send a stubborn, yet goodhearted, mare off to an assured ruin? By Trixie’s standard, it wasn’t even a mistake. It was just a bad decision. A stupid, selfish decision made in the heat of the moment.
It dawned on me. That really is all it takes. A single, misguided action. Something so insignificant somehow possessed the power to do so much harm. After all, isn’t that what Trixie did with the Alicorn amulet? What I did with that dark magic Spike brought me? And now, my snap decision threatened to throw Trixie’s life into ruin again. It pushed her away and compelled her to make another bad decision of her own.
A piercing whistle, and the train began to lumber down the tracks.
And now… it was too late to stop her.
Just as I hung my head in defeat, I felt a hoof softly press against my shoulder. My heart skipped a beat. Hoping that Trixie had changed her mind at the last moment, I turned with an expectant smile. Instead of Trixie, I found Twilight giving me a sad smile. Again, my hopes crashed down around me. Only, this time, I didn’t bother putting on a brave face. I let my emotions overflow as my breath caught in my throat.
“I couldn’t stop her!” I cried, throwing myself into Twilight’s embrace.
To her credit, Twilight was quick to wrap her hooves around and rub my back. “Don’t take it so hard, Rarity,” she softly said. “I know that you wanted her stay, but I’m sure she’ll be just fine carving out a new life for herself.”
As the wave of emotions ebbed away, I struggled to choke back my unseemly sobs. “I just… I-I have this terrible feeling that she’s going to wind up even worse off.” I shook my head, staining Twilight’s shoulder with my mascara-laced tears. “And it’s all my fault.”
A tugging pulled me back and I found myself face-to-face with a rather stern Twilight. “This was Trixie’s decision, not yours. She knows full-well what she is doing and it is her choice to make. In fact, I’m sure she made her mind long before she even met you what she wanted to do with her life.”
Sniffling, I tugged at the corners of my eyes. “But it’s the wrong choice! And I tried so very hard to get her to realize that.. and just-just one misstep on my part completely ruined the whole thing,” I said, hanging my head.
“Hey,” Twilight said, her hoof slipping under my chin and coaxing my gaze to meet hers, “you should know better than anypony how hardheaded Trixie can be. I don’t know that there was anything anypony could’ve done to change her mind after it’s been made up.”
My eyes flitted to the side, shying away from Twilight’s intense stare. “I suppose…”
“And how can you think Trixie won’t do well? Weren’t you just telling us how earnest and kind she was deep down inside? I’m sure she’ll use the lessons we’ve taught her here to finally find her place in the world.”
“Yes, and without me in it,” I said, getting up just to turn my back to Twilight and sit back down.
For a moment, I thought perhaps I had put an end to Twilight’s efforts to mollify my mistake, but then I heard her hooves knock on the wooden platform as she came over and sat by me. “Is that what this is about?” She asked, placing a wing over my shoulders.
“I… I failed in every way imaginable,” I confessed. “I couldn’t make her see that she was making a mistake. I couldn’t make her see that she could be happy right here. And I couldn’t even make her my friend.”
“Rarity…”
“What’s wrong with me!” I snapped back at Twilight, finally looking up at her. “Why couldn’t I make her my friend? Pinkie and Dash made amends with Gilda. You went back and made up with Moondancer. Then Applejack rekindled her old friendship with Coloratura. Fluttershy and Discord… even Starlight and her fillyhood friend…” I grit my teeth as I closed my eyes, sending a pair of hot tears down my cheeks. “Why couldn’t I do the same? Even when it really mattered, I couldn’t make her my friend. Just because of one, stupid decision…”
Again, I felt Twilight pull me into a hug. “Maybe, just maybe, you missed your chance this time, but that doesn’t mean that you won’t get another. If you really made all that effort to get through to her, then I’m certain that, when she finds her way back to Equestria, she’ll find you.”
“And if she decides to never return to Equestria?”
“W-well, then maybe you’ll take a trip one day and find her yourself,” Twilight replied. “The point is that, when it comes to friendship, it’s never too late.”
I couldn’t keep on going with this song and dance. Twilight just wasn’t getting it that this was the only opportunity I had to get through to Trixie. That, even though I considered Trixie my friend, there was too much doubt in her heart to even consider the idea of a friend.
I didn’t dare speak of how desperate Trixie sounded or the conviction in her voice as she asserted that a life short of the one she had before coming to Ponyville wasn’t worth having. That she would succeed or die trying. And either of those would keep her from gracing Ponyville ever again. The only hope I had of ever even hearing from her again were the postcards I left in those saddlebags.
And not one of them ever came.