> My Little Digi-Cat
>  by Lucky Star Kona-chan
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

> (1): The punishment and the weird mare.
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

While Rinna and her new friends in Equestria exchanged hugs, tears, and farewells, Konata stepped away and called Tailmon over for a private talk.

“What do you need, Konata-sama?” Tailmon asked.

“Tailmon,” Konata took a deep breath before continuing, “as you know, we have forgiven you for trying to kill us and the mess that followed.” Konata said to the feline, earning a nod from her. “Well...last night, I was called to a small gathering with everyone involved in said mess.”

“Okay…” Tailmon was unsure of where this was going.

“After a long, long discussion, we decided that you will stay here and help both the ponies of Ponyville and the Element Bearers with whatever it is they might need help with until we come back in two months time,” Konata explained, biting her lip as she waited for the response.

Tailmon just blinked a few times, staring at nothing, before a flick of her ears signaled the return of her voice.

“Did you just said I have to stay here? Like, right here, in this town full of dumb multicolored horses – which I hate a lot by the way – for two months” she stared at Konata long and hard before letting out a laugh, “Good joke.”

But Konata wasn’t laughing with her.

“It’s not a joke, Tailmon,” she told the white feline, who immediately fell silent again at Konata's tone, “everyone agreed to this, even Rinna. You hurt a lot of ponies, even if we all forgave you, that doesn’t mean you can just leave it in the past with no repercussions.”

“So you're leaving me? And here of all places? Can’t I receive a punishment in Álfheimr?” Tailmon argued.

“Sorry, Tailmon, but this was a unanimous decision,” Konata shook her head with a sigh, “we came to the conclusion that this was the only way for you to pay for your actions. I’m sorry, but that’s how it is.”

“...You know I can’t stand these horses, right? If I stay here, I’ll probably beat them up again,” Tailmon said, almost threateningly in an attempt to convince Konata of letting her go back home with them.

Konata let out another sigh, which gave Tailmon a little hope...  

“You can't threaten your way out of this, Tailmon.”

….well, shit.

“Why!?” Tailmon didn't sound or act desperate often, almost never, but she was verging on it right this moment, “at least tell me why! There is something else, isn’t there? If that’s the case, then I at least deserve to know why I’m not allowed to go back.”

“Because, the moment you cross that portal, you’ll be locked down and probably never let out,” Konata's words shut Tailmon up fast, “it took hours, but we finally reached an agreement with Mom and she said that, as she put it, 'if you can stay here and help those you hurt for two months time, you’ll be forgiven for helping someone who almost murdered her daughter and be free to continue your previous life.'”

Silence.

“She’s going to hold a grudge, isn’t she?”

“Yep.”

A loud, kitty sigh. “I guessed as much.”

A softer, pony sigh. “Not surprised, huh?”

“That woman and I never had the best relationship.”

“Well, it surely didn’t help that you stole from her secret stash of candy from time to time. Then again, it’s not much of a secret when everyone knows about it.”

Both of them shared a laugh at that, being a little more relaxed now than when the conversation first started. Not that she relished the thought, but after that explanation, Tailmon fell into some kind of loose acceptance of what was just imposed upon her. Not like arguing the case further would get her anywhere...

“So, I have to stay here and help around a little, right? There’s no catch to it, like making.... F-friends…with ponies, right?” she shivered a little at the thought.

“Nope, she just wants you to help around and not cause trouble.”

“I’ll offer help, but I can’t promise that there’ll be no problems between me and the ponies.”

Relieved that her face wasn't clawed bloody, Konata just shrugged, “Good enough, I guess.”

Then Tailmon realized something, “How are they going to know if I’m doing what they think I’m doing instead of fooling around?”

“Oh, Mom will have someone watching you.”

“Joy,” Tailmon groaned.

“Yes, I know, it's annoying, but don’t let it get to you,” Konata offered the digital cat a soft pat on the shoulder, “just relax here for a time and you’ll be good to go. It’s not that hard.”

“Speak for yourself,” Tailmon grumped, “I hate this place, remember?”

Konata sighed, tiredly, “You can come and say good bye to Rinna, if you want. Speak to Twilight for more details on your duties.”

Tailmon stared at her, “Who?”

“Twi-” Realizing that they'd get nowhere doing it her way, Konata facehoofed, “...Purple.”

“Then say Purple.”

“They have names, Tailmon.”

“Yeah, well, I don’t care.”

Konata groaned and went with the rest to go back home, Tailmon following close behind with an amused grin on her face.





Tailmon waved goodbye to the only person she actually cared about one last time, a legitimate smile on her face. She was tempted to cross the portal, to hell with any punishment that may be waiting for her, but ultimately decided against it. If she was going to go back to protect Rinna, she had to follow the rules, at least this time.

Soon, the glow of the portal faded away into nothing and only an empty platform stood in its place.

For a moment, no one spoke or moved. The Bearers didn’t know how to tackle the situation now presenting itself before them: for the first time they were alone in the same place with Tailmon, the one being that single-handedly beat all of them. Sure, her punishment had been decided, but that didn't erase the memories of the brutality the white cat had unleashed upon them.

Finally, Twilight opened her mouth to break the silence-

“Stop beating the bush and tell me what I have to do already,” Tailmon beat her to it, voice dry, scaring Fluttershy. Both Rainbow and Applejack frowned at the cat: they weren’t convinced that Tailmon would behave herself and had both agreed to watch her like a hawk for her entire stay.

Rarity had simply left the moment Rinna and the others went home; she didn’t want to have anything to do with something related to Tailmon. Pinkie had remained, but was dead silent, not looking at anypony as she fidgeted behind Princesses Celestia and Luna, both of whom were standing straight and stern.

“Please, Tailmon, be reasonable,” Twilight spoke in a tone that bordered on begging, “we're all as uncomfortable as you are right now.”

“Sure, you are,” the white cat drawled, eyes narrowed, “but I don’t care. Just tell me the details and stop wasting my time.”

“Hey, what’s your deal?” Rainbow snapped, eyes narrowing right back, “we helped you, so you owe us!”

“Rainbow’s right,” shaking her head, Applejack glared at Tailmon, “ya’ seem ta not have learned yer’ lesson yet.”

“I may be remembering wrong, but you actually didn’t <b>do</b> anything for me,” Tailmon growled out, “all of you clearly refused to help me, and it was Konata-sama who convinced me to even accept the aid of those two.” Tailmon pointed at Celestia and Luna, both staring back at her with neutral expressions.

If Tailmon was supposed to be intimidated, she wasn't, and so continued uninterrupted.

“And what <b>lesson</b>, Orange? Did you think that after I got defeated, I had some kind of epiphany and now we could all be besties?” Tailmon's ears canted back as her tail lashed in irritation, “Let me make something perfectly clear: I hate <b>all</b> of you and I only accepted this because is my only option to go back to an almost normal life. I will not eat your face when you sleep or whatever, but I’ll beat you up if you annoy me.”

Rainbow had a challenging look, “Oh yeah? I’d like to see you try.”  

A menacing grin spread across Tailmon's face, a sight that made Rainbow lose some of her bravado.

“Do you want me to break your other wing, Blue? ” she asked, slowly advancing towards Rainbow.

Rainbow tried to hold it together, but the memories were still fresh and, as angry as she was, she <b>really</b> didn't want to feel that sort of pain again anytime soon. Fluttershy cowered further behind Applejack as even Twilight started to fidget with every step the cat took.

“What’s wrong? Are you <b>scared</b>?” Tailmon's grin melted into a soft expression, “Oh, you poor little things, let your friendly neighbor Tailmon, make you feel… <i>better</i>.” She said the last word with a dark voice and a wild expression.

Just before Tailmon closed in on the Bearers, Celestia extended a wing to block her path, “I think that is <b>enough</b>, Tailmon.”

Tailmon clicked her tongue before returning to a bored expression, “Killjoy.”

“<b>That</b> was a <b>joke</b>?!” Rainbow's anger flared back to full-strength when she caught on to what happened, “are you <b>crazy</b>?!”

“<b>ENOUGH!</b>” Luna shouted in the Royal Canterlot Voice, leaving the five Bearers and one digital cat with ringing ears.

“Thank you, Luna,” Celestia told to her sister getting a nod from her, “My Little Ponies, I know it’s an awkward situation to be in, but please stop antagonizing Tailmon.” Tailmon rolled her eyes as Celestia turned to her. “As for your task, Tailmon, you’ll be checking the bulletin board at Town Hall and take any request that you choose.”

Tailmon was distrustful as always, “Is that all?”

Celestia’s poker face held strong, “For the moment, that will suffice. Asking you for anything more right now would prove counterproductive.”

“At least you have the common sense to notice it, Alabaster,” Tailmon quipped, sarcastically, before walking off in the direction of the town.

When she was out of sight, Celestia turned to Twilight, “Are you alright, Twilight?”

With the digi-cat gone, Twilight recomposed herself.   

“Yes, thank you Princess,” Twilight tried to smile, but all she could muster was a shudder, “but I’m still worried about Tailmon; I don’t think she wants to change for the better.”

“Just give her time, Twilight,” Celestia reassured her most faithful student and, by extension, the other Bearers, “many foes of the past have proven to be redeemable. Tailmon just needs to find the right pony willing to reach out to her.”





You are now Tailmon, a Champion Level cat Digimon, and you are grumpy.  

You went to Town Hall to check the supposed <i>jobs</i> that you could be doing to start this… redemption...thing... That you need to finish in order to go back home with the people you <b>actually</b> care about.

But, unfortunately, there were none.  

When you were closing the distance between yourself and the bulletin board, anything stuck to it was taken down by what you suppose was some sort of political head honcho. You could have gone inside, beat her up, and taken the stuff you needed, but honestly? You weren’t in the mood, and you probably would get in trouble for doing that the first day.  

Maybe you could wait a couple of days and <b>then</b> beat up the first annoying horse you find. Yes, that sounds like a plan.

You look at the sky and let out a sigh, already bored out of your mind with the prospect of a wasted day, ready to march towards the Everfree and just wait for tomorrow. But destiny had other plans for you....  

… in the form of the gray Pegasus that decided to crash into you while you weren't looking.

“Ow, that hurt sooooo much,” You say with such sarcasm, Geoffrey Butler would be put to shame.

The mare on top of you didn’t move though, sprawled out like a ragdoll in such a way that you wondered if she was dead-

<i>(Hi guys Tailmon here, you’re probably wondering how did I know it was a mare? Well, let just say that I saw things that I can't unsee. Stupid horses...)</i>

-maybe you could eat this one for dinner if that was the case? Surely no one would complain. The food chain, right?

“Hey,” You poke at the winged horse's head with a claw, “are you dead?”

“Ouchie, that was a bad one,” the gray mare spoke, sounding very woozy and <b>very</b> alive.  

So much for dinner. “Damn it.”

With that, you push her off you, which got an audible ‘oof’ out of her as she landed on her back.

You dust yourself, and saw the mare still on her back, but this time she was....sniffling? She wasn't <b>crying</b>, was she? You don't have the time for this now and start to walk in the direction of the forest, where there was lots of meat to hunt.

“I’m sorry.”

Your ear flicked at that almost inaudible sound.

Facing the mare again, you see her now right-side up and staring at you with tears gathering in her golden eyes, “What?”

“I’m sorry for crashing into you.”

“I don’t care,” You shrug, trying not to focus on the fact that the mare's eyes were...strange. Horse eyes weren't supposed to look that way, right? “I've had enough of you horses today. Punishment or no punishment, I am <b>done</b>!”

The mare lowered her head to the ground again and covered her head with her hooves, letting out a high-pitched mantra of, “I’m sorry, I’m sorry!”

You roll your eyes: these horses are so emotional, it’s disgusting.

“Hey.”

“I’m sorry!”

“Hey!”

“I’m sorry! I’m sorry!”

A vein pops up on your forehead: you <b>really</b> don’t have the time for this right now. You walked up to the mare and un-dug her head from her hooves and forced yourself to stare her dead in the mismatched eye.

“Shut. Up,” You hiss, “you’re annoying me. Why are you even crying, anyway?”

One horse blink. Two horse blink.“I flew into you.”

“Yeah, about that, <i>what the hell</i>?”

“It was an accident,” the weird-eyed mare hastily explained, “I was trying to get to town hall and then I did a bad turn and the sun hit me in the eyes and I couldn’t see and then I lost control and then I crashed on you!” By the time she finished her ramble, the weird mare lost the tears and instead gained a victorious smile. “Yay, I got it right!”  

“Huh?”

“What happened. I remembered it all correctly!” the weird mare threw a hoof to the air victoriously, pulling herself out of your paws in the process.

You facepaw.  

“Goddess, please give me the strength to tolerate these idiots...” You mumbled under your breath.

“Oh, I've never seen your before, so you <b>must</b> be new,” the weird mare's smile got bigger, “I’m Derpy Hooves! Who are you?”  

Your eye twitches some: did this horse have short term memory or something? Now that you think about it, maybe she has some kind of situation going on, what with her weird eyes.

You take a deep breath to cool down before lifting up two claws.  

