“Moon Dancer, wait! Please!!”
Now outside Canterlot Palace, in the gaze of two guards stationed outside the entrance, Moon Dancer froze and groaned softly as she heard Twilight’s voice once again. “She just doesn’t learn,” she muttered bitterly.
“Moon Dancer, please!” Twilight yelled again, stopping in front of her old friend. “Please, think about this for a second! You don’t have to do this!”
“Actually, I do,” Moon Dancer snapped, “because you wouldn’t.”
“But this isn’t right! You’d be limiting ponies’ freedoms doing this!”
“Then they should have thought about that before breaking the law. The fact that they didn’t only makes it worse, because they knew you and the Princesses would always go easy on them.”
“But I’m trying to rehabilitate these ponies! It’s not fair for you to get in the way of that!”
Moon Dancer stood there, thunderstruck. “Fair?” she growled. “Fair?! Don’t you dare stand there and tell me what’s not fair, Twilight Sparkle! What’s not fair is being tossed aside in favor of an overpowered madpony who hasn’t gotten so much as a time-out for her crimes! I could just as easily have kept fighting to have her stripped of her magic and thrown in the Canterlot dungeons, but I didn’t! If anything, you should be thanking me!”
“Thanking you?!” Twilight screamed back, not even meaning to. “For what?! Starlight’s making more of an honest effort to change her ways than you know! She helped us rid Canterlot of a Timberwolf pack! She helped us save the Crystal Empire! She’s a hero, Moon Dancer, and this system you want to force on her will stop her from doing the right thing!”
The two mares stared at one another for a good few seconds, as the door guards stood awkwardly at their posts, looking in any direction possible that didn’t let them see Twilight and Moon Dancer arguing.
“If she was so keen on doing the right thing,” Moon Dancer finally said, much more calmly, “she could have done it years ago. Her friend wasn’t gone forever. She could have seen him any time she wanted.”
“Everypony makes mistakes, Moon Dancer,” Twilight replied, also far calmer now. “You forgave me for mine. Why shouldn’t I forgive Starlight for hers?”
Moon Dancer drilled into Twilight with her stare. It wasn’t entirely angry; there was a soft, tender edge to her eyes. As if, deep down under the rage and indignation, Moon Dancer was imploring Twilight to see reason.
“Because I was a fool to forgive,” Moon Dancer said, with almost no inflection. “And so were you.” And with that, Moon Dancer turned and walked away.
There was another brief pause in which Twilight struggled to hold back tears. In her mind, she wasn’t watching an old friend walking away. Now, she saw a stranger—an enemy—walking away without even a glance. It tore at her heart to know that somepony she trusted now seemed incapable of returning it.
“You’ll never get this law passed,” Twilight called out defiantly. “Not in a million years. Princess Celestia is far too merciful to do such a thing. And Princess Luna is a former villain. Her own sister would never pass a law that would be just as bad as imprisoning her in the moon again. They’ll never let this happen!”
Moon Dancer stopped, paused for a second, and turned her head back to Twilight. “The same Celestia that told you just minutes ago that she would put Starlight behind bars if she could?” she asked smugly. “And the same Luna that tortured herself every night for months because of what Nightmare Moon did?” She snorted before finishing, “Keep telling yourself that, Princess.” And she continued walking as if she’d only heard a noise in the distance.
Twilight stood there, feeling so numb that not even the cool afternoon breeze could reach her. Even her normally quick mind was running at a snail’s pace, only capable of processing two questions at present:
What happened to her? What’s going to happen to us?
“Hey, Twilight!”
The Alicorn turned at the sound of Rainbow Dash’s voice. She flew towards her as Rarity, Fluttershy, Pinkie Pie, Applejack and Starlight approached her on the ground. All had looks of intense fret on their faces.
“What happened, Twilight?” Applejack was the first to ask. “We could hear you two hollerin’ all the way inside!”
“You were able to talk to her, right?” Fluttershy asked tentatively. “You didn’t just fight, did you?”
Twilight sighed and bent her head low. “I tried, girls . . . I tried to get her to see reason . . . but . . . I don’t know why she’s acting like this. She thinks she’s the high horse, and she doesn’t understand that what she’s doing isn’t right . . . .” She trailed off when she caught a glimpse at Starlight’s tormented face, and struggled to continue. “. . . I . . . I’m sorry, Starlight,” she said morosely. “I tried. I really did . . . .”
