> Mother of Evil
>  by God of Demons
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

> Chapter 1
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Manehattan is undeniably the most beautiful city in Equestria, a strong competitor to Canterlot. This idea, though quite bold, but also has the right to exist. Many centuries ago, the government of Equestria determined the fate and purpose of this metropolis. A huge number of networks of enterprises with a wide variety of specializations. Here you can also find shopping centers, which are mainly located near the ocean bay. Their purpose is to transport products, goods and items from distant friendly countries to pony lands and, accordingly, sell them to local consumers. This procedure is quite important, because Equestria, despite its development and power, cannot have all the primary and secondary personal necessities for residents. For example, Yakyakistan supplies high-quality medicinal herbs, berries, and potions for pharmaceutical and magical research.

And this is only a small part of what can be said about it.

The perfection and uniqueness of this city is manifested in other areas of pony life. But all this would not have happened if the inhabitants themselves were not so zealous and adamant in their goals. Each of them conscientiously does their job. Which is a consequence of the fact that huge crowds of ponies replace each other on the streets of the city. Everyone is in a hurry to do their own thing. But Manehattan is very large, judging by the geometric characteristics, and therefore there are special ponies with carriages that can deliver their employer to anywhere in the city in a short time.

And now one of them reaches the intersection at full speed and at the last second manages to slip between two of her colleagues and turns right. Of course, such a sharp maneuver strongly shook the transport to the side.

“Ah!” a mare with an oily coat squeaked a little louder than usual speech and pressed hard against the back wall of the transport, trying to maintain at least some balance. Her soft pink waves of the mane immediately trembled from such a sharp swaying, and the bangs covered most of the face and swirled a little at the small nose, tickling and threatening to make a sneeze.

"Sweet Celestia, please don't be in such a hurry, sir," the young unicorn's excited, tinged with annoyance voice cut through the silence. She looked at herself in a small mirror and with her magic frantically wiped off a long ribbon of lipstick coming out of the right corner of her lips and going almost to the temple on the same side.

"But Miss Rarity", slightly slowing down the pace of the gallop over her shoulder, turned into an earth pony with a brown mane and dark orange fur, the stallion did not take his eyes off the road, "Mistress Fleur de Lys extremely rarely makes such orders, and if this happens, it means her and your case is of the utmost importance. I have no right to let her down."

It was amazing to see how this pony manages to clearly express his thoughts during such intense loads. Rarity raised a hoof and lightly patted her mane where her neck met her torso. But even so, she smiled softly and mentally praised the running stallion in front. By the way, his name is Flame Stream. He is the personal taxi driver for the previously mentioned Miss Fleur. He is too young for such a profession, but he still managed to gain the attention of such a high-ranking pony.

And this is not surprising.

Rarity remembers that last Monday when she and Miss Fleur were accidentally caught in a heavy downpour after another fashion show ended near the Statue of the Pony Liberty. Spectators and participants of the events quickly took various taxis and other means of transportation. And they could spend long hours behind the scenes with roofs, if the Flame Stream, who had a maid today, as he said, had not arrived in time, took a cart from somewhere and made a small roof out of his jacket and umbrella. Such a carriage helped us a lot and Flame successfully drove us to the nearest hotel. He himself could not hide from the rain, he was an earth pony. Fleur greatly appreciated such a bold act and hired him as her personal taxi driver. Of course with a triple salary.

Warm memories instantly enveloped the mind of a fashionista. A soft and gentle smile did not fall from her face. She could not believe that her famous model friend would ever be disappointed in such a stallion.

"No need to be so dramatic, darling," Rarity purred in a flirty tone, "Your boss trusts me a lot, which means she will take my words as pure fact if I give you the highest rating for your services. Please do not go beyond your own limits. Or you want so that my tender heart will worry about you if you unfortunately go to the hospital?"