“Two things. One: I don’t care and Two: my name should be public knowledge by now, just ask one of these losers watching us.” You extended your arms to the sides while looking around, showing her a large group of ponies tentatively listening in on their conversation. “Surely one of them can tell you the whole story.”

“That’s not nice, and why would your name be public knowledge? Did you do something?” 'Derpy' asked, innocently.

You might as well tell her. Maybe she'll stop pestering you.  

“I beat up your Princesses and a bunch of guards over a week ago.”

You get an incredulous look in response.... Well, you <b>think</b> it's an incredulous look, anyway.  

“No way,” Derpy objected, “you’re too fluffy and cute to do something like that!”

Well, you didn’t expect that answer at all. Before you realize it, you start laughing.

“What’s so funny?” Derpy tilted her head to the side with a small smile.

“You’re quite ignorant, but I appreciate the compliment nonetheless,” That’s when the wind blows a piece of paper into your face and, in light of the unexpected good spirits, you peel it off to look it over, “Hey, you said you were on your way to put up a request, right?”

“Yep!”

“Is this it?” Tailmon turned over the paper so that the Pegasus could read it.

All it took was a quick glance and another “Yep!” to confirm it.

“Why do you need help in your house?” You ask.

“Because I have some... <i>problems</i>,” Derpy's uneven eyes darted in different directions, “I’m very clumsy because I can't see very well, so I need somepony to help me get around and not break everything. A couple ponies accepted before and they were both nice at first....” Derpy eyes stopped darting about, a frown replacing her smile, “But the more I messed up, the angrier they got and one of them started being mean to me, called me 'stupid'. They both went away and didn’t come back.”  

Okay… this was going in a direction you didn’t like, “Did you talk with the horses in Town Hall about it? ”

“I did,” Derpy nodded, but she didn't look any happier, “that's how I met the two ponies who helped me at first, but they didn’t do it anymore after, so I had the idea of sticking a request on the bulletin board.” Her eyes lit up again, hopeful. “I thought that, maybe, somepony would be interested, you know? It’s a good idea right?” She looked at you like she was expecting an answer.

“I suppose it is,” You said, not really believing it, “look, I have to go now, so…”  

“Oh… that’s okay, I don’t want to ruin somepony’s day again,” Derpy nodded and took her request in her mouth, “thank you for listening, kitty.”  

You stand there, watching the gray mare turn to go to Town Hall, blinking a few times. That was interesting. Annoying yes, but interesting. Heh, you even laughed. How long had it been since you did that? Shaking your head, you turn to go-

“Wait!”  Derpy’s voice called out, followed by the sound of galloping hooves.

You stop, but didn’t turn around, “Do you need something?”

“Um… Can you…” Derpy said with a hesitant, downright shaky voice, “can <b>you</b> help me?”

You say nothing for a few seconds before heaving a sigh.

“I thought I made clear that I was bad, but you probably don’t believe me,” Turning around, you look Derpy in the eye again, “look, I’m really not the kind of person who can help you. I have no patience and hate being annoyed.”

“That’s not true!” Derpy shook her head, a smile reappearing on her face, “You’re nice! You were grumpy before, but that was because I crashed on you! I would be grumpy too if somepony crashed onto me, but then you tried to cheer me up. Somepony rude wouldn’t do that. They would just walk away, but you stayed and actually <b>listened</b> to me, <b>talked</b> to me.”

Wow, she really believes you’re not someone who could easily kill her with one swipe. Hmm, maybe you <b>could</b> give this a try. After all, you're supposed to do odd jobs around town and the idiots at Town Hall don’t want you even <b>looking</b> at said jobs, so you may as well take this one and see how it goes. If it goes wrong, you could just leave without a word.

“Are you sure you want <b>me</b> to help you?”

A spark of hope appeared on her misaligned eyes, “Yes. Will you?”

“No,” You couldn’t help yourself.  

As on cue you saw Derpy’s mood souring, “Oh…”

“Just joking, just joking,” You wave a paw at her dismissively, smirking, “I accept your request, Gray.”

Hope appeared again, but there was a glint of suspicion, “Really?”

You nodded and she smiled, brightly.

“My name is Derpy though,” she pointed out.

“Does it annoy you if I call you Gray?”

She nodded.

“Gray it is then,” You said with another smirk.

She glared at you with poofed cheeks, which looks so funny on a horse, you can't help but laugh again. Wow, two good laughs in one day...  

“I told you I was a mean spirited creature, now you have to deal with it,” You tease, flicking your tail from side to side, “lead the way Gray.”

“Okay, <i>Kitty</i>,” Derpy said in a way that was likely supposed to be teasing.

Cute.

“Oh~ you flatter me, Gray, but I’m used to it. Nice try though.”

She poofed her cheeks at you again and, with a ‘hmph’, she turned and lead you to her house.

“Tailmon has made contact with one of the locals and it appeared to be a pleasant interaction at the end.”





Hidden in the shadows of an alleyway, a shady figure wrote her spoken thoughts down in a notebook, the only thing visible under her cloak being the three-fingered paw holding the quill. A paw covered by a dark purple sleeve with a yin-yang drawn on the back.

Finishing her entry, she then closed the notebook and disappeared without leaving a trace.
> (2): The mysterious watcher and slight hints of improvement.
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Derpy walked at a moderate pace, in no hurry to get to her home, apparently.

Tailmon didn’t mind too much; sure, it was a waste of her time, but since there was no other option. Derpy's request had been the only one available and thus, she had to endure helping the gray mare out.

Still...  

“Oh, I feel the hate in the air, ” Tailmon exaggerated her voice, noticing the distrustful stares of the local ponies they passed, “What a welcoming town.”

“Huh?” Derpy was confused by that comment, “Hate? What hate? Ponyville doesn’t hate you, silly.”

“Gray,” Tailmon said, flatly, “I know you're an idiot like the rest of this town, but don’t abuse it, please.”

Derpy took offense on that, “Hey! That’s not nice!”

“I’m not nice, I told you like ten times already.”  

“That’s not true! You are nice, really! You're just trying to act cool so nopony notices.”  

Tailmon facepawed.

“Why do I have to deal with such stupidity?” she murmured under her breath before raising her voice, “Alright, whatever you say, Gray. At least you're not being a hypocrite like the rest of these losers.”  

“Why are they hypocrites?” Derpy asked, innocently as ever.

Oh yeah, this was going to be fun.

“It’s simple Gray,” Tailmon began with a smile, raising her voice so that everypony passing by could hear, “they want me out of here for kicking their princesses’ butts and then some, but they expect someone else to do it for them.” Her smile took on a sharp edge. “They don’t have the guts to stand in front of me and say anything. Sure, I totally destroyed Blue, Orange and Purple, but at least they actually had the courage to stand against me.”

By now, several ponies had stopped to listen and this just made Tailmon's smile morph into an evil smirk.

“I despise those pathetic sickos that want something so bad, but are too weak to do it themselves! They just stick around to see it happening because of someone else’s actions, but I have to admit it is amusing to see such trash scared!” Tailmon finished her rant with a sinister laugh.

Some ponies looked in shock, others with anger, not that Tailmon cared.  

“What? You idiots have anything to say?” she waited for an answer that didn't come, “I thought so.”  

Derpy just stared, unable to come to a conclusion of what just happened. She didn’t understand even half of what Tailmon was rambling about and now ponies were shooting nasty glares at the digi-cat....who was walking off without her.

“Kitty, wait for me!” she hurried after Tailmon trying to ignore the stares of those around them, “You don’t know where my house is!”

“Hurry up then,” Tailmon told her without looking back.

Catching up Derpy said, “Why is everypony so mad now?”

“Because they don’t like being told the truth on their faces,” Tailmon responded with glee.

“What truth? I didn’t understand all that complicated stuff you told me back there, can you repeat it a little simpler for me? Please,” Derpy asked, innocently.

“Do you really want me to do that Gray?” Tailmon asked with sinister smile, “It could be spooky for you.”

“I can handle spooky stuff, Kitty,” Derpy proudly said.

“Can I get a glass of water or something first?” Tailmon complained,  “How far away is your house, Gray? We have been walking on this ugly road for, like, twenty minutes now.”  

Derpy stopped and looked around, she noticed a little problem, “Oops...I went the wrong way again.”  

Tailmon’s eye twitched involuntarily as she watched Derpy chuckle, nervously, before she lifted one claw.  

“Excuse me for a moment.” 

Derpy gave her a nod and then Tailmon walked towards a tree that was close by.

She extended her claws, which somehow looked way sharper than before, and plunged then deep into the tree's trunk. Then, she started to pull.

Within seconds, then the sound of the ground breaking echoed across the street and every pony in sight, including Derpy, watched as Tailmon ripped the tree from the ground, roots and all, leaving a sizable hole on its place. Several ponies let out strangled cries and ran for cover, a couple were too stunned – and scared – to move, but Derpy just blinked at the sight like it was just another bump in the road.

Holding the tree over her head, Tailmon turned to look at Derpy, “Wait here.”

“Okay!” Derpy nodded with a smile; she didn’t need to know what was happening, everything could be explained later.  

She thought about apologizing to the pony who owned the tree if there was any, because obviously they would feel sad that their tree was no longer there. It was the only considerate thing to do.  

But Tailmon had asked her to wait, so she waited.  

Fifteen minutes after that Derpy was getting a little worried: Kitty didn’t came back and she couldn't help but worry. What if she got attacked by a timberwolf? Or frozen by one of those nasty snake-birds? What were they called again? Cock-a-soming? She fought the urge of entering the Everfree to search for her new friend, wanting to do as she said.

Suddenly, the ground under her hooves gave off some slight vibrations. She looked at the ground, confused. An earthquake? Another cow stampede?

But as soon as these vibrations started, they stopped.  

Looking back up, Tailmon came walking out of the woods with a small broken piece of wood on her left paw. Squinting her mismatched eyes for a better look, Derpy saw Tailmon’s fur stained in various areas with some Bordeaux coloration, her left claw was dripping with liquid of the same color. Halfway to Derpy, she then threw the piece of wood behind her with a satisfied expression.

Finally, Tailmon noticed Derpy, “I'm back.”

“Kitty!” Derpy said, happily, “what happe-“ Then the smell nation attacked. “Ewww…” Derpy lifted a hoof to shield her nose of the pestilence that came from Tailmon’s body. “What is that smell?”  

“You don’t want to know, Gray,” Tailmon insisted with a giggle.

“Let’s just go home, so you can take a bath,” Derpy suggested, waving a hoof to try and make make the smell go away.

Tailmon shrugged, “Whatever.”

“Follow me, Kitty,” Derpy started walking in the (hopefully) right direction, this time.

Watching the entire sequence of events from the safety of a cloud, Rainbow Dash watched: she had been following Tailmon ever since she left the portal on Twilight's orders. She didn't trust the white digi-cat and had been the first to volunteer for this 'mission', determined to keep an eye on the digi-cat throughout her two month stay.

'This cat being here is not a good idea', Rainbow made a face before deciding to take flight, turning tail and making a beeline for Twilight's castle.

Unbeknownst to the prismatic pegasus, a figure covered by shadow also watched from from the safety of the Everfree border, deep blue eyes following Tailmon as she departed.  





Ten minutes later, the pair finally made it to Derpy’s house.

Derpy strolled around happily while Tailmon took a moment to look at the house interior. Cushions, blankets, pillows, some dishes and trays, and lots of paper cake cups were scattered all over the furniture, as though a tornado blew through and left no survivors.  

“Why is everything so messy?” Tailmon asked.  

Derpy giggled sheepishly, “Sorry, I was in a hurry before and I didn’t make time to clean up.”

“Are you sure about that?” Tailmon asked, lifting a tray that was swarmed by ants and then throwing it behind her with a loud clatter.

Derpy’s expression soured a bit.

“I told you that I’m not nice, but you didn’t want to listen,” Tailmon re-stated, “Anyways, where's the bathroom?”

“Down the hallway, second door to the right,” Derpy said with disheartened voice and pointed at the hallway with a hoof.

Tailmon followed the direction, but caught Derpy’s sad expression. She didn’t care, but for some reason, she wasn't as annoyed as she thought she'd be.





Standing in front of her castle, Twilight paced back and forth, glancing at the sky every now and then. She'd gone straight there after the Princesses left, though not before sending out Rainbow Dash to make sure Tailmon actually checked the bulletin board in Town Hall.  

It wasn't that Twilight didn't trust Konata or Rinna. She just didn't trust Tailmon.

A flash of a prismatic mane broke her out of her nervous thoughts and she looked up to see Rainbow Dash touching down before her.

“Rainbow, what did you find?” Twilight nearly tackled her friend to the ground, “did Tailmon look at the board?”

“She took her sweet time getting there, but yeah,” the blue pegasus grumbled.

Twilight winced, preparing for the worst, “And?”  

“Derpy crashed into her.”

Twilight gasped, one hoof going to her mouth, “Is she okay?”

“She's.....fine,” Rainbow said with a confused frown, “something weird happened.”

“What?”

