What if Sunset Shimmer had a friend to be by her side during the Anon-a-Miss scandal?
Sunset Shimmer is undoubtedly the most loathed student at Canterlot High. The Anon-a-Miss scandal has seen to that quite well. After all, who else but Sunset could know those secrets about her friends?
But Sunset has one friend on her side. A friend who will stand by her, no matter what backlash she herself might face. And Sunset will learn how one true friend is better than a thousand false ones.
If you had put Danielle Ratigan into a lineup with other Canterlot High School students, chances are you wouldn't really notice her. You'd probably notice that she was quite a bit taller than her classmates, or admire her magenta skin, long raven hair and large dark blue eyes. You'd comment on how nice she looked in her everyday outfit; a white blouse, black corset vest, gray slacks and black boots. If you saw her in action on the soccer field during a Wonder Colts game, you might mention how athletic she was. If you watched her in the classroom maintaining a 4.0 grade point average, you might comment on her smarts. But Canterlot High was full of equally smart, athletic, nice-looking students.
No, Danielle Ratigan was just an ordinary Canterlot High student.
But to one girl, she would be an important part of helping her rebuild her life.
It all started when Sunset Shimmer, the former number one bully in Canterlot High, was accused of being behind a cyberbullying scandal. A Mystable account known only as "Anon-a-Miss" started posting embarrassing secrets and photographs of Sunset's newfound friend group; Applejack's childhood nickname, Rarity's closet of failure, Rainbow Dash's failing test, all were posted on Anon-a-Miss's page.
Given that a lot of the embarrassing photos seemed to be of an intimate sleepover of the friends, and that Sunset was the only one not it any of the photos (and probably the one TAKING the photos), the logical explanation would be that Sunset was the culprit. But Sunset was reformed now. Surely her friends wouldn't actually believe she could do something so heinous, would they?
Apparently they would.
Sunset found herself confronted by Applejack, Rarity, Rainbow, Pinkie Pie and Fluttershy in the school hall. They were sure that she HAD to be Anon-a-Miss, since all the secrets were revealed to only their little circle of friends. Sunset tried to plead innocent, but the girls weren't having any of it. They renounced their friend and turned her away. Sunset left the group, crying as she did.
"How could she?" Rarity asked. "After all we did together, after all we did FOR her, why would she turn on us like this?"
"I can't believe I let her fool me again," Applejack groaned. "That lowdown no-good varmint."
"Unbelievable."
The five friends turned to see Danielle watching them, an angry look on her face. Rainbow recognized her as her soccer teammate. "Hey Danielle."
Danielle didn't respond to her teammate's greeting. "I cannot believe what I just witnessed."
"I know, right, that meanie Sunset is such a..." Pinkie began, but stopped talking when she noticed the lapis-colored glare in the other girl's eyes.
"I meant YOU," Danielle responded. "I can't BELIEVE how callous you all were to Sunset just then! What did that poor girl do to deserve such cruelty?"
"Oh, I dunno, how about postin' stories on MyStable humiliatin' us?" Applejack retorted.
"Really?" Danielle asked. "You're cutting ties with Sunset based solely on the idea that she MIGHT be Anon-a-Miss?"
"There's no MIGHT about it, Danielle," Rarity argued. "Sunset IS Anon-a-Miss! How else would that dreaded account get access to my horrid closet, or Applejack's nickname? Other than the five of us, she was the only one at those sleepovers."
"That IS kind of hard to dispute," Fluttershy agreed timidly.
"So just because it's likely that Sunset is the culprit, we're automatically going to throw the book at her? Have any of you ever heard of a little thing called "innocent until proven guilty?""
"There's nothing TO prove!" Rainbow shot back. "Sunset was the one taking those pictures! She posted those photos on MyStable! How can a straight-A student like you not get this?"
Danielle arched an eyebrow. "OK, Sunset took the pictures of Rarity's closest. She knew about Applejack being called Piggly-Wiggly. By that logic, any one of you five could ALSO be Anon-a-Miss. YOU were at those sleepovers, were you not?"
"Hey now, you're just bein' ridiculous now," Applejack spoke up. "I would NEVER do somethin' like that, and I know for a fact that none of these girls would either!"
"Because they're your friends, right, AJ? That's how you know they wouldn't do such a thing? And what about Sunset, huh? She was your friend too. How are you so quick to judge her and not any one of these girls?" The other girls looked at each other, seemingly unable to give an answer.