The taxi driver did not look in our direction and continued to pull the carriage behind him. But even so its obvious signs of nervousness were noticeable. No not like this. From hooves to the mane, he was stroked with thick embarrassment. The whole face was bright red, like the tips of the sore ears. The hooves during the run were slightly pulled, which a little difficult control of their own body. The facial expressions of the flame stream grimaced slightly by the type of shy foal of the schoolboy praised a beautiful mare.

"Um ... I ... I don't know .... you .."

“You should not worry so much, Mr. Stream”, a quiet thin voice rang out on the opposite side of the carriage, “I ... we are going to visit a friend, nothing to happen to be serious. Therefore, you should save your own health ...I- If you do not mind of course”

Fluttershy said the last words with a rush. She was a little afraid that their words could depreciate his efforts in the performance of their work. Although there is no sense in this logic, there were still fears. The yellow mare snuggled slightly and held the right wing to the right corner of the carriage. Flame's dangerous maneuver still acted on her. She pushed her pink strands from her face, trying to look at the back of the nap of the stallion running at all. It seemed to her that he was thinking tensely.

“Okay, you won,” I exhaled Flame, “How can I not fulfill the small wishes of such beautiful ladies?”

It was a simple compliment, designated by a rhetorical issue. This technique of flattery is as old as Equestria itself. The stallions were not rarely established relations with influential partners in some major business or simply wanted to make a pleasant one for their special ponies. This flattery has always worked. And now no exception.

“Oh my,” Rarity giggled muffledly, fingering the tip of her mane, “More carefully with expressions, dear. Or are you planning to make us your regular employers?”

"T-Thank you for the compliment", it was all too much for the Fluttershy. She closed her face with the front hooves, hoping to hide the absolutely red skin and wool. Not only did Rarity put them in an awkward position with a flirt from ponies during working hours, but they were praised. He praised her appearance. This kind of compliments have always been a weakness of mare. When someone claims that she is beautiful, it always seems to her that she is exposed special. As if its beauty can shine against the background of a colorless society. "Shine" is drawing unnecessary attention to yourself, and Fluttershy didn't like it.

The next five minutes passed without talking. Unless Rarity occasionally told Flame where and which street to turn. Fluttershy herself directed her gaze to the window opening, where the buildings and ponies constantly replacing themselves were visible under the influence of the carriage. Flame listened to us and reduced his speed a little. So at least the surrounding review did not erode. The yellow pegasus could now distinguish between constructions by external signs: she met small houses of flower merchants, broken by yellow or orange inserts; Ordinary residential buildings with less bright flowers and of course, by her vision could not but go unnoticed by the theatrical quarter of Bridlway, through which we drove and turned to the left.

Fluttershy remembered this place very well. Oddly enough, but for this she could thank Stygian. In those days when he was ... let's say ... darker, she, together with friends and with a idol of Twilight, searched him throughout Equestria. And by mistake we were brought by traces of this main area of Manehattan. As it turned out, the map in the Twilight Castle was old and showed the lands of the pony of the ancient era. On the site of the theater quarter Bridlway, there were dark abandoned lands. It was obvious that Stygian could not recover in such a "bright" place. And this is not surprising. The central square of the city was the most technologically equipped. Numerous billboards, advertising neon signs, light animation stooms. All these things with their existence said that life is too intensively here.

Life passes too intensively, Fluttershy mentally repeated to herself and lowered her head sadly, If they all found out what happened in Ponyville, would they be energetic as now?

]Pegasus felt her eyes get wet. She tightly closed her eyelids, trying not to let out wet drops of grief. She now had similar attacks often and Fluttershy could not do anything about it. Pony jerked her front hooves, miraculously keeping from covering her face. No. Rarity is still here. She shouldn't see her like this. During these four days, the girls have endured so much, Fluttershy does not need to start all over again.

"Are you feeling well, darling?" Fluttershy turned her head sharply towards the source of the voice. Luckily, she didn't cry. Rarity continued, "I noticed your shoulders were shaking."