“Tailmon accepted Derpy's help request,” Rainbow reported, nose scrunching up, “Whatever it was...”

After her heart rate evened out, Twilight needed a minute to process that.  

“So… she’s with Derpy right now?” Rainbow nodded. “And you just left her there?”

That got Rainbow's attention, “Uhhh...”

“Sweet Celestia!” Twilight's panic spiked all over again, “anything could be happening to her right now!”

“Oh horseapples,” Rainbow got airborne fast, “I-”

“The gray mare is safe,” a new voice interjected.

Both ponies gave a start: they were the only ones who stood before the castle gates and Twilight would've known if it had been Spike from the other side of the door.  

“Who-?” Twilight didn't get a chance to finish.

“Do not be afraid. I am an ally, sent to watch Tailmon,” the disembodied voice spoke again.

It dawned on Twilight first, “Are you the one that Konata’s mother sent?”

“Indeed,” the voice replied, “Lady Mihoshi trusted me with the responsibility of watching Tailmon’s progress on her quest.” A pause. “She also ordered me to do the same with the ponies involved in the incident.”

“We don't need a babysitter,” Rainbow put her hooves on her hips, sounding insulted at the insinuation.

“I have orders to intervene in case of an emergency,” the voice continued, “I felt the need to inform you before I returned to my watch. Farewell.”

“Hey, wait just a-”

“I think she's gone, Rainbow,” Twilight frowned, looking around them with a wary expression.

“Want me to head over to Derpy's place?” the prismatic pegasus still looked ready to take off at a moment's notice.

There was a pregnant pause between them and it very nearly brooked Rainbow to take off anyway, but Twilight made her decision and shook her head.

“We're just going to have to trust Konata's mother and the person she sent to watch over Tailmon,” she said.

A sour expression on her face, Rainbow landed: she wasn't about to let Tailmon off the hook just because some disembodied voice said so.





When Tailmon finally left the bathroom – which she had to clean up in order to clean herself off – she saw that Derpy had moved.

Curious, she explored the house for a bit, taking in all the trash as she did so: this amount of clutter was not normal.   

She finally came upon the kitchen, sticky corners and cabinets covered in muffin batter, and it was there that she found a note on a table.

'Dear Kitty,  

I’m going to take nap, so please make yourself comfortable. If want something to eat, there are fresh baked muffins in the oven.

Love, Derpy

Tailmon crumpled it into a ball and threw over her shoulder; she might as well take one, since she wanted something sweet to eat after her little exercise.

Taking one of the dozen of muffins that were in the (dirty) oven, she took a bite...and her pupils shrunk.  

“This taste…”  

The taste of the muffin was familiar to her.

It was very similar to Rinna’s muffins, an observation that caused a warm feeling to rise inside the feline's chest.  

“How can someone with this talent be so…” Tailmon was about to say something mean, but stopped at the last word. Looking around at all the trash in the room, she sighed and adopted a determined expression. “Might as well start by helping this one a bit. Not like I have anything better to do.”
> 3: Progress and lunch.
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Even if Derpy wrote that she just taking a nap on the note she left on the kitchen, she actually overslept. She didn’t feel very good, what Tailmon told her was weighting in her mind, she knew deep down that all the digi-cat said was true to an extent.

She has been truth to her word and didn’t show any hint of kindness in her behavior, everything she has said has been mean and rude. Derpy tried to play it out has just being edgy, but the more she thought about it the more it downed on her that Tailmon was actually a ruthless individual with no compassion or empathy in her heart.

Maybe she shouldn’t have insisted Tailmon to help her. Derpy considered Tailmon’s words, and she thought like Tailmon said before she was being a hypocrite, it saddened her to no end to consider something so mean as the truth, but the evidence was there.

Maybe Tailmon would’ve been better with any other pony or even nopony, her hostility and the way ponies look at her made clear the incompatibility between them.

It is the same feeling Derpy herself gets from some ponies in occasions, she feels left out, empty and alone due to nopony understanding her and treating her differently just for something out of her control.

Derpy didn’t want to get up anymore, what was the point of it anyways? She would get out make her route, ruin somepony’s property by crashing into something or simply being yelled at for being her.

Yet nature made its call and Derpy had to go attend to her needs downstairs, she sighed and begrudgingly made her way to the bathroom.

It was late on the night so everything was almost pitch black in her way there, but it was strange, she didn’t step on as much trash as she usually does when she walks inside her house, something was off. But she shrugged it off as just being luck on her part.

While inside there, she wondered what did Tailmon do all day, was she even in the house anymore, has she abandoned her like all the other ponies have done before? Derpy could just wonder what ifs at this point, but she wouldn’t hold it against Tailmon if she did just that, Derpy doesn’t want to ruin Tailmon’s day anymore.

Stepping out of the bathroom she couldn’t help the sobs from escaping her, she knew feeling this way was wrong, but she didn’t want to be alone anymore. The only thing she wanted was somepony that would treat her like a normal pony, even if Tailmon was aggressive, she didn’t masked her words behind petty sentences, Tailmon was honest, truly honest, painfully honest with her. This was more than what she gets from other ponies, it was a silly thought to feel complimented by something like that, but this was the case for Derpy.

She smiled sadly at the darkness around her, “I really am an idiot aren’t I?” she whispered to herself as she made her way back to her room upstairs to sleep some more.





Meanwhile in the castle of friendship Twilight was asking Konata for some information about the individual her mother sent to watch over Tailmon.

“Sorry Twilight, I have no idea of who mom sent there, it could be anyone really, and white furry legs with three toed feet are not that rare around here I’m afraid,” Konata told to her friend crushing her hopes of learning anything useful for the current situation.

“Can’t you ask her to tell you?”

“Can’t do sorry, we asked her to give Tailmon a chance, she would not budge to any other request unless there’s something for her to gain out of it, and considering the situation I don’t see what gain she could get.”

Twilight’s mood deflated like a balloon, but she was still determined to get something out of this conversation, “in that case… can you tell me something about Tailmon?” she asked innocently.

“Why do you want to know?” Konata asked back not really understanding why she would ask something like that.

Twilight coughed into a hoof to clear her throat, and adopted a professional stance, “I would like to learn about her species, how do they operate and common likes and dislikes, it would help us a lot if we can understand how she functions.”

“Oh, then it’s better if you ask that to her instead of me,” Konata told her killing her chances of learning something once again.

“Why can’t you tell me?” Twilight asked with a little frustration.

“I don’t know that much about her Twilight, also if your objective is learning in general terms you can make Tailmon tell you, since it would be considered a request and Tailmon has to do them if she wants to get positive points,” after Konata said this Twilight regained some hope back.

“Really?” Twilight got a nod as response, “well, if you put it like that it makes sense, thank you for clarifying it.”

“You’re welcome, and I’m sorry for not being able to help you more Twilight but I have my hoov…erm… hands tied, jeez you guys rubbed on me way more than I anticipated,” Konata let out a light hearted laugh.

Twilight just giggled slightly in amusement, “sorry for that, and I know you just left this morning but we already miss you, especially Pinkie and Rainbow even if she doesn’t want to admit it yet.”

Konata just smiled at that, “well, Twilight it is nice to know that you learned how to use Magical Vision so fast you really are a good student,” she complimented getting a slight blush on Twilight. “Once again sorry for not being of much help, but now we are in a little bit of a busy time on here so I have to go for now, we’ll be in contact soon, I’ll be seeing you later.”

“It’s ok, thank you for the help Konata, and good luck,” Twilight waved with a smile before the communication ended. 

Being left alone in the darkness of the throne room except Twilight began to plan on how to formulate the request for Tailmon.





Konata waved back as the transmission ended, she let out a sigh afterwards.

‘I’m sorry Twilight, but I can’t help you with this,’ Konata thought to herself.

A giddy giggle was heard behind her, “how does it feel to lie to your friend?”

“This is your fault mom, you made me lie to her,” Konata replied with some hostility.

“You can’t blame me for being fair, you wanted a chance for Tailmon to redeem herself, I’m giving you one, so deal with it,” this was Mihoshi’s reasoning behind this.

“But you just had to send her, didn’t you?”

“She was perfect for the job, and she proved it quite fast I admit.”

Konata couldn’t argue with that logic, yes the one who her mother sent was doing her job properly, but it still annoyed her, “whatever,” with that she turned to leave her room.

But her mother stopped her when she passed by her side, “you better calm down.”

“I’m calm, just make sure nothing happens to them, or things will get messy,” Konata got the hand of her mother off her and walked off.

Shaking her head disappointedly, Konata’s mother followed behind to go somewhere else, ‘kids these days…’





Next Morning.

Derpy woke up the next morning when she felt an inviting smell, rubbing her eyes she got out of bed and went downstairs. 

With the light of the sun lightening the room her eyes widened at the scenery, the floor was devoid of trash; her sticky furniture had no remains of muffins or some miscellaneous food that she decided to eat at some point in time, the walls, the ceiling even the stairs were clean, not sparkly clean but at least the filth on them was no more.

She went to the kitchen, where the same thing happened. All the muffin batter and rests of food in the sink and on the corners of everything weren’t there anymore.

Tears were escaping her eyes, “who…” her voice cracked some but then noticed a note on the fridge.

She read it out loud, “Look, I accepted to help you in your house, and that’s what I’m going to do, you don’t have to thank me Gray. I’m no cook but I left you some tea and cookies so you don’t go to work with an empty stomach, if you see this note it’s because I’m getting rid of all the trash on the house. I don’t know what happened or care about it, but don’t go doing this again, or I’ll beat you up.”

“Kitty…” Derpy couldn’t believe her eyes; she left the note on the table just next to the tea Tailmon made for her. With a shaky hoof she took a sip of the tea, “it’s so good!” she exclaimed loudly, tears of happiness falling all over the cookies, but she ate them anyways, “these are salty, but still good!”

“They aren’t supposed to be salty, you’re crying all over them you idiot,” Tailmon said from the kitchen door.

Derpy stopped with her mouth full of cookies and looked at her, she tear up even more, “kbffity!” she spat out some nonsense and cookie crubs everywhere as she made her way towards the digi-cat where she proceed to catch her in a hug.

Tailmon took a couple of seconds before saying the following, “get off me! You’re getting crubs on my fur you idiot!” she yelled as she tried to pry off Derpy, but she wasn’t really trying too hard to do so.





Some hours after that, Derpy was in a very good mood and prepared herself to go to work, got her mailmare uniform on and was about to leave, but Tailmon called her.

“Gray,” Tailmon got closer, for some reason she was wearing a plain blue apron she had a little box in her paws, “here,” she held the box in front of Derpy so she could grab it.

“Huh?” Derpy was confused, “what is this? Kitty.” She asked while grabbing the box.

“Lunch,” Tailmon plainly said.

“Lunch?”

“Yes, lunch. For what I saw while cleaning this dump you have not being eating correctly for a while, so there you go, I will get in trouble if you go fainting somewhere when I’m supposed to be helping,” Tailmon explained.

Derpy smile heartwarmingly, “Thank you Kitty!” she gave Tailmon another hug.

Surprisingly Tailmon gave her some pats on the back, “alright, alright, enough hugs, go to work before I have to drag you there,” she said getting a look from Derpy, “I’ll do it even if I don’t know where it is.”

Derpy resumed her way to work, Tailmon closing the door behind her.

Inside Tailmon had a satisfied smile on her face and turned to go do something else, before suddenly stopping, “what am I doing?” she questioned, but shrugged it off soon after, “whatever, I’m hungry so off this apron goes,” she said tossing the apron in some random direction where it neatly landed on the couch.

Tailmon went to the forest to look for a certain something.





Twilight having finished her request for Tailmon to do was in her way to Derpy’s house, she was expecting the place to be some kind of ruin by now. But what she found was unexpected; it was very clean, even the exterior was cleaner than the houses next to it.

‘Strange, was Derpy’s house always this clean? I don’t remember it being this way before, but I never really visited her ever so I’m not sure,’ Twilight thought to herself.

She knocked at the door, but nopony answered, she waited there some more knocking every once in a while but still nopony attended the door.

Twilight just sat there, ‘maybe there’s nopony at home?’ then another thought crossed her mind, ‘or did something happen…? No, if something happened it would have been reported already by that one creature,’ she let out a sigh, ‘Calm down Twilight, don’t go into that dark place yet, Tailmon has to behave or else she won’t get what she wants, so she wouldn’t do something so reckless at least for now.’





Tailmon came back from the forest with the thing she went there to look for inside a plastic bag and saw Twilight at the door; a devious thought came to her. She went behind the house and with a jump she got to the roof, then she put a claw inside the bag until it was drenched with a red substance, she placed herself in just the right angle so her claw was on top of Twilight making the dripping of the substance fall directly on the unaware alicorn.





On the distance the mysterious figure wrote everything on her notebook, “Tailmon has done some progress, but she should learn how to behave at some point,” she murmured with disappointment.
> 4:Breaking the barrier of the heart.
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Twilight was waiting patiently at the door of Derpy’s house, since she had nothing else to do at this point because she had no other plans for the day besides giving her request to Tailmon; she saw no issue in waiting just like that.

