Through A Darkened Mirror

by Dorath

12.0 … Back Through The Mirror …

Twilight’s hooves clattered on polished stone as she passed through the Portal’s energy field, transferring between grimy alleyway and palace hall in the blink of an eye. With a relieved sigh, she turned to smile at Celestia and Luna who stood flanking the mirror, the auras of their magic fading from the now quiescent Portal, when an agonized scream echoed through the chamber!

Her friends were clustered around a familiar-looking orange unicorn as they tried to restrain the thrashing mare, while Spike and Cadance stood nearby, uncertain of how to help.

“Fluttershy, what’s wrong with her?” Applejack demanded as she caught a flailing foreleg and pinned it to the floor just as Sunset’s cybernetic talons snapped out, causing the young dragon and the Princess of Love to start back in surprise.

“I don’t know!” the worried pegasus replied as she checked her diagnostic bracer, which had somehow come through the Portal unchanged, “Her readings are all over the place, but her body is rejecting her implants!”

“Is there anything you can do, Flutters?” asked Pinkie anxiously as she held down one of Sunset’s back legs.

“I can sedate her,” Fluttershy offered, and the unicorn’s violent writhing form quickly went limp as the gentle-natured pegasus gave her an injection, “But she needs a doctor.”

“The Palace has a medical wing,” Luna suggested, “Darling Cadance, will thou run ahead and let the churgeons know we are coming?”

“I’m on it, Auntie Luna.”

“Thank ya kindly, Princess,” Applejack said gratefully as Rarity and Rainbow carefully hefted Sunset’s limp body onto her back and Pinkie picked up the crossbow the farmpony had discarded in all the commotion, “Twi’, sugarcube? Why don’t ya get tha word from Princess Celestia while we get Sunset looked after?”

At the purple alicorn’s nod, the ponies quickly filed out, hurrying to the medical wing. Turning back to her mentor, Twilight shook slightly as a small figure slammed into her and wrapped a pair of stubby arms around her leg in a desperate hug, “It’s alright, Spike,” she crooned comfortingly as she enfolded the quietly weeping dragon in her wings and gave him a neck-hug, “We’re back, we’re safe.”

“May Faust be thanked,” Celestia prayed fervently as she wrapped the pair in one of her own wings, “Poor Spike has barely slept since Sunset Shimmer sent word through the journals that you were missing and the she could not open the Portal to search for you,” the princess added, giving the dragon a quick nuzzle, “Speaking of Sunset, that young mare ….”

“Is the Sunset Shimmer from the other side of the Mirror, yes,” confirmed the younger alicorn, “Although, I suppose we should start calling her Aurora … Sunset is just a nickname,” Twilight clarified, seeing Spike’s and Celestia’s confusion, “H-how long were we gone?”

“Five days, my faithful student.”

“Only five days?” blinked Twilight in surprise, “Such as extreme temporal divergence between the two worlds,” mused the academic, “It’s almost like the stories about somepony going into Feyholme ….”

---

The next morning, Spike and the six Bearers of Harmony joined the other three princesses for breakfast, “Did everypony sleep well?” asked Celestia as the little gathering got comfortable.

“It was heavenly, Princess,” Rarity assured her diarch as her five friends nodded in agreement, “Sunset, bless her cynical little heart, tried, but her place was never meant to house four ponies, let alone seven.”

“Indeed, it sounds like thou have had some most interesting exploits,” Luna commented as she nodded at the computerized medical bracer Fluttershy was still wearing, “Would thee mind telling us somewhat of thy tales?”

The following hour was filled with boisterous, disjointed, storytelling as the six mares gave an abbreviated, and, on occasion, slightly edited, accounting of their time on the other side of the Mirror.

“Well, it sounds like the six of you have had quite the adventure,” Cadance remarked as she started on her fourth plate, “And I bet it’s given you plenty of ideas for your writing, Twily,” she added, reaching over to give her sister-in-law a playful nudge with her wing.

Twilight blushed slightly, even as she threw her sister a concerned look, “Are you feeling alright Caddy? You’re kind of eating a lot ….”

“Well of course she is, silly,” Pinkie giggled, “She’s eating for two now!”

“How did ---,” Cadance’s question was interrupted as the others descended upon her in a jubilant mob.

“I’m going to be an uncle! I’m going to be an uncle!” chanted Spike happily as he bounced up and down on his claws.