"Because she's a bully!" Fluttershy finally piped up. The other girls nodded in agreement.
Danielle gave the five girls in front of her an incredulous glare. "Wow. Wow, wow, wow, wow, wow. You girls truly are something else, you know that?"
"What's THAT supposed to mean?" Rainbow asked. "Sunset IS a bully! You've seen firsthand the crappy things she's done! The time she filled your water bottle with hot sauce, or the time she got Snips to trip you in the lunchroom while you were carrying your tray of food? Don't you remember that?"
"And don't YOU remember Sunset also renouncing her bullying ways and helping to save the school from a trio of sirens?" Danielle shot back. "Or is that not enough proof for you? If Sunset can help you all stop evil forces, what makes you think she'd be STUPID enough to betray your trust over something as STUPID as a few embarrassing Internet scandals?" The girls seemed to all be at a loss for words. "Believe whatever the hell you want to, I'm not going to try and penetrate through the fog in your heads, but I for one choose to believe that Sunset is innocent until proven guilty."
With that, Danielle turned around and stormed off from the hall, leaving the five girls at a loss for words.
Sunset wept as she was being cornered by a group of students, making threatening movements. These were some of the victims of Anon-a-Miss's most recent string of embarrassments; a photo of Gilda sleeping in pink footy pajamas, Bulk Biceps sleeping with a teddy bear, three jock guys playing tea party with one guy's little sister. The whole school was convinced that Sunset was behind the Anon-a-Miss MyStable page.
And now these students would make her pay.
Gilda cracked her knuckles. "Oh boy, this is gonna be fun." She smirked as Sunset shivered. "Relax, Anon-a-Miss, this'll only hurt...A LOT."
"Get away from her."
The group of students turned to see a tall magenta-skinned girl in a Wonder Colts soccer uniform, her black hair tied back in a ponytail. Gilda sneered. "Beat it, Bratigan."
Danielle didn't move an inch. "I said. Get. Away. From her."
"What the hell is your problem?" one girl known as Lightning Dust asked. "Sunset has been bullying us all for years! We're trying to give her what she deserves!"
"She doesn't DESERVE to be beaten up by a bunch of thugs with single-digit IQs," Danielle argued. "Just like she doesn't deserve all the crappy remarks people have been throwing at her these past few days. Or the little nudges. Or the notes in her locker saying she should drop dead. Sunset Shimmer did terrible things, yes, but she's more than made up for those with everything she's done for this school."
"Like makin' us all look like idiots on MyStable?" one jock named Dumbbell asked.
"Oh-ho, dear Dumbbell, you don't need help making yourself look like an idiot," Danielle smirked. The boy glowered while his two buddies chuckled. "None of you do. You're all making yourselves look like idiots and bullies right now by ganging up on an innocent girl and threatening to beat the tar out of her."
"Excuse me?!" Gilda shrieked. "WE'RE not the bad guys here, Bratigan, SHE is! SHE'S the one who's been posting shit about us with that stupid Anon-a-Miss account!"
POW!
The group of students looked in shock as Gilda was knocked onto the floor, holding her bleeding nose. Danielle glared angrily at the fallen girl, then at the other students. "Listen here, assholes. From now on, no one gets to Sunset without going through ME first. You harass her, you insult you, YOU LOOK AT HER CROSS-EYED, and I will make you pay. Now all of you fuck off and tell everyone what I just said."
One by one, the group of students dispersed to tell the other students about the threat Danielle had just made. Gilda was the last to go, giving Danielle a cold glare and hissing "You'll pay for this, Bratigan" before she left.
Danielle turned to Sunset, who looked bewildered by what she'd just witnessed. "You all right, Sunset?"
"Y-Yeah," the orange-skinned girl responded. "Thanks for that."
"Hey, that's what friends are for," Danielle replied, draping an arm over the reformed bully's shoulder.
"You...really wanna be my friend?" Sunset asked.
"Of course. You're an awesome girl; smart, pretty, talented. Why wouldn't I wanna be friends with you?"
"Because of the Anon-a-Miss thing? Because of all the crappy stuff I've done before?"
Danielle waved a hand dismissively. "I meant what I said. You've made up for what you did in the past. And I don't believe in blaming people on doing things online without hardcore evidence."
"Well, then you're the only one in the school who does," Sunset sighed. She looked sadly at her new friend. "You know you just painted a big fat target on your back, right?"