But suddenly she felt droplets falling on her head.

“Huh? Is it raining?”

She looked around but the sky was as blue as ever even put a hoof in front of her to make sure if there was any rain. But nothing happened, so she shrugged it off.

Then more droplets fell on her head, this time she knew something was off and looked around in the sky for something strange but there was nothing, again.

Whatever fell on her head was now going down her face; she rubbed it off with a hoof and looked at it.

It was a thick dark red fluid, her eyes shrunk. But then some fell on her nose and with a yelp she jumped away.

Twilight heard a loud laugh, a really familiar loud laugh.

Figuring out who this was she got really annoyed.

“Tailmon! Where are you!?” 

Her answer was more mocking laugh.

“Oh, my nonexistent stomach, I can’t breathe!”

Identifying the source of the voice Twilight took to the skies and flew over the roof of Derpy’s house to see Tailmon struggling to breathe and with tears in her eyes due to the howl of laugher she was letting out.

Twilight scowled at her, but this didn’t detour Tailmon from her laugher, it appears that this made it even worse.

Tailmon calmed down a bit after some time, and was just moderating her breathing.

Twilight scowled even harder, “Are you done?”

Tailmon steadied her breathing and got into a sit down position, “yes I’m done Purple, thanks for killing my boredom, how nice of you.”

Twilight scowl didn’t fade even a little; she was trying to disintegrate the digi-cat by her stare alone, if only this would work.

“What even is this substance you dropped over me?” 

Tailmon moved her head from side to side with eyes closed, “nothing important, just blood.”

Twilight looked shocked and somewhat scared, “you can’t be serious.”

With a swift move from her claw Tailmon reached inside her bag and threw a piece of bloody meat that made a wet plop into Twilght’s face.

The alicorn shrieked in panic and disgust, “Ahhh! Get it off, get it off!”

Tailmon facepawed at the ridiculousness of this situation, she knew quite well that this stupid horse could just use her magic to get the piece of meat off her face, but decided to scream like a ninny instead.

Apparently Twilight finally figured it out as Tailmon saw her get the piece of meat off, but did it in a very shaky way, apparently this disturbed her to no end.

After shivering a little, Twilight focused a frown on Tailmon once again, “Why did you do that!?”

But Tailmon only shrugged.

A vein bulged on Twilight’s forehead, but she closed her eyes and let out a painfully long sigh, “Look, I have something to discuss with you.”

Tailmon raised an eye brow, “really now?” Twilight nodded, “well, I don’t care, get out of here.” Tailmon then jumped down and was about to walk inside the house.

Twilight giggled, making Tailmon stop on her tracks, “I don’t think you will refuse this one, or maybe you don’t want to get positive points? I mean fulfilling requests from us helps with that.”

Tailmon slowly turned to face Twilight, “are you trying to bribe me, Purple? That’s cute.”

Twilight was tempted to just leave, but she had to beat Tailmon on this at least, “well, I suppose that you really don’t want to get back to Álfheimr. It’s a shame really,” she wiggled the piece of parchment with the request in her magic around the air.

This time was Tailmon’s turn to frown at the smug looking alicorn, “give me that thing,” she snatched the parchment from Twilight’s magic and read it.

“Bla bla bla, boring introduction, unnecessary wording just making the whole thing a hassle to read, bla bla bla, I want to learn from your species, bla bla, more boring stuff bla bla,” Tailmon eyed Twilight with a disappointed expression, “how can you write so much but say so little?”

Twilight stared dumbfounded as Tailmon made the parchment into a ball and threw it to her, it bumped off her horn and into the ground.

“I put so much effort in writing that request…”

Tailmon stared at her in annoyance, “what did you expect me to do? You moron, if you’re asking someone to do anything make sure you know how to explain it without so much filler, just get to the point and get done with it!” she was getting exasperated, “look, your whole note would have been shortened to just asking me to tell you about me and that would have been acceptable.”

Twilight felt something different coming from Tailmon this time though, for some reason the frustration she felt from her was not because of hatred but because she actually found the inefficiency on her method. 

Tailmon meanwhile adopted a more carefree stance, with a claw up as if to make a point she was still talking, “always make sure you know who you’re asking something for and make it understandable for them, otherwise you’ll get the other side confused.”

Twilight was at a loss for words on this situation, “Why are you giving me advice?” 

“Because you suck, I don’t know how you idiots can function if this is the way you do things around here, but I shouldn’t be surprised; after all you horses are full of nonsense.”

Never mind, Tailmon went back to being rude just for the sake of it, “you don’t pull any punches now do you?”

Tailmon shrugged, “what can I tell you, Purple? I just hate you that much, now go and wash out that blood; I don’t want you to make a mess when I finally managed to clean this dump.”

“Huh?”

“What are you waiting for? Go quickly if you want to learn that stuff you asked me to tell you, but I’ll get some lunch done for me first, I’m hungry.”

Still not sure of what to think about this whole ordeal, Twilight did as she was told and went to wash off the blood she had in her fur.





Derpy happily flied through Ponyville, doing her route and delivering the mail for the ponies, her good mood had a positive effect on her performance. She didn’t have a single accident yet and ponies told her that she was brighter than usual.

She wondered what those ponies meant with that, but she ignored it for the time being and was waiting impatiently for lunch time.

“I can’t wait to taste what you made for me Kitty!”

Then somepony made act of presence.

“Hey Derpy!” a raspy voice called for her.

Looking around to see who it was Derpy saw Rainbow Dash closing the distance.

“Oh, Rainbow Dash Hi!” she waved with a smile.

“Derpy you’re ok, right?” Rainbow asked out of the blue.

“Huh?” Derpy blinked a few times in confusion, “Yes I’ am, why?”

Rainbow was skeptical, she knows Tailmon is not to be trusted, “well, I heard you were with the cat that attacked us, she dangerous so I wanted to make sure you were fine. You better stay away from that cat Derpy.”

Derpy was feeling something was off with this, Rainbow seemed to have ulterior motives, “maybe she’s a little mean, but she’s not dangerous!”

Rainbow’s eye twitched after hearing that, “not dangerous you say?” she was looking rather mad, “you don’t know anything!” she lashed out.

Derpy was surprised by this sudden outburst.

“You don’t know the suffering that cat made us pass, everypony else knows this, but you’re here saying that she’s not dangerous? Don’t make me laugh! She’s just using us to fulfill her goals!”

“Stop lying! You don’t know her!” Derpy lashed out too.

Rainbow lifted an eyebrow, “and you do?”

“What?”

“Do you know her, Derpy? I suppose you do because you speak like you do.”

Derpy hesitated for a moment, “I don’t know her that well, but enough to see that she’s not dangerous!”

Their heated argument was getting the attention of the ponies that were wandering around the area.

Those in their proximity heard the yelling and the ever so growing angry scowls both mares were giving to each other. If this kept going it was just a matter of time before one of them decided to attack the other.





Meanwhile Twilight was uncomfortable; she had to put up with Tailmon devouring a piece of meat in front of her.

Even the smell made her nauseous; she wasn’t used to other creatures eating meat. In fact she never saw anypony who could, until this day.

Tailmon who almost finished eating, didn’t like Twilight’s stare, “Can you stop giving me that weird look? It’s not a big deal, Purple. You’re such a softie.”

“Where did you even got that thing to begin with?”

Tailmon swallowed the last portion of her dish, “in the forest just outside town, I thought maybe the creatures there would be any fun, but no. Just more weaklings, so I knocked a Hydra out and cut a piece of tail to eat. And before you say anything, no, I didn’t kill it.”

“Can you not sustain yourself without meat?”

Tailmon put a claw on her chin in a thoughtful manner, “I certainly can, but the reason I had to go for that is because if I went to hunt to the other forest that is close to town, I probably would have got in trouble because it seems like a natural reserve or something.” She explained, “I saw an orchard as well but again, taking some of that would have got me in trouble, I can’t afford to ruin this even if I can’t stand you horses I have to behave and go by the rules for now,” she got up to wash her plate.

Twilight looked at Tailmon in a funny way, “you don’t seem to be that bad when you’re like this Tailmon,” she changed to a sad smile, “why do you hate us so much?”

Tailmon didn’t expect that question to rise up so quickly, but it made her think, why does she hate them so much?

“You remind me of something I had to forget a long time ago.”

“What is that?”

Having finished her task of washing the dishes, Tailmon turned to look at Twilight narrowing her eyes, “that’s not something you deserve to know, now if you want to learn anything, you better take care of what you ask from now on, because if I get annoyed, I will not hesitate in beating you up.”

Twilight gulped nervously, “o-ok I’ll be more careful.”

Tailmon snickered, “relax, Purple. If it counts for anything, you’re the less likely to piss me off out of the group I fought before,” she waved a paw dismissively.

“Huh? Why is that?”

“You seem to be the less annoying of the bunch, I can’t speak for yellow and white, but the others are just plain annoying, besides you are smart for horse standards, so if I’m ever having a decent conversation with anyone here, it will probably be with you.”

“Jeez thanks,” sarcasm was very clear on Twilight’s voice.

“You’re welcome, but Purple, why are wasting time instead of asking what you want to learn? I already accepted but you didn’t ask anything yet.”

Twilight thought about it and formulated an appropriate answer, “it is because I wanted a more relaxed ambience for the two of us, and if there were tension present it would be hard to talk properly.”

Tailmon nodded in agreement, “good point now shot those questions.”

Twilight started to feel comfortable around Tailmon, this was a side of her that she didn’t knew existed, but before she could speak the front door opened and crying was heard.

The two of them looked at each other with confusion and left their seats to investigate what happened.

Getting to the front door they found…

“Gray/Derpy?” the two of them said at once.

There was Derpy in her uniform, it was all dirty with dust and she had bruises in various areas, she was crying a lot, “I’m sorry Kitty!” she managed to say between sobs.

This surprised Tailmon some, “why? What happened to you?”

“I-I was doing my route, and then somepony started saying mean stuff about you, I wanted them to stop,” Derpy let out another sob, “we started yelling a-and then we got in a little fight, and and…” the distress she was on right now was quite heartbreaking.

Twilight spoke in a soothing voice, “and then what happened? Did they do something else to you?”

“They broke the lunch Kitty made for me!” Derpy wailed.

Tailmon was a little disappointed, “you shouldn’t have done that Gray, you know I don’t care what those losers say about me, as for the lunch I can still make more of them don’t be sad for it.”

“But it was the first thing you gave me! I really wanted to taste it! It was the first gift I got from a friend!” Derpy yelled at the top of her lungs, taking the two of them by surprise.

“Y-you see me as a friend?” Tailmon asked totally taken aback from Derpy’s outburst.

Between whimpers Derpy managed to say, “of course I do… that’s why I wanted them to stop being mean to you… but they got angry and attacked me…”

Tailmon was gaping with an unreadable expression on her face; it slowly changed to her closing her eyes as a small smile appeared on her.

‘Is she smiling?’ Twilight thought as she saw the scene play out.

Surprising everypony, Tailmon beamed at Derpy and started to clean Derpy’s tears with a tissue she had in her paw.

“You got hurt because of me…” Tailmon hesitated, “I’m sorry Derpy.”

“Kitty…” Derpy wanted to say more but Tailmon shushed her.

“No, no. I’m Tailmon, nice to meet you,” she still smiled but a frown formed on her eyebrows, “who did this to you?”

“It was Rainbow Dash…” Derpy said with a calmer tone of voice, she felt more relaxed now.

Twilight was shocked and Tailmon well she just smiled sweetly.

“Derpy, please wait for me here, rest a little. I’ll make you something to eat when I come back, ok?” 

“Where are you going?” Derpy asked curiously.

“I have a little something I have to do, I won’t take long.”

With that said Tailmon made her way out the house, Twilight hurried after her and closed the door.

“What are you planning on doing Tailmon?”

Tailmon was resting a paw in one of the wood pieces of the fence that was around the house and was looking at the ground with her back towards Twilight.

“You heard her, she got hurt because of me, I tried to pry her off so she would hate me as well, but instead she grew to like me, even after all that and the first time she tries something for me… someone attacks her for it.”

Twilight felt the intensity behind Tailmon’s words; she saw the paw resting on the fence twitching slightly. 

Seconds after the piece of wood snapped under the pressure.

Tailmon sighed, freeing a big part of her stress, “what was your name again?”

Twilight lifted an eyebrow, “Twilight, Twilight Sparkle, why?”

“Take care of her in my absence Twilight, I have to find blue.”

Twilight was worried that Tailmon would do something terrible to Rainbow, “I know you’re angry with her, but be reasonable please!”

Tailmon looked back at Twilight with an unnerving stare, “But Twilight, I’m not angry…” she paused for a bit, “I’m just going hunting,” and then she became a blur disappearing from there.

Twilight just stared at the empty space where Tailmon was, ‘I can’t intervene after getting to her good side, if I do, Tailmon probably will feel betrayed and will hate ponykind even more. Rainbow, why did you had to do this!?’ with frustration ruling her thoughts, Twilight made the decision of taking care of Derpy, she was the real victim here.
> 5: You're such a moron.
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Tailmon speeded through Ponyville in search for Rainbow Dash, her eyes darting left and right, covering every inch of space on her way to find the idiotic horse that dared to hurt Derpy.