As the cluster finally separated back to their chairs, Fluttershy stopped in her tracks, her ears dropping flat as tears gathered in her eyes, “Oh, oh my, here we are rejoicing in being home and Cadance’s baby, but poor Sunset…,” a shadow descended upon the gathering as the other five returned mares exchanged grim looks.

“Enough with such dour thoughts,” Luna admonished them, “Thou do thy friend no service by letting such feelings grip thy hearts. Although … in truth I had hoped to hear from Sunset Shimmer’s churgeon before I retired for the day.”

A knock at the door drew everyponies’ attention as a hoofstallion stuck his head in, “Your Highnesses? A Doctor Healing Spring wishes to see you.”

Celestia smiled at the stallion, “Of course, Snowy Day, please send him in.”

The door opened wider to admit a white-maned, burgundy-coated earth-pony stallion, “Good morning, Princesses, ladies. Gentledrake,” he added at Spike’s pointed cough.

“And a good morning to you as well, Doctor,” the solar diarch returned his salutation, “And how is our patient this morning?”

“That … is a problematic question, you Highness. We removed an arrowhead from deep within her shoulder, and the muscle spasms seem to have stopped, but she is suffering from moderate, but systemic, toxic shock and a weakened immune system … and then there is the matter of all the other foreign materials.”

“‘Foreign materials’? Pray, of what do thou speak Doctor Spring?”

“Based on our examinations, both of Miss Shimmer’s eyes have been replaced with prosthetics, and her entire body has been invasively modified with metallic filaments and what I can only guess are additional prosthetics of some kind, including parts of her brain … and she has what appears to be a pair of knives inside her right foreleg,” the stallion cocked an eyebrow at the gathered mares, “I don’t suppose you have an explanation?”

Rainbow Dash just shrugged at the doctor’s inquiry, “Implanted weapons are common among gillettes.”

“Yeppers,” Pinkie nodded, “And most of them get ocular replacements and muscle and nervous system augmentations too.”

“She is a foreign guardspony, Doctor,” Celestia gently informed the confused earth pony, “And it appears the prosthetics and other materials were part of a medical procedure for her previous posting,” she raised a cautioning hoof, “And any discussion of their possible removal should wait until Miss Shimmer can join us.”

“Very well, Highness, as you wish, but it will likely be several days until Miss Shimmer wakes up, and then we’re looking at two or three days of physical therapy and additional treatments before she will be fit to be released.”

“Our thanks, good Doctor Spring, mine sister and I have the utmost faith in thou and thy staff’s abilities, and we shall not delay thou further.”

As the doctor returned to his rounds, Fluttershy looked up, chewing on her lip in thought, “Uhm, Princesses, I think I can help, w-well not with Sunset, but ponies in general. Maybe?”

Cadance looked at the yellow pegasus curiously, “What are you thinking of, Fluttershy?”

“I know we probably can’t replicate the computers and sensors in my bracer,” Fluttershy held up her foreleg as she explained her idea, “But what about the drugs in its reservoirs? I mean, we only have a few doses of each, but couldn’t it help with our own medicines?”

“Hey, good thinkin’ there, Flutters!” Applejack clapped the smaller pony on the back, staggering her slightly, “That QuickHeal stuff is right handy.”

“That is an excellent thought,” the elder diarch said with an approving nod, “And I believe we can find some research chemists and alchemists who will be quite interested in what you have to share.”

---

Apple Bloom, Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo sat doing their homework as various medical doohickeys quietly beeped around the room.The return of the three fillies’ big sisters had been greeted with tearful hugs, and when they had learned that one of their sisters’ friends had been hurt, the foals had quickly volunteered to help keep the mare company.

Since then, the Cutie Mark Crusaders had learned that watching somepony sleep … was pretty boring, actually.

Admittedly, it was fairly entertaining when the strange unicorn started talking in her sleep, even if the fillies didn’t always understand what she was going on about.

“You promised me a pony … with lasers … I want my laser-pony!”

Case in point.

The Crusaders giggled at the older mare’s sleep-addled silliness, only to stop as they realized the unicorn’s eyes were open and she was blinking at them owlishly, “Hello!” Sweetie chirped as she waved at Sunset, who began to confusedly wave back, only to stop and stare at her hoof as if she had never seen one before.

“Nope,” the orange unicorn declared firmly as she laid back and closed her eyes, “There’s an esper fragging with my head, or they’ve got me pumped full of the really good drugs, but I am not a horse and you three are not real!”