"Let those morons come for me. I'm not afraid of them."
Life at Canterlot High School after holiday break went by as normally as it could, given that Anon-a-Miss was still at large and posting everyone's secrets and embarrassing stories. But now, it wasn't just the high school students that were being targeted; the students as Canterlot Junior High were having their secrets posted as well.
Now more than ever, the students were sure that Sunset Shimmer was behind the Anon-a-Miss account. After all, who else but the school's queen bee bully would humiliate junior high kids like that?
And if Sunset was Public Enemy Number One for being Anon-a-Miss, then Danielle Ratigan was Public Enemy Number Two for preventing Anon-a-Miss from getting what was coming to her.
Danielle made good on her promise to the group of students that had tried to gang up on Sunset before holiday break. She stood by Sunset, acting as her sole friend and somewhat bodyguard, preventing anyone from trying anything on the reformed bully. She arranged with Principal Celestia and Vice-Principal Luna to have her class schedule shifted so it matched Sunset's, and she would walk the girl to and from school every day to make sure no one tried anything off campus.
If any student tried something, they were met with swift punishment from the tall girl. Soon after school reconvened, when the students were playing volleyball in gym class, Bulk Biceps "accidentally" served the ball so it would make a direct hit with Sunset's face. Fortunately for her, Danielle noticed that and spiked the ball before it could hit its target, making it hit the opposite side of the net so hard it bounced back and hit Bulk in a very sensitive area. While the other students laughed at the sight of the buff boy lying on the floor in a whimpering fetal position, they were less than thrilled that Danielle had kept Sunset from getting hit.
The volleyball incident was the last time any student tried a physical assault on Sunset. Or really, any kind of assault. Now, the worst either girl got were looks of disgust and anger as they walked down the hallway together, but they were met with equally venomous lapis glares from Danielle.
Yes, Canterlot High School went back to as close to normal as it could, given the circumstances.
"There we go, nice and shiny."
Danielle had invited Sunset over to her home for a sleepover one weekend in mid January. At the moment, the raven-haired lass was giving the redhead a manicure and had opted to go with glittering gold nail polish.
Sunset beamed as she observed her newly painted nails. "Nice. Good choice of color, too. I bet Rarity would approve." Suddenly, her smile turned to a sad frown as she sighed.
"Hey now, don't let those idiots get you down," Danielle tried to cheer her up. "They chose to not believe you, after all you've done together. That's their problem, not yours."
"It's not that," Sunset assured her. "I just feel really bad for you. You're the only student at Canterlot High who's stood with me through this Anon-a-Miss crap, and you're being punished for it. Everyone hates you now almost as much as they hate me. You had to quit your extracurricular activities to act as my bodyguard. If Gilda and her thugs weren't convinced that you'd wallop them, they'd probably try to beat you into a pulp!" The orange girl closed her eyes, tears welling up in them. "I'm the first to admit that I'm no angel, I did horrible things in the past, and this is probably the universe's way of punishing me for them, but you've never done anything to warrant being so mistreated other than being a good friend!" She started to cry.
Danielle wrapped her arms around her friend. "It's OK, Sunny, it's OK. I wouldn't change a thing I've done for you, and you know why?" Sunset shook her head. "Because I know you're a good girl. The other students may be convinced that you're Anon-a-Miss, but when you were telling your "friends" that you were innocent, I could tell you were telling the truth. My father always called me a living polygraph. I can always tell whenever someone's telling the truth or not."
"You can?" Sunset smiled a little. "That's pretty cool." Just then, her teal eyes widened as a thought came to her. "Hey, Dani, can you help me with a project? I think I might know who Anon-a-Miss really is."
The next day, on the campus of Canterlot Junior High, three eighth-grade students were on their way from the cafeteria to their next classes. These were Apple Bloom, Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo, often referred to as the Crusaders. Bloom was the younger sister of Applejack, Sweetie was the younger sister of Rarity, and Scootaloo was the fangirl of Rainbow Dash.
Suffice it to say, they were close to Sunset's former group of friends.
Just then, the three young girls were stopped in the hallway by a tall high school girl with magenta skin. "Excuse me, girls, but I'm going to need a word with you."
"Uh, OK," Bloom spoke up, a bit intimidated by the older girl. "What can we do fer ya?"