She didn’t went livid about it, but she was highly disappointed on herself for letting this happen, if only she would have figure it out sooner, she probably could have prevented it from even happening in the first place.

But then again, she didn’t expect Rainbow of all the ponies to be the one the mess it up, Tailmon thought that the punishment she applied to her during their battle was enough to keep the annoying pegasus at bay.

The ponies around the area looked away when they crossed stares with her, all of them tried their best to ignore the annoyed digi-cat. Some of them even ran away after seeing her.

Turning a corner she caught a glimpse of Rainbow in the distance and fixed her eyes on her.

“Blue!!!” 

That shout was one of the loudest the ponies have heard, it wasn’t Princess Luna level of loud, but it was pretty loud.

The prismatic mare came to a dead stop and turned her head to look back, to see the cat that she wanted to screw over running at her in the distance.

It wasn’t surprising to see her making a beeline at full speed without caring for anything or anypony that was in her way just to get the hay out of there as soon as possible.

“Yes Blue, run away. Make it interesting for me.”

Zooming out after the scared mare, Tailmon had to go through a group of foals that were playing with a ball, this gave her an idea.

“Hey kid, pass!” 

The colt unconsciously followed the order, throwing the ball just in Tailmon’s way; she stopped briefly in front of the ball with her right leg lifted high up. The wind up for the kick gave the ball an absurd amount of momentum, which closed the gap between the object and Rainbow Dash, it soon after hitting its target on the back of the head sending her spiraling down to the ground behind some houses. The angle in which the ball hit Rainbow send it back to where Tailmon was, she caught it in her paws and returned it to the foals.

“Thank you!”

The colt from before caught the ball and the group got together with excited looks, they waved at Tailmon happily while the adults looked in terror at what happened.





Rainbow was fortunate to drop over some bushes which cushioned her fall, she was still dazed by the hit she received, but recovered enough to start walking. 

“That darn cat.”

But almost immediately she heard a voice saying, “You called?”

A chilling sensation went down her spine, she knew quite well who that was, she didn’t dare to look off the ground, afraid of getting face to face with the one she tried to mess with from the sidelines.

“What’s wrong? Don’t you know how to greet an old pal?”

Rainbow was scared, even if she was ready to mess Tailmon’s quest, she knew very well that she cannot take on Tailmon on a fight, their skills were on completely different levels. 

She heard Tailmon getting closer, she didn’t know what the cat was planning, but it couldn’t be good, a question crossed her mind, ‘why is she chasing me all of a sudden?’ the situation with Derpy earlier flashed on her mind as well, her eyes shrunk at the revelation, ‘is she after me for fighting Derpy?’ 

Her answer was obvious when she looked up and saw Tailmon sneering at her. 

Tailmon’s intense stare didn’t change but a smirk crept its way to her face, “you think you are clever don’t you?” she took a step closer, “you think you can do whatever you want as long as I’m not there to see it, right?” another step, “well, let me tell you something Blue,” she stopped in front of Rainbow, “is not a good idea to mess with my friends behind my back, because when I get to know what happened…” she closed her paw with force, “I get mad.”





Meanwhile in Derpy’s house, Twilight was helping Derpy with her uniform folding it neatly with her magic, she would have to wash it later but for now this would suffice. 

As she told Derpy to take a bath to clean the dirt in her fur, she couldn’t take her mind off the fact that Tailmon was most likely already with Rainbow. She shivered at the mere thought of what the digi-cat would do to her friend for hurting Derpy.

Twilight had to think of a solution, she was sure Tailmon wouldn’t go as far as to try to kill Rainbow, but if somehow she gets more enraged, that possibility is not that far off.

She thought and thought, but she didn’t have that much influence in Tailmon to do anything, she just got to her good side just enough for her to ask a favor out of Twilight, but that was it.

It wasn’t until she saw Derpy again that an idea came to her, ‘maybe she can do it?’

“Derpy”

Derpy was drying her mane with a towel as Twilight called for her, “Yes, Twilight?”

Twilight didn’t want to involve Derpy on this, but it was the only chance, “I know I’m supposed to help you until Tailmon gets back, but I need to ask you a favor.” 

Derpy tilted her head in confusion, but smiled at her nonetheless, “sure thing! What do you need?”

Twilight gave her a grateful nod, “come with me, we need to find Tailmon.”

“Huh, but Kitty said she wouldn’t take long, do you know what is she doing, Twilight?”

Twilight felt bad for saying this to Derpy, since she became Tailmon’s first friend just a little back ago, “she went to fight Rainbow, she was mad for what Rainbow did to you. I’m sure she found her by now and it is most likely that a fight has begun.”

Derpy stared in silence for a bit. Then she giggled some, “she wouldn’t do that, Twilight.” 

Her giggling started to fade, as a sad frown took over.

Twilight could only look sympathetically, “Derpy… I know it’s hard to believe for you, but…”

Derpy stopped giggling, “She feels so alone… like me. I don’t want to think she would hurt somepony.”

Twilight put a reassuring hoof on Derpy’s withers, “I know how you feel, but this time she’s just reacting because Rainbow hurt you, I think if we go find her you can stop her from being aggressive, I believe she will listen to you.”

Derpy was hesitant “Do you think so?”

Twilight nodded with a smile, “she considers you a friend, Derpy. You saw her smile when she spoke to you before leaving? She likes you, Derpy.”

Derpy remembered that moment, how nice and caring Tailmon looked for that brief moment. Derpy wanted to keep seeing that side of Tailmon; she didn’t wanted anypony to get hurt for her. She just wanted everypony to be nice with each other.

She wasn’t sure if she could convince Tailmon, but she made her mind to go and try to stop her. She put up a brave face, which was still adorable and went out of the house to look for Tailmon.

Twilight followed suit, “Wait for me, Derpy!”





Rainbow dodged a blow to the face by jumping backwards.

Pursuing her was Tailmon, “come on Blue, this is what you wanted isn’t?”

Rainbow tried to keep the distance, “I want you to disappear! That’s what I want!”

Tailmon managed to catch her by the tail, pulling she made Rainbow get momentum in her direction where her muzzle connected with patiently waiting paw.

Rainbow got sent rolling backwards by the hit; she stopped by crashing with a tree.

Her consciousness almost faded away, but she resisted it, she shook her head a few times, ‘I’m sick of being afraid of this cat, if things came to this…’

Tailmon lifted an eyebrow at the struggling pegasus, “are you really going to confront me, Blue? Look, I don’t know what stupid reasons you had in your underdeveloped brain to do what you did; maybe you’re just that stupid, but if stay far from mine and Derpy’s way, I’ll be willing to let you go if you can follow that simple order.”

Rainbow felt something strange from that, “what are you trying to pull now? I know you’re just using Derpy to fulfill your own goal.”

Tailmon huffed at her, “believe what you want, Blue. But I’m giving you a chance to go away here with what you received so far, take the chance and thank me for my generosity.”

Rainbow eyed the cat with caution, “yeah, right. You think I’ll believe something like you? Not happening, I’ll do whatever it takes to not let you complete what you are trying to do, Kona made a mistake by forgiving you but I can’t blame her since it was Rinna’s wish.”

Tailmon was getting annoyed and was reconsidering her previous offer, “you better watch what you say and just go away now Blue.”

Rainbow still didn’t let her guard down, “ha! That won’t work on me.”

Tailmon rolled her eyes.

“Tailmon/Kitty!” the voices of Twilight and Derpy were heard and soon after came into sight from the trees.

Tailmon was surprised to see them there, “what are you two doing here?”

Derpy got closer and held Tailmon’s paws in her hooves and looked at her with worry, “Kitty, please don’t hurt Rainbow Dash, she did attack me but… I don’t want you to get more hate because of me Kitty.”

Tailmon smiled at her, “Don’t worry Derpy, I’m not going to hurt her further, I already did enough. The story would’ve been different if you were seriously harmed, but you just had some light bruises on you. I mean I thought about punishing her harder, but you wouldn’t have liked that.”

Derpy returned the smile and hugged Tailmon.

Tailmon sighed, “You really like hugs don’t you?”

“Uh huh!”

Twilight went to check on Rainbow, “are you ok Rainbow?”

Rainbow wasn’t happy, “Darn good plan to bring Derpy here Twi, now that cat is going to use her as a hostage!”

Twilight didn’t know what to think about that statement, “What are you talking about Rainbow? Tailmon is not going to do that.”

“We can’t trust that cat Twilight!”

Rainbow prepared to dash off, “I’m going to save her!”

“Rainbow no!”

As Rainbow took off, Tailmon stepped in front of Derpy protectively, but Twilight managed to use her magic to stop her friend before she made contact.

Rainbow struggled inside the magic containing her, “Twilight what are you doing!? Let me go!”

Twilight dragged Rainbow closer to her, “Rainbow, calm down.”

Tailmon softened her posture, “you should listen to her, Blue.” She narrowed her eyes when she saw Rainbow’s hind leg twitching.

In a desperate attempt Rainbow tried to kick Twilight’s horn while she was distracted to free herself. 

But her hoof didn't connect with Twilight, it connected with something softer.

Tailmon blocked her kick, “jerk move, Blue. Jerk move.”

With a potent and precise chop hit in the back of the head, Rainbow was out cold.

Twilight was quite shocked, “w-why would she do that?”

“She’s not ok in the head.”

Derpy joined too, “Kitty… that’s mean.”

Tailmon sighed, “Derpy, I’m not gonna repeat myself at this point, I made clear what I’am before.”

“But can’t you be a little nicer?” Derpy begged with puppy dog eyes.

“Nope, unless I have a reason to change my attitude with someone, I will not be any other way with them.”

Twilight shrugged, “I’d say it’s an improvement, over how she was before. At least she didn’t break Rainbow’s wing again.”

Derpy didn’t know if she heard Twilight correctly, “wait, what was that?”

“Twilight,” Tailmon called getting her attention and frowned at her, “shut up.”

Twilight smiled sheepishly, “sorry.”

“Don’t worry, just be careful,” Tailmon then pointed at the unconscious body of Rainbow, “What do we do with this one though?”

“Can you help me carry her to my castle, Tailmon?” 

Tailmon eyed her suspiciously, “why do you want me to carry her, when you can just teleport with her there?”

“I just want to have a nice chat meanwhile, is that too much to ask?” Twilight said with an almost legitimate sad expression.

“You’re a terrible actress Twilight.”

Twilight threw a hoof forward in offense, “Oh come on, give me some credit at least.”

“Nope,” Tailmon replied making Derpy giggle.

“I’m sorry, I shouldn’t laugh but I feel so happy right now,” Derpy explained.

The other two changed knowing looks.

Tailmon then picked up Rainbow on her back, because of her size it looked quite uncomfortable, “Well, let’s get going anyway. But I won’t be responsible for any issues that this will produce.”

Twilight got confused by that statement, “what issues are you talking about?”

Tailmon deadpanned, “Twilight, you are smart I admit but… you also are such a moron.” Then she started to go in the direction of the castle, Derpy following behind with a happy smile.

Twilight poofed her cheeks at Tailmon because she didn’t understood why the cat said that just know, even if it was quite obvious and just for that she deserved to be called a moron.
> 6: I want to trust you
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Tailmon begrudgingly carried Rainbow on her back as they were walking towards Twilight’s castle, she was feeling this way not for carrying Rainbow or by the whispers of the ponies around or because Rainbow was nibbling on her ear and almost strangling her by hugging her neck.

No, she was annoyed for a different reason.

“Derpy, can you please get off!?”

Just as Rainbow was on Tailmon’s back, Derpy was on Rainbow’s back giving Tailmon a bigger load to carry, “But Kitty… I’m so comfy here.”

“I don’t care, just get off. I’m feeling really weird already by having this thing nibbling on my ear.”

Twilight giggled, “Oh come on, Tailmon. Don’t you think is cute? She’s looks so peaceful on your back."

Tailmon glared sideway towards Twilight, “don’t push it, Twilight. Or do you want to end up the same way, perhaps?”

Twilight put a hoof up defensively, “I said nothing.”

“Yes, that’s what I thought.”

Tailmon then glared at the ponies around, all of them freezing in place and not daring to move a muscle.

She smirked, “Well, at least they know their place in the food chain.”

Derpy sighed, “Kitty… that’s…”

“That’s mean?” Tailmon intersected.

“Yes, that. Can you…”

Tailmon cut her off again, “nope, now get down.”

“But I don’t wanna!” Derpy whined.

“Twilight,” Tailmon called without looking at her, “could you be so gentle…”

“Sure, but you better tell me some things when we get to the castle.”

“Sure, sure, but remember that I’m free to ignore any out of boundaries questions.”

Twilight seemed to accept the deal, “fair enough,” then she levitated Derpy out of Rainbow’s back and put her back on her hooves on the dirt path.

Derpy was not happy with that, “aww… you meanie…” but didn’t complain much after that and walked at Tailmon’s side.