I don’t understand, she guessed everything or really didn’t suspect anything, she mentally asked herself. Pegasus and continued to look at her friend’s face, trying to find at least some clues in her eyes, in her face, in her lips. It didn't work out.

After a few seconds, the pony slightly moved her pink mane to her face and replied, turning away from Rarity somewhere forward: "It's okay", Fluttershy mentally scolded herself for lying, "It's just ... a little cold"

The purple-maned unicorn looked at the window to her left, then at the other one next to Fluttershy. Yes, she could assume that because of Flame's fast ride, the air in the carriage circulated with the air from outside with great intensity, but still this is not enough to make the pony feel cold...

"A-Anyway," Fluttershy continued softly, noticing the skeptical look in her friend's eyes, "Any news from Miss Cup?"

Rarity looked back at the pony to her right and twitched her ears. She didn't expect this question, "Um, as far as I know, Cup didn't send me any letters, only the one you and I read yesterday. If she didn't decide to share this news with the other ponies," she said last with a smirk and added, "Why do you ask?"

"It's just... I feel like there's something wrong here."

"Fluttershy dear," the white unicorn said warily, “Have you signed up for Rainbow’s training? If so, then you should take additional courses, otherwise you will never be able to scare me.”

Fluttershy looked at her in surprise and then quickly turned away with puffed out cheeks. Rarity began to laugh elegantly. As soon as the pegasus wanted to continue the conversation, she and her friend felt the carriage slow down and come to a complete stop after about thirty seconds.

The mobile taxi stopped so that Fluttershy's window was near the sidewalk. The yellow pegasus looked through the window at the small building they were supposed to enter. This is a residential building with six floors, and each of them housed eight apartments on the front side. Fluttershy paid more attention to the exterior of the building. Here, the walls were built of light bronze-colored reinforced concrete slabs, the window inserts were made of bright red wood, and Fluttershy knew a tree with this color of internal fibers ... from the Everfree Forest. Pegasus trembled.

"Arrival destination on 167 Glittering Victory Street," Flame Stream said formally and cheerfully, "Have a nice evening, Miss Rarity and Miss Shy."

"It was a pleasure for us to use your services," Rarity said in a sweet tone as she put a large amount of bits into the stallion's side bag, "You can keep it, darling."

"But Miss Rarity, there's too much..." Flame couldn't finish because he felt the mare leaning against his left front hoof with her right shoulder, she craned her neck up hard to get close to the stallion's cheek and began to giggle passionately, "...I....I got it...I got it. The desire of my employers is above all."

The flushed taxi driver convulsively closed the side bag and abruptly moved from the spot, wanting to pass the nearest front intersection as quickly as possible.

Rarity waved her hoof at the stallion and then walked towards the building, "What a cute pony, isn't it?" she asked rhetorically, smiling contentedly and walking past the pegasus.

"In public... in front of everyone... how embarrassing," Fluttershy covered her face with her hooves, her speech more like a strangled squeak from a kitten.

"Fluttershy, let's go," Rarity ignored her comment and was already approaching the entrance, inspecting and assessing the outside area of the building.

…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………......................................

Three minutes later they took the elevator to the fifth floor. The metal box, designed for vertical movement, stopped with a low whistle and pushed the doors, a long corridor appeared in front of the mares, on the sides of which doors leading to different apartments were visible.

Rarity didn't think twice and stepped forward first, stepping over the line between the elevator and the floor with her hooves. The pace of her walking was fast, which could imply that the unicorn did not want to spend much time on this visit. Fluttershy immediately followed her, trying to stay as close to her right shoulder as possible. Pegasus tilted her head slightly forward and bit her bottom lip a little. She was a little nervous, because their conversation about Miss Cup was not over yet. And this whole situation looks suspicious. The yellow pony quickened her pace a little. The two friends began to walk in line with each other, and Fluttershy slightly spread her left wing and touched the top of the unicorn's right hoof.