The girl looked to her left, where a familiar orange girl with red and yellow hair was standing. "I believe you girls know my good friend Sunset Shimmer here?"
"Y-Yeah, we do," Sweetie agreed. "Hi, Sunset."
Sunset gave the three younger girls a wuthering gaze. "I'm sure you girls are aware of the whole Anon-a-Miss scandal that's been tearing through the school as of late, yes?"
"Who ISN'T aware of that?" Scootaloo asked. "I haven't seen the school in this much chaos since the Dazzlings were here!"
"And you're also aware that this all started because of some little secrets that were brought up during the sleepovers at Pinkie Pie's and Rarity's houses?" Sunset continued.
"Yeah, we know," Sweetie admitted. "I was at the house when you were over."
"And I called AJ durin' Pinkie's party," Bloom confirmed.
"So, how is it that Anon-a-Miss knew about both Applejack's embarrassing nickname AND Rarity's closet of shame?" Sunset asked. "As far as I know, the only people who knew about "Piggly Wiggly" before that scandal were me, AJ, the other girls and AJ's family."
Scootaloo realized where the older girl was going with this. "Hey, you don't think WE have anything to do with Anon-a-Miss, do ya?"
"As a matter of fact, you three are on the top of the suspects list," Sunset responded. The Crusaders looked like they had been stricken with triple heart attacks. "Fact: Apple Bloom, being Applejack's sister, would more than likely know about "Piggly Wiggly." Fact: Sweetie Belle was at Rarity's house when Rarity was showing her closet of shame. Fact: neither of you girls seemed very happy that you were being shut out of the festivities. Fact: if two of you were in on something like this, there's a good chance that Scootaloo, being the third Crusader, would get sucked into it too." Sunset arched an eyebrow at the younger girls. "Am I correct so far?"
Just then, the three younger girls collapsed onto their knees, shaking and near tears. "Please, stop, I beg of you," Scootaloo whimpered.
"We swear, we have nothing to do with Anon-a-Miss!" Sweetie cried.
"I...you what?" Sunset asked, clearly taken aback.
"It's true, Sweetie an' I were both steamed that our sisters were spendin' more time with ya than with us," Bloom admitted. "But I promise ya, we ain't behind the Anon-a-Miss thing!"
Sunset was still skeptical of this. "Dani, you're the living polygraph. What do you make of this?"
Danielle knelt down before the three young ones, huddled together in a hug. She looked hard into each girl's eyes. "You swear you three aren't behind Anon-a-Miss? You solemnly swear?"
"Yes, we solemnly swear," Sweetie replied.
"As solemnly as possible," Bloom added.
"We would never go that low!" Scootaloo assured her.
Danielle nodded. "Yep, they're telling the truth. They're not the ones behind Anon-a-Miss."
Sunset felt a bit relieved that the younger sisters of her once best friends weren't the petty little witches she had feared they'd be. Then, the relief was replaced by sickness when she saw how terrified the Crusaders looked. "Oh sweet sundrops; I'm sorry, girls, for the scare tactics. I guess the inner bully came out for a bit."
"Can't say that we blame ya for thinkin' it might be us," Bloom sighed as Danielle helped her onto her feet, then helped the other two up. "If I was in your shoes, I'd probably think it was us too."
"Yeah, the whole thing IS pretty convincing against us," Sweetie agreed. "What with Bloom knowing about AJ's nickname, and me being at the house when you found out about Rarity's fashion mishaps."
"And me being the only one of the three of us having a MyStable account," Scootaloo added. "But like we said, we're not Anon-a-Miss...but we know who is."
Babs Seed walked through the halls of Canterlot Junior High, keeping quietly to herself. The girl held her head down, not wanting to make eye contact with any of the other students.
Unfortunately, by keeping her head down, she didn't notice she was walking right into Diamond Tiara. The rich girl sneered as the Manehattanite bumped into her. "Watch where you're going, loser! You almost made me spill my chai latte!"
"Sorry..." Babs whimpered.
"You SHOULD be sorry," Silver Spoon, Diamond's best friend and number two, smirked. "Wandering around with those hand-me-down clothes and shoddy haircut. You're besmirching us just by standing next to us! Now scram, we don't want any of your fugly rubbing onto us." The two rich girls giggled as Babs walked away shamefully, then did their secret handshake. "Bump, bump, sugar lump, rump!"