Both of them exchanged smiles, they knew too well this was just another friendly quirk of their relationship.

Twilight didn’t get it though, “why do you keep doing that?”

Then Derpy and Tailmon said in unison, “Because we’re friends.”

The rest of the walk was used for random chattering, stating the obvious and more trolling by Tailmon.





They left Rainbow in one of the rooms after prying her off of Tailmon’s back with some difficulty since she didn’t want to let go for some reason.

Tailmon massaged her aching neck, “for wanting me to disappear she sure was adamant in not letting me go.”

“Who knows, maybe she actually likes you,” Twilight joked.

Tailmon rolled her, “Your jokes are terrible too Twilight.”

But Twilight just waved a hoof dismissively, “I’ll let it slide for now, since you promised me to tell what I wanted.”

“Let me make some lunch for Derpy again and we can do that, can I use your kitchen?”

“Sure, but you don’t have to do that, I can always ask Spike to make something quick for us.”

But Tailmon refused by shaking her head, “You don’t get it Twilight.”

Twilight was confused, “Get what?”

Tailmon let out a light laugh. Then looked at her, “what it is to be my friend,” she looked at Derpy who was sitting some feet away staring at the decorations, “come on, Derpy! I’m going to make you something yummy!” she said enthusiastically.

Derpy’s eyes lit up, “Yay!”

The two then walked off the room and in direction of the kitchen.

Then Twilight noticed something, “Hey! How do you know where my kitchen is!?” she followed them.





Half an hour later.

The group was in the library, Tailmon sat in one of tables in front of Twilight.

Derpy was at Tailmon’s side happily eating a Russian salad; she was full of glee, “Thish ish sho good!”

Tailmon smacked her in the forehead lightly. 

“Ouchie…” Derpy rubbed the area with her hooves.

“Don’t speak with your mouth full you dummy.”

Now this got Twilight curious, “hey, can I…” she didn’t even finished the sentence as she tried to levitate the fork with some of the salad on it in her direction.

Tailmon stood on the table, “I’ll be taking this, yoink!” she snatched the fork out of the magic.

“Hey! I just wanted a little taste,” Twilight protested.

Tailmon gave the fork back to Derpy and crossed her front legs, “You didn’t even asked, I never thought royalty would be so unrefined.”

“I was about to, but you interrupted me!”

“Oh right, I should have waited until you stuffed your face with it, how rude of me.”

Twilight frowned, Tailmon stared boringly and Derpy kept eating her meal. 

Twilight groaned, “Alright, I’m sorry. Can we please go on with the plan?”

“Finally,” Tailmon sat on her chair again, “well, what do you want to know?”

Twilight cleared her throat, “Well, let’s start with, what are you Tailmon?”

“A Digimon.” That was the only thing Tailmon said.

An awkward staring contest took place for a moment.

Until Twilight decided to speak again, “emm… do you mind elaborating?”

Tailmon sighed, “The complete term would be Digital Monster. We are creatures from the Digital World, we share almost all the same base characteristics with any other being of any other world, the only difference being that our bodies are not made of flesh like yours, instead ours are made of data.”

“Data? What do you mean by data?”

Tailmon poked her chin with a claw, “basically, data is just a big binary code that defines our appearance and abilities. The entire Digital World is made of data as well, changing anything in the line of code would transform a Digimon or any object in the Digital World quite drastically depending on how much the code changed, fortunately every being capable of modifying the code has been dealt with at their due time.”

“Does that mean if anypony discovers how to change the code they could even be able to create other Digimons?”

“In theory yes, but only the gods can create totally functional Digimon.”

This got Twilight confused, “What do you mean?”

Tailmon took a napkin and wiped Derpy’s messy face before continuing, “Non godly beings tried to create Digimon before, but those ended up being soulless puppets, since they weren’t created properly, most of these created Digimon end up as corrupted counterparts of other Digimon generally adopting a black coloration, those who don’t lose their essence become evil instead. Digimon who are affected by a virus could also end up converting into corrupted Digimon if they don’t get treated.”

“What reasons did those individuals had to create Digimon?”

Tailmon snorted, “what else would it be, Twilight? For war, of course.”

“War?” Twilight got a little worried.

Tailmon nodded, “they tried taking over the Digi-World, hordes of corrupted Digimon would invade territory upon territory to eliminate any possible threat. Those who weren’t wiped out would be infected by the virus and become corrupted or simply pass away depending on their level of resistance to it.”

Twilight stared in shock, “How horrible…” 

Tailmon took a glance at her gloved paws with a sad expression, “yes…”

Twilight was a little afraid of the next question, “h-how many Digimon were cured?”

Tailmon closed her eyes as if deep in concentration, “there was only one case of partial recovery from the virus, at least from the area I used to live in, I was never told about how the other areas fared with it.”

“I-I’m sorry.”

Tailmon shook her head with a melancholic smile, “don’t be, war is cruel, that’s a fact. My village was very small and I was the only champion level Digimon on it, which in consequence made us an easy target for the attacks.”

Twilight felt in some capacity the sorrow in Tailmon’s words, this made her think of a terrible possibility, “Tailmon… is your village ok?”

Tailmon’s expression became somber, “My village is no more Twilight, as far as I know only a couple of Nyaromon from my village survived, and only because the forces of Álfheimr happened to pass by that area.”

“Does that mean…”

Tailmon nodded slowly, “if it weren’t for Konata and Rinna-sama’s mother the entirety of my village would’ve been wiped out completely and…” she looked down to her paws, “I wouldn’t be here now.”

Derpy hugged her supportingly, but said nothing. 

Tailmon closed her eyes as she put a paw on Derpy’s embracing leg, “thank you, Derpy.” She looked at Twilight, “can… can we change the subject?”

Twilight was taken aback; it’s the first time she saw Tailmon in a vulnerable state, “of course.”

Tailmon nodded thankfully.

Her mind then drifted to another detail, “alright, you mentioned you are a champion level Digimon, what does that mean?”

Letting out a stressed sigh Tailmon calmed down, “ok, champion level refers to the adult stage in a Digimon’s evolutionary status.”

“Oh! What are the other levels called?”

Tailmon thought about the best way to explain it, “well, I think I should start from the start, every Digimon starts off as a DigiEgg, after hatching we enter our first baby stage which is almost identical for most Digimon since we are little blobs, some with ears, some with different coloration, but essentially the same. After some time we evolve into a second baby stage, which shows some traits of our next stages, some grow limbs, legs, tails teeth, etc, but nothing notable.”

“Why is it called evolution and not simply growing?”

Tailmon held a claw up, “because this change is not periodical, it is sudden. A Digimon will stay with their predefined appearance until they evolve, at that moment their appearance changes directly to the one of their evolved state, there is no in between transition in this situation.”

“So, that means that a Digimon in their first baby stage will just jump to the appearance of it next stage upon evolution?”

Tailmon nodded, “exactly, but we don’t really consider the first baby form as a form so to speak, because we expend so little time on it, that’s why the second baby form is just referred as baby form not counting the previous one.”

Twilight processed the information and nodded, “alright, got it. What are the other forms?”

Derpy rested her head on Tailmon’s legs, the latter caressing her mane gently.

“Our next forms are called Child or Rookie stage, we get to this form after getting stronger by any means, on this stage we have more defined appearances with fully developed limps, our height on this stage depends of our species, but we usually aren’t too tall at this point.”

Derpy let out contented sighs from the attention; then Tailmon continued, “The next evolutionary stage is the one I’m in, Adult or Champion level, after getting strong enough; we get taller depending again on our species. Rookies can achieve this form, at first they will not be able to stay on it, but with perseverance any Digimon can stay as a champion level, this applies to the next stages as well.”

Twilight raised an eyebrow, “are there levels above Adult level?”

Tailmon nodded, “indeed, there are two other levels above Adult/Champion level, Ultimate and Mega level. The height of Ultimate and Mega levels can either increase or decrease, as their power further increases.”

“What? Are you saying that an Ultimate or Mega can be smaller than a Champion level?”

Tailmon laughed a little, “Don’t think too much into it, even I don’t know exactly how that works. But it’s something that happens to Digimons.”

Twilight accepted that explanation with a nod, “I see.”

“Well, is there anything else you want to know?”

Twilight thought about it, “I don’t think so, I would ask about the virus you mentioned before, but I believe that would be a bad idea.”

Tailmon shook her head while giving an empty smile, “It’s ok Twilight, this is something I’ll have to bring it up at some point, so it’s better if I do it now and get it out of my system.”

With closed eyes, Tailmon took out her gloves and showed the back of her bare paws to Twilight.

Twilight’s eyes got wide and gasped, there were big nasty scars on Tailmon’s paws, “Tailmon… were you…”

Tailmon nodded with a serious expression, “I was badly hurt; these scars remind me that every world just wants to manipulate others for self gain.”

Twilight was about to say something but Tailmon beat her to it.

“I know I’m generalizing, but no matter where I was, the same story repeated itself. A group would find something new and will try to take advantage of it to fulfill their selfish ambitions; the only group that didn’t do this was Rinna-sama, her family and those close to them. I think you now figure out why I was so wary of you guys.”

Twilight understood her reasoning, but there was one last thing she didn’t quite get yet, “I see, but why did you ally with Kurumi, Tailmon?”

Tailmon looked away, “for a time, she was on the good side with them as well,” she said getting a shocked look from Twilight, “yes I wouldn’t believe it either if I were you, but she was. At some point she was acting off and I confronted her, she told me that she was a spy for another faction, she told me that if Rinna-sama stayed with them, one day she would get used just like it happened so many times before and that she would be safer with that other faction.”

Ashamed Tailmon looked down, and chuckled dryly, “I was so naïve back then, just like you ponies. I let her manipulate me, to fight against those who I respected, I feel so stupid…”

Twilight was panicking a little, not knowing what to do, “d-don’t be so hard on yourself.”

“Maybe the virus residue on me pushed me to go the evil side… after all my corruption never healed fully.”

“You’re a corrupted Digimon!?”

“Partially, you see these patches of black fur on my ears and tail?” she asked getting a nod from Twilight, “these are supposed to be purple, my eyes were supposed to be blue, and my gloves supposed to be yellow with purple stripes, all of these are the effects of my corruption. Their method only stopped the corruption; they told me that if they were to find me earlier they could have been able to cure me totally.”

“At some point they said they wanted to try something experimental, to try and get me back to normal, I refused since I know that once the virus settles it cannot be removed. I could’ve tried but I also decided to wear this corruption as a mark of my weakness.”

“Weakness?”

“I was weak; my village got destroyed because I couldn’t protect it.” Tailmon lay on her chair looking at the ceiling.

“Don’t blame yourself, it wasn’t something you could control, Tailmon,” Twilight tried to reassure her.

Tailmon smiled without averting her gaze from the ceiling, “You’re a good pony Twilight, I’m sorry by the way I treated you in the past. Maybe I was wrong about all of you, but I still have this voice in the back of my head that tells me one of you is not to be trusted, maybe it’s the corruption on me but I can’t help but trust it.”

Twilight smiled with empathy, “don’t worry Tailmon, I’ll help you in any way I can, you’ll see that all of us have good intentions, maybe some will take longer to trust you, like Rainbow or Applejack. But I’m sure they will warm up to you in the long run when they get to know you like this.”

“Maybe you’re right, but I won’t hold it against them if they decide to keep that hate for what I did.”

They stayed in silence for some minutes just relaxing, Twilight even asked Spike to make some tea for them.

After about twenty minutes of thinking about everything they spoke before, something clicked in her mind, “Taillmon.”

“Hmm?” Tailmon replied half asleep.

“You told me before that I had to be careful about what I ask, but you told some quite personal things about you…”

Tailmon kept her eyes closed, “because I want to trust you, Twilight. If I never let my guard down I could hurt someone important to me,” she stroke Derpy’s mane, the mare happily sleeping on her lap.

“You want to trust me?”

She gave a bittersweet smile, “Yes, I even want to trust Blue, she reminds me of myself from a long time ago, I would get mad if things didn’t go my way and even hurt others out of frustration. As you probably figure it out, I’m also quite protective of those who I hold dear, I know I said I held back because Derpy wasn’t really that hurt, but I fought against myself to not beat Blue up even more. She being annoying didn’t help much.” 

Twilight giggled awkwardly, “well, she can be quite impulsive sometimes, I’m just glad you didn’t hurt her badly.”

“Don’t mention it; I will not hurt her as long as she doesn’t repeat this again.”





Hours have passed since they started talking, and it was almost evening already. Tailmon didn’t want to wake up Derpy, so she carried her home, Twilight waved them good bye.

“She’s not that bad, don’t you think so Rainbow?” Twilight asked to the pony at the door.

“Shut up, Twi. I still don’t trust her.”

“But she wants to trust you; at least she’s making an effort Rainbow. The least you can do is consider it.”

Rainbow averted her stare from Twilight, “you guys are not being fair…”

“Her entire village was massacred Rainbow, she was infected by a horrible virus, and had to see the same situation happening over and over. Sure her past doesn’t change what she did to us, but we don’t know how she feels with that trauma present on her mind.”

