//------------------------------//
// Epilogue: The Wait 
// Story: Transdementia 
// by Kwakerjak 
//------------------------------//

Sunset Shimmer’s face was blank as the cell door slammed shut behind her, mostly because she wasn’t about to give the guards the satisfaction of seeing any of the emotions that roiled beneath her calm surface. As she’d expected, her trial had been a fait accompli from beginning to end, though not for the reason she assumed it would be. Instead of trying to prove all of nasty things that Pinkie Pie had accused her of doing in the human world, Princess Celestia had decided to try her for the “crimes” she’d committed in Equestria, which revolved around the incident that had caused her self-imposed exile in the first place.

Of course, there never should have been anything controversial about it. Okay, sure, she’d used neuromancy to make a squad of guardsponies go AWOL in order to search for an ancient artifact, and most of them had gotten killed before the spell wore off, which was technically supposed to be treated as a capital offense, but there were clearly extenuating circumstances. After all, the prophesied return of Nightmare Moon had been imminent, and there was no reason to think that the Elements of Harmony would be found in time, no matter what Celestia insisted. Sunset Shimmer needed a backup plan, and she’d acted accordingly. Unfortunately, the jury was composed of easily-swayed simpletons who returned with a unanimous verdict of “guilty” within less than six hours, and now she was in a maximum-security prison with particularly resilient magic inhibitor attached to her horn, while Nightmare Moon walked free!

After peering outside her cell to make sure nopony was watching, Sunset bucked one of the walls in frustration at the blatant miscarriage of justice. She didn’t care if there were restrictions on the Nightmare’s freedom; the mere fact that she was allowed to be among the common ponies at all was an affront to decency. At least the trial resulted in Penumbra Noctis’ true identity becoming public knowledge, so hopefully she was now being treated like a pariah instead of an upstanding member of society, but Sunset rather doubted that was going to happen. Not if ponies weren’t pragmatic enough to see that her actions were perfectly justified, despite the sob stories of her surviving “victims.”

Ignoring the pain that shot up her leg, Sunset sat down on her haunches and stared at sterile gray walls of her cell, stewing in her own indignation. Eventually, though, her urge to throw a tantrum subsided, and she could finally take stock of her predicament; despite the bleakness of her situation, she did have several things going for her. First, despite the Nightmare’s rather tasteless remarks upon their return to Equestria, she hadn’t been sent to Tartarus. That meant that she would still be allowed to know about the outside world, which meant that she’d be allowed to request reading materials, and there was no reason to think that these materials couldn’t include treatises on magical theory, particularly if she demonstrated that she wouldn’t attempt to tamper with her inhibitor.

Second, and far more importantly, she knew that thoughtforms were more than just fanciful cautionary tales to keep young unicorns from getting in over their horns when dabbling in the unknown. They were real, and Pinkie Pie was one of them. In retrospect, this had to be the reason why she had been so confident in her eventual victory, even if that victory had to be “messy.” At the end of the day, it was only Pinkie’s desire to protect those hairless chimpanzees that had led her to hold back. The whole time, Sunset had been completely outgunned... but that wouldn’t be the case next time. Next time, she’d be properly informed. Sure, there was no way that she’d be allowed access to any classified information, but a unicorn of Sunset’s caliber wouldn’t need to have everything spelled out for her in order to formulate workable theories.

And no matter what the judge had said, there would be a next time, because there was no way Sunset Shimmer was going to spend the rest of her days rotting in a cell. All she needed was patience... and a little imagination.