Babs blew a strand of magenta hair out of her face as her sad gait turned into an angry stomp. Once she was out of sight of the two bullies, she pulled out her phone and signed onto her MyStable account. "Let's see what we've got on Diamond Twerp and Slutty Spoon..."
"Hello, Babs."
Babs yelped and nearly dropped her phone at the sudden greeting. She turned to see Sunset Shimmer, the former bully of Canterlot High and the alleged guilty party of Anon-a-Miss, and Danielle Ratigan, her new bodyguard, standing there. "Uh...hey, hey, Sunset, Danielle."
Danielle frowned. "Or should I say, Anon-a-Miss?"
Babs glowered. "What're you talking about? Everyone KNOWS Sunset is Anon-a-Miss!"
Sunset shook her head. "No, what they KNOW is that I was at the two sleepovers where the first two secrets were unfolded. Everyone then jumped to the conclusion that I was Anon-a-Miss. But I KNOW that you're Anon-a-Miss for three big reasons." She held up a finger. "One: as Applejack and Apple Bloom's cousin, you would know about Piggly Wiggly." She held up a second finger. "Two: you were at Rarity and Sweetie Belle's house having your own mini-sleepover when Rarity showed us her closet of shame." She then held up a third finger. "And three: Bloom, Sweetie and Scootaloo TOLD us you were Anon-a-Miss."
As Sunset mentioned their names, the three Crusaders came out from behind the two older girls. Babs growled. "You little traitors! I oughta..."
"Stuff it, Babs, we ain't afraid of you no more," Bloom replied.
"Yeah, we're done keeping your secret," Scootaloo agreed. She turned to the older girls. "We're really sorry this got so out-of-hand, Sunset."
"Yeah, we never meant for it to go this far," Sweetie added.
"It's gonna go THIS far," Babs snarled. The girl charged at Sweetie, looking ready to clobber her. Thankfully, Danielle grabbed the much smaller girl and wrapped her in a bear hug, her back pressed against her chest. "I think someone just earned herself a visit to Principal Celestia."
The six Rainbooms were asleep in Rarity's room. It had been a long evening of partying, fun and laughter, but they were all bushed. They knew that tomorrow would be quite fun as well.
As the high schoolers slept, the door to Rarity's room openly quietly. A small figure crept in, snuck over to Sunset Shimmer, carefully picked up her phone and searched through the photos Sunset had taken. A wicked smile was illuminated by the phone's screen as the culprit used her own phone to hack into Sunset's, make copies of the most embarrassing pictures, then carefully set Sunset's phone back where it was and snuck out of the room, silently shutting the door behind her.
"Babs?"
The culprit jumped slightly when she saw Sweetie Belle standing by her. "Uh, hey, Sweetie."
"What were you doing in my sister's bedroom?"
"I was, uh, looking for the bathroom?" Babs lied.
"If you were gonna use the bathroom, then why do you have your phone out?" Sweetie noted. She then saw what was on the screen. "Hey, that's Rarity's closet of shame! Why do you have a picture of it on your phone?"
Babs slapped a hand over Sweetie's mouth, trying to keep her from waking anyone in the high schooler's room. "Shut up!" She dragged Sweetie back into her room, where Apple Bloom and Scootaloo were half-asleep in their own mini-sleepover.
Sweetie gasped when she realized what was going on. "YOU'RE Anon-a-Miss, aren't you?"
"So what if I am?" Babs asked, crossing her arms over her chest.
"I can't BELIEVE this! I invited a cyberbully over to sleep over! This is awful!" Sweetie started for the door. "I'm telling Rarity!"
Babs grabbed Sweetie by the arm. "No you're not!"
"And why not?" Sweetie demanded.
"For two reasons. One: if you don't tell anyone that I'm Anon-a-Miss, who do you think WILL be blamed for it? The former bully who was at BOTH sleepovers! If the girls think Sunset is Anon-a-Miss, they'll stop hanging out with her, and Rarity will start hanging out with you again, just like you wanted."
Sweetie paused, thinking that over. She DID want Rarity to spend time again with her, just like she had before she became friends with Sunset. But that thought was quickly shoved aside by the girl's moral conscience. "This isn't right! I'm not gonna let Sunset take the fall just to hang out with Rarity again!"
"What in tarnation are you two jabbin' about?" Bloom asked, groggily sitting up in her sleeping bag. Scootaloo soon followed suit.
"Babs is Anon-a-Miss!" Sweetie told her friends.