Rainbow got out of the castle and went to Twilight’s side, “I don’t know Twilight…”

“Rainbow, you know that it’s not her fault that Konata and Rinna had to go back to their world. She protected me Rainbow, and even when she complained a little, she still carried you here. Look Rainbow, we can become Tailmon’s friends, but only if she’s shown compassion and kindness, and with time she will show us the same in return.”

Rainbow seemed conflicted and without another word she flew away to her house.

In the distance the watcher sat in a tree branch big enough to support her, “Tailmon is progressing, I was worried with that confrontation and that I had to intervene, but the some of the locals fortunately were able to get her to stop. I’m surprised she’s opening up to them, it will be interesting to see her development here,” satisfied she closed the notebook and went away.
> 7: Bad omen.
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The next morning was mostly uneventful, Tailmon had to clean and make breakfast for both of them, also had to wake Derpy up for work since she overslept.

“Hurry up Derpy, you’re going to be late for work,” Tailmon called from downstairs.

“Coming!” Derpy flied down the stairs, but a bad movement made her loss control and was about to crash onto the window.

Rolling her eyes Tailmon jumped to catch her and put her on the floor.

“Hehe… thanks Kitty,” Derpy said sheepishly.

“You have to be more careful you doofus,” Tailmon then checked her out, and shook her head disapprovingly.

“What?”

Tailmon deadpanned, “come with me, you’re such a mess.”

Derpy followed without complain, she trusted Tailmon more than anypony else at this point, after hearing about her past she understood her a little better and why she’s so mean sometimes. But that doesn’t change how well Tailmon treats her right now.

They went to Derpy’s room.

“Your tie is wrong,” Tailmon fixed Derpy’s tie, then took her hat off, “your mane is all over the place,” Tailmon got a brush and comb Derpy’s mane, “you’ve to learn to take care of yourself better Derpy.”

“I’ll try, but I don’t worry that much about it Kitty,” Derpy was brimming with optimism.

Tailmon raised an eye brow, “And that is because?” 

Derpy beams at her, “because you are here to help me.”

Tailmon stopped briefly, fortunately she was combing Derpy’s mane from behind so she couldn’t see her happy smiling face right now, “heh, you’re such a silly pony sometimes.”

Short after Tailmon finally was done combing Derpy’s mane, “alright, soft and smooth,” she then gave Derpy her hat back.

“Thank you Kitty,” Derpy gave Tailmon a hug.

Tailmon patted her on the back a few times, “ok, ok. Go before it gets even later, I’ll wash your other uniform just in case something happens to this one.”

Derpy let go, “I’ll see you later Kitty.”

“Your lunch is in the corner, don’t forget it,” Taimon reminded her.

“Ok!” Derpy said as she went downstairs.

Tailmon went to fetch the other uniform; she let out a chuckle, ‘I wonder what else is going to happen around here, sure Blue messed up but it hasn’t been all that bad really, Twilight is good company for a relaxing chat.’ 

Tailmon then started her chores with a happy song in her heart.





Twilight and Applejack were walking in the middle of town towards Derpy’s house.

Applejack looked a little skeptic, “Ah’m not sure about this Twilight, are ya sure she’s ta be trusted?”

“I know how you feel Applejack, I was worried as well when I invited her to have a talk, but she proved to me that she can behave nicely, she just needs a chance to do it,” Twilight reassured.

Applejack still wasn’t convinced, she sighed, “Ah’ just hope nothing goes bad with this.”

After several minutes they got to their destination and saw Tailmon removing the leaves from the lawn.

Applejack looked warily at her.

Meanwhile Twilight called her out, “Tailmon!” she waved at her.

Tailmon perked up, waved back and opened the door of the fixed fence, “Good morning Twilight, what brings you here today?” then focused on Applejack, “Oh, hello there Orange.”

“Howdy…” Applejack greeted with not so much enthusiasm.

Twilight glanced at her briefly before focusing on Tailmon, she smiled, “good morning Tailmon, today I’m just accompanying Applejack. She has something for you.”

“What is it?” looking at Applejack Tailmon asked with curiosity.

Applejack averted her gaze, “Ah’m not so sure of this anymore…”

Twilight put a reassuring hoof on Applejack’s withers, “come on now Applejack, we talked about this, everypony deserves a chance.”

Applejack looked troubled but with a sigh that calmed her down she took a piece of paper from her hat, “Ah’ have a request fer ya, since ya were so kind ta leave Big Mac with a cast on two legs, we’ve been getting behind schedule with ta harvest of apples.”

Tailmon reached for the paper, when her claw made contact she noticed the subtle change on Applejack’s behavior, her stare turned harsher and her eyes squinting slightly giving her a sharper look.

Tailmon read the short request, then folded the paper neatly and gave it back, “so, you want me to go fetch apples at your orchard?”

Applejack took the paper kind of forcefully, “that’s it, will ya accept?”

Tailmon shrugged, “sure, why not? I’ve cleaned the house already I just need to go buy some stuff for dinner.”

Twilight intervened, “I’ll take care of that Tailmon, you go with Applejack.”

“Are you sure?” Tailmon asked and Twilight nodded, “alright, here’s the list let me go get the bits.”

“Don’t worry about that Tailmon, I’ll pay for it, it’s the least I can do after I made you remember all those memories yesterday,” Twilight offered.

“Ok then, if it makes you feel better then do it your way,” Tailmon then looked at Applejack, “lead the way Orange.”

Applejack said nothing and tipped her hat to cast a shadow over her eyes.

“Have fun you two!” Twilight waved happily to them.





The way towards Sweet Apple Acres was quite silent, in fact it was very silent; the awkwardness could be cut with a knife from how thick it was. 

Tailmon was ok with that; after all she understood that Applejack was still bitter by the whole beating her and her brother up to a pulp.

She just followed the country pony as rows and rows of apple trees covered the entire left side of the road. Soon after they arrived to the big red barn.

“Wait here, Ah’ve ta check something,” Applejack said without waiting for an answer as she went inside.

Tailmon respecting Aj’s personal space shrugged and sat on the steps of the porch and rested her chin on her paws.

Shortly after she heard some growling behind her, confused she turned to a see a dog, a collie to be more specific, showing its teeth to her and as said before growling.

Tailmon ignore it but then it started barking, her very sharp sense of hearing wasn’t charmed by this ever increasing noise.

“Shut up…” Tailmon said in a calmed voice, but the dog didn’t stop.

“Shut up,” still kept barking.

Applejack was looking through the behind the curtains of the front window. She stood there as if waiting for something in particular to happen.

Tailmon got up; her tail whipping from side to side in an energetic way, her claws twitched ever so slightly and looked back without turning her body to look at the dog which flinched and whimpered in response. 

That moment seemed to last for longer than it really was, the sense of tension grew up and Applejack was about to jump outside in case Tailmon were to attack Winona. 

But… that didn’t happen, Tailmon just walked towards the orchard and blended between the trees to stay out of sight.

Applejack got out of the house, looking rather surprised, she was seriously expecting Tailmon to go and attack them. Even after Twilight’s reassuring she didn’t quite trust Tailmon yet.

“Winona, go play with Applebloom,” Applejack ordered.

Winona waving her tail happily barked once and went away.





Applejack looked around the orchard in search for Tailmon, but wasn’t able to locate her.

“Now where did that little rascal go now?” Applejack went deeper into the orchard looking carefully but still didn’t found the digital cat. “Hey! Where are ya! Hey!” she called for her but… “gosh darn it, Ah can’t remember ta name.”

She was getting nervous, what if the cat went against Applebloom, Big Mac or even Granny Smith? What if she tricked Twilight into believing her so she could get away with some things? Her mind was playing more and more scenarios in her head.

“Ah’ swear ta Celestia if she does…” Applejack started but got cut off.

“If I do what,” Tailmon jumped down from one of the trees and landed in front of Applejack.

Applejack jumped back in surprise.

“Well? What do you think I’ll do?” Tailmon said in a relaxed and calm tone, “attack you? Your dog? Your family? What is it Orange?”

Tailmon’s unexpressive and calm stare was unnerving to her, it made her remember that same look she had in the past battle, “Eeeh… well, Ah’…” she was sweating while backing away slowly at the same time as Tailmon advanced towards her.

This awkward little chase kept going until Applejack rear collided with a tree not leaving her any more space to retreat at which she just shrunk to the ground.

“What’s wrong, Orange? Are you afraid of little old me?” Tailmon giggled, “Aren’t you a cutie? You ponies really want to make me go d’aww with your scared faces,” then she reached for Applejack with a paw.

By instinct Applejack closed her eyes believing the cat will do something to her, but she felt her hat being removed and soon after her mane was being ruffled, this unexpected attention made her open her eyes.

“Uuuh… what are ya doing?” 

“Petting you of course,” Tailmon happily replied.

“Why?” 

“Why not, would you rather have me being a savage? I don’t work that way girl, now tell me how does all this business with the apples needs to be done so we can start,” Tailmon put Applejack’s hat back on her head but very tilted down so she couldn’t see.

Applejack tilted it up to see again, “Ah’ don’t why ya did that but ok, let’s go down ta business; we’ll need ta harvest at least a third part of the orchard ta catch up with the delay.”

“Alright, do we need anything to start? Or I just get them down and then pick them up?” Tailmon asked.

Applejack got up on her hooves again, “we need ta get the baskets and place them below the trees so no apples hit the ground and we also need the cart ta transport them back ta the barn.”

“Makes sense, let’s go.”

With that they went to the barn to get everything they needed.





They got everything in place to start working.

“Do ya know how ta buck a tree?” Applejack asked.

Tailmon stopped for a moment before awkwardly facing her, “excuse me? Can you repeat that again?”

Applejack was confused she thought she made that question as clear as possible, “Ah’ said if ya knew how ta buck a tree.”

“Oh… out of curiosity what does ‘buck a tree’ entails?” Tailmon asked unsure of the answer she would get.

Applejack tilted her head to the side, “well,” she positioned herself, lifted her hind legs and delivered a strong kick to the tree behind her that shook the entire thing, causing the apples to fall in the baskets below. 

She posed proudly, “that’s about it.”

Tailmon let out a sigh of relief, “oh, thank goddess that was it.”

Applejack raised an eye-brow, “what do ya mean with that?”

Tailmon waved a dismissive paw, “nothing, nothing. So I just hit it right?”

Applejack nodded.

“Alright then,” Tailmon stood in front of a tree, winded up and struck the tree with force, the apples fell but a crunching noise could be heard as well, “Uh oh,” the tree trunk cut and fell to the ground making a cloud of dirt, “oops.”

Applejack was with her jaw on the ground for a bit before fixing it back up, “what did ya do!?”

Tailmon put her paws on her waist, “Hey I didn’t think your trees would be that soft, I’m sorry, ok?”

Applejack was taken aback by that, “wait… did ya just… apologize?”

“Yeah, why?”

“Uuuuuh…” Applejack just stared dumbfounded.

That was until an apple bumped on her forehead, “Ow!” she rubbed her forehead, “what was that for?”

“Stop daydreaming, there’s lots of work to do and I’m not doing your part,” Tailmon flashed a smug smile.

Applejack flashed a smile herself, “ya sly cat.”

“Dumb, pony.”

With that both of them dedicated to finish the job in the next few hours.





From the distance the watcher kept her eyes on Tailmon and company.

“It seems Tailmon is expanding her relationships with the locals, it’s good to see them getting along nicely, I’m proud of her she’s trying really hard,” she stopped for a moment, “but I can’t help this feeling of dread surrounding us… what could this mean? The portal can’t be opened yet and even if it could be, I don’t remember anyone from the Chaos Faction were there to cross it.”

She closed her notebook and took a look around; she didn’t see anything suspicious around besides Rainbow Dash resting on a cloud.

Not seeing anything at ground’s level, the watcher took a glance to the sky, then…





“I can’t believe I’m considering what Twilight said,” Rainbow sighed tiredly and looked at the blue sky, “well… if she’s going to help then its fine I guess.”

She let out a yawn and stretched her body to be more comfy, but something in the sky caught her attention.

Thinking she was just seeing things with a lazy eye, she focused on it and saw it wriggling.

“What is that thing?” she asked out loud to no one.

Little dots came out of the black round wriggling shape in the sky; then again it was far away and it suddenly disappeared.

Rainbow went airborne; she saw the dots falling over the Everfree, curious she flew in said direction to investigate.





Rainbow took only a few minutes to get to the area she thought the dots have fallen.

She landed inside the forest to avoid any wild swing of the weather in the air.

Looking around she didn’t find anything yet, but soon after she heard footsteps and not only a pair but a bunch of them, hearing them closer she jumped at a bush for cover.

The footsteps grew louder and louder, Rainbow stayed down to avoid detection but she also happened to hear the passing conversation.

“Where to now?” One of the growly voices asked.

“Didn’t you pay attention? You incompetent retard,” Another voice extremely similar to the first responded in a hostile tone.

“Shut up you prehistoric waste and follow me!” a third one with a slightly lower tone ordered.

“Yes Boss!” a bunch of similar voices said in unison.