“Don’t blame yourself, Twilight,” Starlight replied, her voice slightly broken. “I should have seen this coming. I have nopony to blame but myself . . . .”
“You can’t tell me you’re giving up!” said Rainbow Dash as she touched down beside Starlight. “Come on, you know this is a bunch of horse hockey as much as we do! We don’t have to take this! We can still fight this!”
“Well, not right now, Dashie,” Rarity said solemnly. “As of this moment, it’s up to the Princesses. Until we’re allowed our say, all we can do is wait and hope.”
“And once we’re allowed to vote on this, you can bet that I’ll be supporting you all the way, Starlight,” Twilight assured, putting a hoof on her shoulder. “We can prove you’re a good pony. And even if we lose the vote, we’ll make as many appeals as we’re allowed to fight it.”
“I wouldn’t plan your appeal speech so early, Princess.”
The seven mares all turned to see Thunderbolt emerging from the castle entrance, looking over them all with a cocked eyebrow and a superior smirk.
Dash groaned loudly and rolled her eyes, and Fluttershy rushed to hide behind Applejack, who stood staunchly and glared back at the old captain.
“And I wouldn’t lose faith in true Equestrian justice, Captain,” Twilight snapped back, now ready for the captain’s vitriolic attitude. “Celestia knows how hard I’ve worked, and how far we’ve all come. You can’t undo that just because you’re the new captain of the guard! I don’t care how good and virtuous you think you are! You make this ‘checks and balances’ nonsense a reality, and you sign over all of these genuinely good ponies to a lifetime of misery!”
The smirk disappeared, and the eyebrow lowered, and the difference between the two looks was palpable. Thunderbolt slowly crept up to Twilight, to the point where it seemed as though he were about to instigate a bare-hoofed brawl. Dash dropped to the ground and charged, but was held back by Applejack.
Finally, Thunderbolt stopped with just inches between him and the princess, and he spoke with a quiet fury that made his earlier tirade inside the palace pale by comparison:
“I’ll be ‘signing their lives’ over to real Equestrian justice. And don’t you dare tell me what misery is. Wait until you see what monsters like her,” he pointed to Starlight Glimmer, “are really capable of. What they can do to you . . . your family . . . your whole world . . . then, and only then, you can come back and talk to me about misery.”
Twilight was stricken breathless by the old stallion’s bitter words. They weren’t the words of an old army pony. They weren’t even the words of a grizzled old stallion. They were pained, tempered with rage, and dripping with the very misery he spoke of. His eyes matched perfectly—as sharp and stony as his glare was, it sparkled with what Twilight knew had to be genuine tears.
He stepped back and walked past Twilight, giving a snort and shaking out his short, salt-and-pepper mane as he trudged away. The seven mares stood in perfect silence long after Thunderbolt had left, not even asking what should happen next or where they should be. The occasional glance punctuated the pause, but no sound was made for quite a while.
Until at last, after what seemed like hours, Starlight uttered something that only sounded like abject failure:
“Monster . . . .”
“Don’t you listen to him, Starlight,” Twilight urged, piercing her with her eyes. “We’re a team, and we’re your friends. We won’t let this happen, no matter what.”
Starlight nodded, but did not speak. Rainbow Dash had already speculated it, but nopony else quite knew for sure. It was in her eyes, though. A deep, pensive look in her eyes was all it took to know.
Starlight Glimmer had indeed, given up.
“And this is the complete plan, sister?” Princess Luna said as the two royals sat in their throne room.
“Indeed,” Celestia replied, nodding. “And yet . . . I can’t help but feel terrible. I should have known Thunderbolt was too risky to replace Shining Armor . . . the way he acted . . . the way he shouted at Twilight and her friends, berated them, assaulted them . . . and I just stood by and let him . . . is this unlike me, Luna?”
“You have been known to be strict yourself in the past, you know,” Luna answered calmly. “You have to have been, in order to be the ruler you’ve become. I don’t believe you or Moon Dancer were fully in the wrong. As for Thunderbolt, his past experiences may have been agonizing, but it molded him into the soldier we needed here in Canterlot. And we’ve truly needed him.”
“But Luna . . . Twilight . . . the way she looked at me . . . it was as if I’d betrayed her . . . I can’t help but have second thoughts about this . . . it doesn’t seem right . . . .”