"WHAT?!" both Bloom and Scootaloo yelped, fully awake now.
"YOU'RE Anon-a-Miss?!" Bloom asked her cousin incredulously.
"This is crazy!" Scootaloo cried out. "We need to tell the older girls!"
"I was just about to," Sweetie confirmed. "You two coming with me?"
"You bet," Bloom agreed. She and Scootaloo joined Sweetie to go tell their sisters about Babs, when Babs blocked their way out.
"You didn't let me tell you the SECOND reason you ain't gonna tell nobody that I'm Anon-a-Miss," the Manehattanite spoke up. "The reason being, if you breathe a word of this to ANYONE, I'll wail on you so hard that your GRANDCHILDREN will feel it. Got it?" She clenched her fists at the three girls. "Got it?"
The Crusaders looked uneasily to each other, then nodded. "Got it."
"And that's the whole story."
Sunset, Danielle, Babs, the Crusaders and the five Rainbooms, who had been called over by their sisters, were in Principal Celestia's office. Celestia was seated at her desk, and Superintendent Discord, the head of Canterlot City public schools, was next to her, having been called in when the Crusaders told her they knew who Anon-a-Miss was.
The Crusaders had just finished telling about how Babs had threatened them to keep her secret quiet. Fluttershy and Rarity were in tears, Pinkie Pie looked down at her feet guiltily, and Applejack and Rainbow Dash were casting angry glares at Babs, who looked defiant.
Celestia sighed. "Well, I must say, I AM disappointed in you three girls for not coming to me about this whole ordeal before it exploded the way it has." She looked at Babs crossly. "Though not NEARLY as disappointed as I am in YOU, Barbara. I don't know what's worse, to be honest; that you would create the Anon-a-Miss account in the first place, or that you'd let poor Sunset take the fall for it."
"I can't believe one of my own kin would do something this heinous!" Applejack blurted. "I have never, NEVER been ashamed to be related to someone before, but I REALLY can't look at ya right now, Babs." Babs looked like she didn't give a flip. Applejack then turned to Apple Bloom, her tone and face softened considerably. "Bloom, when Piggly Wiggly first surfaced online, you told me it was probably Sunset. Why would you say that?"
"Because at that point, I honestly DID think it was her," Bloom responded. "If I had known Babs was really behind it...I'm so sorry, Sunset." Sunset nodded sadly at the girl.
Celestia drew in a breath. "I'm afraid these actions warrant some punishments. Apple Bloom, Sweetie Belle, Scootaloo, I want each of you girls to write me a three-page essay on why you should always go to an authority figure when you find out something this serious. You will each also be given two weeks' worth of detentions, and you are barred from all extracurricular activities for the rest of the school year. Does that sound fair to you?"
"Yes, ma'am," Bloom agreed.
"Totally," Scootaloo added.
"We deserve it," Sweetie piped up.
Babs smirked at the Crusaders. "That's what you get for bein' tattle tales."
"Oh, if you liked THEIR punishment, you're going to LOVE yours," Discord announced. "As of this moment, Barbara Jean Seed, you are expelled from all Canterlot City public schools."
"WHAT?!" Babs nearly fell out of her chair. "But that ain't fair!"
"Oh isn't it?" Celestia asked. "Not only did you start a cyberbullying account online, but you got another student falsely accused, causing her to be bullied mentally, emotionally and almost physically at least twice."
"But before you clean out your locker, you are going to be the center of the assembly I'm going to call this afternoon, where you will confess to being Anon-a-Miss, making a public apology to both Sunset and the school, and publicly deleting both the Anon-a-Miss account AND your personal account." Discord got closer to Babs's face as he finished, "And if you fail to comply, I WILL be calling the Canterlot City Police Department to have some words with you."
"And you can bet your sweet bippy that I'll be havin' words with your folks about this," Applejack added. "I'm sure they'll have a few additional punishments for ya. Not only that, but you ain't allowed back on Sweet Apple Acres EVER again; not for family reunions, not for holidays, not for ANYTHING. Because as far as I'm concerned, you and I ain't family."
Babs glared silently at her older cousin, but you could tell she had tears welling up in her eyes. "You can't ban me from Sweet Apple Acres! You ain't in charge of it, Granny Smith is!"
"You're right, she IS; an' once I explain to her what you did, I'm sure she'll agree with me to ban you."