Rarity turned her head so that her right eye caught her friend's face, an enthusiastic faint smile shone on her face, "Did you want something, dear? Oh, I'm sorry if it seemed strange to you that I quickly looked around. Just try to understand me, you just look at these doors", the unicorn pointed with her left hoof at the doors far in front and those next to us, "Each of them is absolutely unique! Just look, they were all chosen for the design in a very specific way. Both the color and the material and the embossed the surface finishes were tailored to the individual preferences of each occupant, and I can tell you for sure that none of these doors are sold in stores."

With each new proposal, the face of the fashion designer gradually acquired familiar features. Eyes filled with life and creative passion. And Fluttershy sees it.

She couldn't help but smile at that moment.

After all, the beginning of the trip to Manehattan was not very pleasant. Pegasus had to put up with Rarity's behavior. She pulled away from reality and closed her eyes for a few seconds, but those few seconds were enough to replay a moment from the past when they got here by train. The memory is clear, as if it happened a few seconds ago. When they just moved away from Ponyville, Rarity decided not to doze off much and asked to wake her up after three stops, the pegasus did not say anything extra, and was even afraid. After all, the way Rarity spoke to her was something that Fluttershy never wanted to face. Her voice was...unnatural, not her own, comparable to meeting Starlight for the first time in that Equality Village.

The same sharp and not sincere, as if she was trying to hide something. But she doesn't get it well. After all, the suspicions were confirmed that Rarity was in an unstable state.

But she doesn't get it well. After all, the suspicions were confirmed that Rarity was in an unstable state ... she made a very unpleasant scandal. In fact, nothing terrible happened at that moment, Fluttershy understood that this is life and a pony can find itself in any unpleasant situation. Except it was hard to explain to the unicorn who pissed off her friend. The poor pony was walking past us with his little dog in a specially portable container. All security measures were observed: the animal is isolated and the owner is nearby. But that wasn't enough for Rarity. In that carriage, Fluttershy didn't know what to do: stand up for her friend or listen to the poor gray unicorn with a blue mane. The fact is that when he walked past us, his pet began to bark and, moreover, very loudly and furiously. And Rarity did not like all this, she quickly got up, forgetting about her fatigue, and began to harshly scold the unicorn for "irresponsibility" and "lack of culture". Normally, Rarity wouldn't act like this. She, like no one else, must understand what it is like to have a very capricious pet. And even when that pony apologized and wanted to leave, the fashion designer insisted on continuing their conversation. This conversation was for the most part consisted of discontent and indignation of her friend. She pointed out his mistakes to him, gave hints of his limited thinking and all that sort of thing. Fluttershy herself stared at the white unicorn in shock, wide eyes staring at the whole argument and that was all the pegasus could do. Or not. She couldn't do anything. The situation was one in which there were no right decisions. She knew that Rarity had gone too far and should not be so angry at a stranger pony for small mistakes. But she couldn't blame her friend either. Probably THAT incident is still in Rarity's mind...

Fluttershy returned her consciousness to the present. That incident began extremely unpleasantly, since ten minutes later the conductor came to them and helped her calm her friend and the angry unicorn, everyone went to their places, and Rarity sat in her place and did not say anything until arriving in the city. This ending was relatively perfect.

Now the pegasus looked at her friend, who continued to talk about the "extravagant" construction and decoration of every door that they had before their eyes. To be honest, the pegasus did not understand much. Rarity uses too many unfamiliar design terms. But this doesn't matter. The fact that Rarity started the conversation first and that she flirted with Flame is proof that she is beginning to recover mentally. Fluttershy couldn't be happier than she was now.

"I did not expect that my description of the exterior of the apartments would be so interesting for you, dear," the purple-blue pony made a pleasant comment, "I am very pleased that this topic is of interest not only to me. If you want, I can help you with choosing a new door or furniture for interior decoration!

"Um..." What an unfortunate incident that happened, Fluttershy was only happy for her friend, "Thanks for the offer, Rarity. But I'm fine with it for now."