The footsteps went away, Rainbow poked her head from the bush just enough to see through, her eyes got wide as she saw seven black dragon-like creatures heading in direction to Ponyville.
> 8: The calm before the storm
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Rainbow saw the figures disappearing between the trees. When she believed she was alone, she got out of her hiding spot.

“What were those? Dragons?” She asked to herself, “They seemed different though, also what was that black thing in the sky?” she then looked at the direction the ‘dragons’ went, “I better keep an eye on them, something tells me this is bad news.”

With that, she carefully took the same path the black ‘dragons’ took.





Back at the Apple’s orchard, Applejack seemed to put her guard down a little bit around Tailmon after the couple of hours of work they shared. The cat seemed to be true to her word and actually helped, but she still didn’t trust her completely.

Still something needed to be done.

“Hey,” Tailmon called while casually carrying a basket full of apples.

“Eh? What is it?” Applejack replied with some surprise.

Tailmon scratched the back of her head and let out a somewhat sad sigh, ears folding backwards, “I’m sorry.”

Applejack just gave her a blank look, “Uh?”

“I said I’m sorry, ok!?” Tailmon yelled taken Applejack aback.

“Are ya’ ok there, sugar?” Applejack asked with some concern from the random outburst.

Tailmon just held her head down in shame, “No! Nothing is ok! I did something awful to you and your family; I hurt you just for my own stupidity.”

Those weren’t very good memories in Applejack’s head either, seeing Big Mac in that state. The pain she endured by Tailmon’s paw, it’s something she wouldn’t forget in a very long time.

But hearing Tailmon’s story from Twilight did serve for some small explanation of what happened that day.

Tailmon felt a hoof on her shoulder and stared up at Applejack giving her a somewhat empathetic look.

“Yes, ya’ did give us a good beating back there ya’ vermin,” Applejack said half-jokingly. “Twilight told me bout’ yer’ past and yer’ reasons to be with that Kurumi fella. Ah’ kind of understand it, Ah’ would’ve gone da same path if Ah’ were in yer place too,” Applejack’s eyes softened even more, before giving her a wink with a big smile, “but a lil’ less eviler probably.”

Tailmon just blinked a few times.

“Now, hear me here. Ah’m not saying Ah’ forgive ya’ just yet for what ya’ did to us, that will take time, mah’ chest still hurts a lil’,” AJ rubbed her chest, “But Ah’ can tell ya’ll trying ta make amends, so Ah’ll give ya’ a chance ta prove yerself.”

“Prove myself?”

“Eyyup, Ah’ wanna see with mah own eyes how ya’ fix the mess ya’ made, then we can be friends,” Applejack held her hoof up in front of Tailmon, “Do we have a deal, partner?” she said with a smile.

“You’re an idiot, you know,” Tailmon muttered with her eyes closed. But then her ears perked up again a faint smile appearing in her face, “But you’re a good kind of idiot, Applejack.” She grabbed the hoof with claw, doing a hoof/claw shake, “we have a deal. But…”

“But?”

“We’re not even yet,” Tailmon then stood in front of Applejack with her arms behind her, getting a puzzling look from the mare, “I want you to hit me as hard as you can, I will not defend myself.”

“Excuse me? What?” Applejack was confused, why would Tailmon tell her something like that?

“Hit me as with everything you have,” Tailmon repeated herself, “its only fair after what I’ve done to you and your family.”

“Ye’re making no sense now, sugarcube.”

“How am I not making any sense? I’m telling you to hit me!” Tailmon got exasperated.

“Ah’m not gonna do that.”

“Why?”

“Becuz it’s not yer’ fault,” Applejack replied with a neutral tone.

“What?” now it was Tailmon’s turn to be confused, “I beat you up, literally. With my own paws, how is that not my fault?”

“Yeah, ya’ did. But ya got tricked ta do so, also we already got a deal here so Ah’m satisfied,” Applejack finished with a playful wink.

Tailmon gawked at the country pony; her legs giving up on her she stuck her paws off for support. Then, she started to sob.

“Whoa there partner, what’s wrong?”

“It’s not fair…” Tailmon muttered between sobs, “you’re making so much sense right now; you’re supposed to be dumb…”

“Even the dumb can make sense sometimes,” Applejack gently replied, “not that Ah’ agree with me being dumb or anything.”

“Heh,” Tailmon let out a chuckle, “I guess I lose this one,” which triggered both to laugh in unison, any kind of resentment staying long in past memory.

In their laughing spree, they didn’t notice the yellow filly with red mane and a bow looking at them awkwardly for laughing at seemingly nothing.





Rainbow Dash carefully tippy hoofed around the vegetation of the Everfree as to not alert the strange visitors of her presence.

‘Where are they going?’ she asked mentally.

“Say, boss.” One of them said.

“What do you want now?” The bigger of the seven said with a grumble, apparently it had little patience.

The one from before, obviously dumber than the rest bought a claw to his chin, “what do we do after going to the nearby town?”

All of them, the only exception being the big one faceclawed exclaiming, “What an idiot.”

‘What an idiot’ Rainbow found herself agreeing with them for some reason.

That kind of silliness didn’t last long though, as the big didn’t look amused at all, instead he looked pissed off.

“What will we do, you ask?” He said stomping towards a small tree, impaling it with tremendous force using his claws, “This of course and then,” he pulled rooting the tree from the earth and smashing it against the ground.

Rainbow noticed this one started the leak smoke from his mouth.

“Black Flame!” The big one exclaimed while spiting a black fireball to the tree in the ground, engulfing it in flames which left nothing but ashes a few seconds after.

Out of nowhere the dumb one got kicked in the gut by the big one.

“That is what we’re going to do there. If you don’t want to join them, then don’t ask stupid questions like that,” He said threateningly before kicking the dumb one once more. 

The rest of his group laughing at the one struggling to get up.

‘Yikes, that must have hurt,’ Rainbow thought as she was getting nervous of being so close to them. But she was more worried about what their plan was, ‘so they are planning to attack Ponyville,’ another look at the ashes of the once before tree gave her a nightmarish image in her head of what would happen if these things reach the town.

“Got it, boss!” The dumb one from before said, surprising Rainbow how quickly he recovered and wasn’t even scared or angry at the way he was treated before, “this will be so much fun,” a maniac grin taking place on his face.

“Finally, you say something worth our time. Now move on, you prehistoric waste!” The big one commanded as he resumed his way towards town.

The others merely said “Yes!” as response before following their leader.

Rainbow being left alone at last rested against a tree and left out a heavy breath, “I-I have to do something,” she muttered, “But I can’t go seven against one, as much as I would like to. Those flames are a problem too…”

She was interrupted by a familiar shout, “Black Flame!” soon after a black fireball collided with the tree she was resting.

“Ahh!” she screamed involuntarily while jumping away of the almost totally on fire tree. Not wasting a single more second Rainbow took to the air and flew away towards town, “I have to tell Twilight.”

She could hear the crazy laughter below her as she zoomed out of the forest.





It was almost mid day when Twilight returned to her castle after doing the groceries for Tailmon.

“We are finally making progress,” she said with a sense of relief, “I hope we can continue this way.”

That was until she heard something.

“Twilight!” 

“Eh?” Turning to see who’s calling her, she saw Rainbow coming her way at a fast speed, “Rainbow?”

The prismatic mare landed in a very awkward way making her skid on the ground.

“Twilight! We are in trouble!” Rainbow yelled.

“Rainbow, calm down,” She tried to calm her distressed friend, “What happened? How are we in trouble?”

After some long and steady breaths Rainbow managed to calm her nerves a little bit, “A bit ago, I saw something weird in the sky.”

“Something weird in the sky? What do you mean?” Twilight asked being puzzled by this statement.

“I’m not sure what it was, I just know it was a black thing that wiggled in the sky. After looking at it for a while, it threw off seven things that landed in the Everfree Forest,” Rainbow continued her explanation, “That’s when I went there to check out what was the deal with that.”

“You went to the Everfree!? Rainbow that was very risky!” Twilight yelled out in concern.

“I know, but I’m glad I did.” The look on Rainbow’s eyes turned a bit somber.

“W-what do you mean by that?” 

“The seven things that landed in the forest looked kind of like dragons. But I don’t know, they felt different to me,” This was something Rainbow herself couldn’t explain still.

“What kind of dragons?”

Rainbow focused on how they looked and what they could do, “They have no wings. They are not much bigger than us except for one that was slightly bigger than the rest which they called Boss, have bright yellow eyes and black scales, their arms and feet have three claws,” then she remembered the big thing, “They also could throw black flames from their mouths.”

“Black flames?” Twilight asked in confusion, “I never heard of dragons being able to throw black flames.”

“I told you, I’m not sure they are dragons Twi,” She was getting nervous again, “but those things are dangerous, they plan to attack Ponyville!”

“What!?” 

“I heard them, they plan to come here and destroy everything,” Rainbow wasn’t sure how to behave at this point.

Twilight recovered from her shock and adopted a more serious expression, “How far are they from Ponyville?”

“I’d say around an hour if they keep going at the same pace I saw before, they would probably come from the area near Fluttershy’s”

Nodding, Twilight improvised a plan, “Rainbow, go to town hall and tell Mayer Mare about the situation to begin the evacuation, I’ll reunited the girls and take the ponies closer to the area to safety. We will re-group in Fluttershy’s cottage, ok?”

“Got it!” Rainbow said with a salute before taking off.

When left alone, Twilight mentally slapped herself, “I had to jinx it didn’t I?” then she went inside the castle to let Spike know about what was going to happen.





30 minutes later in Sweet Apple Acres.

After finishing the harvest of the day, Tailmon and the Apple sisters were taking a break in the porch with some apple juice.

“Yer not as bad as it said in the papers, Miss Tailmon,” Applebloom with all the innocence, exclaimed.

“I’m making an effort to change, sweetheart.” Tailmon said with a rather sad tone, “But, I did mess up real bad when your sister and her friends met me the first time.”

“But ye’re now fixing everything right?” The filly asked, getting her mane ruffled by the cat.

“That’s the plan, yes,” Tailmon giggled at the cuteness, she was always fond of children and would never bring herself to hurt any even when she was on the bad side.

“What are ya’ gonna do now?” Applejack asked, since there was no more work for the day.

Tailmon shrugged, “I’ll probably head back to Derpy’s house and wait for her.”

“Aww, ye’re leaving already Miss Tailmon?” Applebloom said with a bit of disappointment.

“Don’t worry I’ll come to visit every now and then,” Tailmon replied with a smile.

This excited the filly, “Really!?” she asked, getting a nod from the digi-cat at which Applebloom gave her a hug.

“You ponies really are the huggy type, huh?” Tailmon joked, but she would lie if she said she didn’t start to enjoy this aswell.

“That we are.” They shared a good laugh soon after.

A few minutes passed and Tailmon was in the way to Derpy’s home, she was far away when Twilight teleported to Sweet Apple Acres to communicate the situation to Applejack, which immediately rushed inside to let everypony know they should go evacuate with the rest of the town. 

Tailmon meanwhile had a weird feeling annoying her, ‘Something is not right, but what could it be?’





After the hour had passed, all the Elements of Harmony exited Fluttershy’s home making sure all the animal took refuge first.

They took position in front of the riverbank next to the road heading towards town directly in front of the Everfree.

Rainbow then asked the obvious, “what about the cat?”

“Ah’m with Rainbow here, we should’ve told her,” Applejack added.

“I don’t want to put all the weight on Tailmon’s shoulders girls; she’s trying to change for good. Making her responsible of an entire town is just something I don’t want to impose on her right now,” Twilight’s heart was in the right place, even if she herself was a bit doubtful about the outcome of the next encounter.

“Emm… Twilight…” Fluttershy suddenly called in a shaky voice.

“What is it?”

“They are here darling, look.” Rarity said while pointing a hoof to the forest.

All of them looked as the seven figures started to appear at the other side.

“Be prepared girls, this can be dangerous,” Twilight commanded as all of them took fighting stances. “Rainbow,” she called getting her attention.

“I know what you’re gonna say Twi, if things go wrong I have to get the cat here.” Rainbow replied with confidence.

Everypony nodded and then focused on the figures leaving the darkness of the forest.

“I guess we’re having fun earlier than expected guys,” they heard the big one say as soon as they left the forest, “we have a welcoming committee.”

Hearing that make the rest of the group laugh and crossed the riverbank with all the intent of causing damage.

“I guess we can’t come to a peaceful agreement, right?” Twilight spoke up to the strange dragons.

“You can always stay still and die peacefully without resisting, but that’s less fun,” the leader replied in a cocky manner.

“I have to kindly say no to your offer sir,” Twilight answered with a smile of her own.

“I have a better one!” Rainbow gained everyone’s attention, “we will kick your butts and you will go away!”

The dragons stared at the prismatic airborne Pegasus with dumbstruck expressions before laughing in her face.

That’s when the leader stopped, “Kill them, I will jump in if any of them give trouble.” As on cue his group started the attack on the ponies. 

Unknown to them the mysterious figure was watching the whole exchange, before quickly vanishing.