Babs pointed an accusing finger at the Crusaders. "Oh yeah? And what about Apple Butt, Shitty Belle and Scumaloo here? Aren't you gonna punish THEM for keepin' the secret this whole time?"
Applejack frowned and knelt down next to her younger sister. "Apple Bloom, your punishment for this whole thing is to make me this promise: promise me that the next time someone threatens you to keep a secret, you'll come to me, or Big Macintosh, or Granny Smith, or some other older person to tell us about it."
"Same goes for you, Sweetie Belle," Rarity spoke up. "You will tell me or Mother and Father about if anyone is threatening you."
"You too, squirt," Rainbow told Scootaloo.
"You girls promise to never, never, NEVER keep something like this a secret again?" Applejack asked.
"We promise," all three Crusaders replied at once.
"YOU GOTTA BE SHITTING ME!" Babs exploded. "I GET ALL THIS CRAP HEAPED ON ME, AND THEY GET OFF WITH A SLAP ON THE WRIST! HOW THE HOLY FUCK IS THAT FAIR?!"
"If you REALLY can't see why that is fair, then I've failed you as a principal," Celestia sighed. "Now go get ready for the assembly, Barbara. Danielle, go with her to make sure she doesn't try to escape."
"Yes, ma'am," Danielle agreed. She turned angrily to Babs. "Let's go, Anon-a-Miss." Babs got up from her seat and stormed over to the door, flipping off the Crusaders and older girls before she left.
Once Babs and Danielle were gone, the Rainbooms looked over at Sunset. "Sunset, we are so sorry that we didn't listen to you," Applejack apologized.
"We should have given you the benefit of the doubt," Fluttershy wept. "After all you've done for us, that would've been the least we could've done."
"Instead we acted like savages," Rarity sighed. "We were cruel to you."
"We're gonna make it up to you," Pinkie promised. "I'm gonna throw you the biggest "I'm sorry" party I can."
"Can you ever forgive us?" Rainbow asked.
Sunset looked sadly at her former friends. "Before I answer that question, let me ask you one of my own; are you TRULY sorry, or are you just saying that because I'm innocent?"
The Rainbooms looked shocked at the question. "Whatever do you mean, darling?" Rarity asked.
"Let's say I WAS Anon-a-Miss for real," Sunset hypothesized. "Would you still be apologizing right now for the way I was treated?"
"Sugar cube, that don't matter, because you ain't..." Applejack began, but she was cut off.
"Would. You. Still. Be. Apologizing?" Sunset repeated. The guilty and sad looks on the other girls' faces told her what she wanted to know. "I didn't think so. You told me that I was your friend, that I was your FAMILY, for pity's sake. Well, last time I checked, neither friends nor family would jump to conclusions about something as serious as cyberbullying before they got hard evidence." She shook her head sadly. "I'm sorry, girls. I want to forgive you, truly I do, and I hope that one day I CAN, but for right now, I'm afraid I don't want anything to do with any of you anymore."
Sunset headed for the door, but stopped, chuckling sadly. "You know, in a way, I guess I should thank Babs for starting this whole Anon-a-Miss thing. Because thanks to that, I learned who my TRUE friends are. I have two; one in Equestria, and one here at school. In Equestria, I have Princess Twilight Sparkle, who has listened to my story this whole time through my journal, and who offered her condolences and wanting to come over and talk. And here at school, I have Danielle Ratigan, who didn't judge me based on what I did in the past, who stayed by my side and protected me from getting my flank handed to me by Gilda and her cronies, who gave up her time and her reputation to be with me. And really, those two are all the friends I really need."
With that, Sunset Shimmer opened the door and walked away from her former friends to find her true friend.
Dear Princess Twilight,
I'm pleased to report that things have gotten a lot better since the last time I wrote to you. I'm still not friends with Applejack, Pinkie Pie, Rarity, Fluttershy or Rainbow Dash, but this time it's because of my own choices. Because through this whole ordeal, I've learned an important lesson.
A TRUE friend is someone who doesn't judge you based on what you did in the past. A TRUE friend is able to look past those things and see you for who you are at the present. A TRUE friend is someone who, if you're standing at the gates of Tartarus, is next to you with fireproof boots and s'mores makings at the ready.
I realize now that I have two TRUE friends; you and Dani. Next time you come over, I hope we three can get together, I know you'll like her. And really, I'd much rather have only two true friends, than a thousand false ones.