“What about it seems wrong?” Luna asked, studying her sister’s countenance. “You’ve heard both sides of the issue, weighed the decision, and made the best possible choice for all parties. Equestria has seen you do that for centuries.”
“Yes, but . . . Twilight was right. Starlight Glimmer is making an honest effort to change her ways.”
“And Moon Dancer was also correct, sister. Equestria is under constant threat, especially now with the Elements of Harmony gone. And forgiveness has hardly helped rehabilitate Discord, has it?”
“Well, I suppose not . . .” Celestia mumbled, “. . . the more I consider it, the more I realize that trying to redeem him was a terrible idea . . . .”
“And Starlight has proven to match Twilight in strength and cunning. Power like that should not be given free reign, not after what’s she’s done with it.”
Celestia heaved a deep sigh as she continued mulling over Luna’s points. After a lengthy silence, she shook her head and gave a weak chuckle.
“I expected you to be the last pony to agree to this, Luna,” she said, with a hint of an unsteady grin.
Luna unseated herself and stood in front of Celestia, showing a dour look in her eyes.
“If this had been done a millennium ago, I might not have done what I did as Nightmare Moon. This goes beyond us and what we might want, Celestia. This is for the good of Equestria.”
“And . . . and Thunderbolt?”
“We shall deal with his decisions as the time comes. For now, we act for our nation.”
Celestia sighed again and lowered her head, cradling her face in her hooves. Her thoughts kept regressing to that meeting with Twilight and her friends. As those memories pervaded her mind, she felt the same permeating grip from regret.
I haven’t truly had any regrets in helping you realize your potential as a princess until recently.
I believe you are a bit too comfortable with your own friendship lessons to know the difference between friendship opportunities and actual threats to Equestria.
I wish I didn’t have to be so firm. But I haven’t been, and that’s largely why things have turned out the way they have.
Ponies are afraid. Your decisions must be regulated, as must the ponies you claim to trust.
Celestia suddenly sat upright, ignited her horn, and a scroll of parchment and quill pen appeared out of thin air.
“You’re right, little sister,” Celestia said resolutely. “This is for the good of Equestria. It has to be. We can’t let things go as they have been. We can’t keep making decisions that lead to ruin. And we can’t risk endangering our subjects anymore. Enough is enough.”
Luna stared at her elder sister with a combination of reverence and doubt. “I applaud your resolution, Celestia,” she said, “but given the circumstances, I feel I must ask . . . do you really believe that?”
“What do you mean, Luna?”
“I mean, with everything that’s happened . . . everything you’ve accused Twilight of . . . everything that’s happened that could be traced back to her . . . it’s just as much our fault as hers.”
One last heavy sigh, and Celestia rose from her throne and began to walk back to the conference room. As Luna followed her, the herald of the sun gave one last solemn reply:
“Exactly.”
The fluffy-maned mare in the apron lay on the plush, carpeted floor, twitching and moaning but otherwise unresponsive. Perhaps the spell had been a bit too strong for her?
The violet-coated Unicorn stood over her and smoothed back her short blonde mane. Yes, I suppose I didn’t have to put so much effort into the memory spell, she thought, staring at her with a stone face, she’ll probably look like that for weeks.
But there was no time for empathy. She had what she needed.
Opening her saddle bag, she wrapped a small gemstone in her magic and pulled it out. Her horn glowed, and the gem began to glow at the same time, in the same color and intensity. After a few seconds, the spell was complete, and Sugar Belle became the latest in a series of memory thefts.
The Unicorn looked down on Sugar Belle’s gently convulsing body, and couldn’t help but think back to her other victims. Night Glider. Double Diamond. Party Favor. All sapped of their memories concerning the monster that destroyed their lives.
Maybe they knew Mama and Papa . . . .
No. No empathy. No remorse. Not now. This didn’t need to come up during her first attack on that orange Unicorn “wizard” (in the loosest sense of the word) in the Crystal Empire, and it didn’t need to come up now. She had what she needed, and the plan was already in motion. Now that her information was in Moon Dancer’s hooves, all there was left to do was wait. The princesses would debate, and all of Twilight Sparkle’s excuses and defenses wouldn’t be enough to prevent what would happen.
And now that she had what she needed, revenge would be sweet, indeed.
“All I need to do now is make one last stop . . . .”