“Hey!” objected Apple Bloom, “We are too real!”

“And what’s wrong with being a pony?” demanded Scoots indignantly.

“I am not having this argument with a herd of hallucinations, no matter how cute they are,” Sunset stated adamantly, her eyes still closed, “Now go on,” she added, waving a hoof at the fillies, “Go back to wherever delusional figments stay when they’re not working, I’m going to wake up now.”

“But you are awake,” Sweetie pointed out, her muzzle scrunched in a confused frown.

The orange unicorn opened one eye a slit to look at them, before resolutely closing it again, “No, I am not, and stop being adorable at me!”

“Ah bet ya’d believe Twilight if she told ya that ya was awake,” Apple Bloom challenged the mare.

“Yeah, well Sparky isn’t in whatever drug-fueled coma dream this is, now is she?”

The three fillies smirked at each other, “Ya jus’ stay there, an’ we’ll be right back.”

---

Sunset kept her eyes closed as she snuggled deeper into the pillow ‘You know, for a dream this bed is pretty comfortable. Although,’ she sighed, ‘I should probably start trying to wake up now.’

“Aurora?” a familiar voiced called out of her self-imposed darkness, “The fillies tell me that you won’t believe that you’re awake?”

“Sparky?” Sunset’s eyes snapped open to stare at … a purple unicorn-pegasus critter that was smiling at her, ‘Same hair, same voice, same eyes … it really is Sparky.’

“Yes, It’s me, Aurora.”

“You’re a horse.”

“We told you that we were ponies,” Twilight rolled her eyes in annoyance as she walked over to the bed, “And I’m an alicorn, actually.”

“Like I would actually believe that,” retorted Sunset as she reached up a hoof and booped Twilight on the nose, eliciting giggles from the trio of fillies watching from the doorway, “Holy drek! You’re real, aren’t you?” dropping back into her bed, she stared at her friend, “What the hell happened? I don’t remember anything after I was shot and AJ and Rainbow dragged me into your portal thing. Why am I a horse? … And why are you calling me by my first name?”

“Well, in order,” Twilight replied as she settled into one of the chairs and waved the Crusaders back in, “Your body reacted … poorly to the Portal’s transformation, so you’ve been in the hospital. And you’re a pony because part of the Portal’s magic is to transform anyone who passes through it into an appropriate species for their new dimension, which is why we were humans back on your world, and you’re a unicorn here. As for your name, I was trying to avoid any confusion with our, ‘native’, Sunset Shimmer ….”

“‘Native Sunset Shimmer’? So, what, I have a doppelganger? Or am I a doppelganger?” the unicorn frowned for a moment and then shrugged, “Whatever, someone has been doppelganged.”

“That isn’t even a word!”

“You’re just jealous that I invented a word,” Sunset smirked at the flabbergasted alicorn, “So who’re the squirts?”

“Aurora, meet Apple Bloom, Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle, fillies, this is Aurora.”

“Ah, so you’re the little sisters I’ve heard about,” the bedridden mare grinned at the three foals, “And call me Sunset.”

“Aurora …,” Twilight sighed.

“No, Sparky,” Sunset said firmly, “It’s my name, I worked and bleed for it, and I’m not giving it up,” glancing around her hospital room, she continued in a milder tone, “So, how long have I been out?”

“Six days,” came Sweetie’s ‘eager to be helpful’ reply, “Did our sisters really talk about us?”

“Sure did, short stuff,” the flame-haired mare assured her, “Only six days, huh? That’s not so bad, I think I’ll …,” Sunset started to rise, only to collapse back into her bed with a pained grunt, “Try getting up later.”

“Just like Rainbow Dash,” Scoots observed sagely as the other two Crusaders nodded, “Always trying to get up while she’s still sick.”

“Actually, Sunset,” said Twilight with an embarrassed cough, “You haven’t been gone for just six days.”

Sunset cocked an eyebrow at the academic, “But you just said ….”

“You’ve been here, in Equestria, for six days,” the alicorn clarified, “But we’ve determined that the temporal deviation between realities is rather … extreme.”

“How long have I been gone?” asked the unicorn apprehensively.

“This is going to be rather a shock, Sunset, so please try to remain calm and remember that we’re all here for you.”

“Twilight. How. Long?”

Twilight smiled at her friend nervously, “Three years.”

The alicorn and the fillies began to shift anxiously as Sunset just stared at them impassively, until the mare finally spoke, “I think I’d like to be alone right now.”