A note of annoyance appeared on the unicorn's face as they approached the correct door to their right. This door was painted pale yellow with green insets around the edges, giving the appearance of a writhing dragon.

"You should think twice, Fluttershy," Rarity said with fake hurt as she approached that door and stood to the left of it, facing the pegasus, "Discord has no taste in elegance and fashion. I understand he wanted to help you after when my sister and her friends burned down your door...but why did he create a new door with swampy paint?! It doesn't match the look of your cottage!"

Rarity would like to continue her indignation, but she suddenly heard her listener begin to giggle softly, trying to cover his face with his left hoof to be quieter: "What's so funny?", This action from Fluttershy caused the unicorn to arch an eyebrow and look skeptically at her friend.

"Forgive me," the pegasus tried to chuckle, "Don't get me wrong please, but this incident reminded me of the time you and Discord argued about my new door. You also argued to him about the incompatibility of my house with his gift... and he threatened to paint your boutique the same color"

Fluttershy couldn't help but laugh softly, also covering her face with her hoof. Pegasus understood that her chaotic friend could hear all this and Rarity would very much regret the words that she said.

She looked at the white unicorn again and saw how she made a tight smile, a few drops of sweat flowed from her forehead. She seemed to be thinking the same thing, "W-What's the nonsense, darling?" she said with noticeable nervousness as she looked around, "I'm sure he's not going to do something so childish...yeah...right ...Anyway, we're already there!"

Rarity turned to face the door and lifted her right hoof and brought it closer to the middle of the door. She was about ready to knock, but...

"W-Wait," Fluttershy suddenly stopped her friend, but she didn't expect her to say so loudly, "Like I said before, I think there's something wrong here. Usually if ponies have problems with their pet, they're the ones who come to and they point out problems to me. Now I'm coming to the pony, so he or she is not able to bring their pet to me. So I think there is a serious problem. Ms. Cup assured us that there is nothing serious, but I still worry that I did not take with me medical devices, a dropper, surgical instruments, bandages, antiviral ointments and solutions. I didn’t even take a container for transporting animals.”

During this monologue, Fluttershy's head gradually lowered, and the pupils began to resemble small dots. Anxiety gradually began to grow in the mare's heart. She has no idea what she's about to face. An acquaintance of Rarity did not divulge the details to us, but said that it was very important. Of course, Fluttershy could not refuse help, especially when it came to cute, small and defenseless animals.

What if I arrive unprepared? What if someone's life could depend on me ?, these questions unfortunately could not leave her mind. Fluttershy closed her eyes tightly and tried to calm herself. But her loud breathing betrayed her.

"Oh, oh, oh, take it easy, darling," the unicorn ran up and hugged her friend with both hooves, "I swear, with such imagination, you should have become a writer. Come on ... let's just go and find out for ourselves. I'm sure everything will be fine."

The yellow sand pony opened her eyes and looked first at her friend, then at the door. A sense of insecurity prevented Fluttershy from taking the unicorn's words seriously. But in one thing, Rarity is definitely right - you must first assess the situation yourself. They have already wasted too much time. She turned her head to the pony, who continued to comfort her, and looked into her eyes. Rarity froze for about ten seconds, distracted by the interesting look of her yellow partner. Bolder features, a calm look and a slight nod were confirmation that they were ready.

"That's better," smirked the unicorn and again stood in the same position against the door. She brought her hoof closer and knocked three times. The knocking sound was surprisingly muffled, although according to Rarity, Equestrian wild oak doors are popular in such apartment buildings, and have a special sound. Of course, it is irrational to use it in a public house, but this disadvantage is compensated by the high strength and durability of the material. Fluttershy noticed that there was still no answer and therefore wanted to tell Rarity to repeat it.

But both mares suddenly tensed up when they heard the loud thumping of metal mechanisms heard in the door's key hole. They immediately stood next to each other and began to expect a long-awaited greeting. The door began to slowly open, and as Fluttershy could see, it moved without a single creak. Which was very different from her home. She stepped a little closer.

The door opened fully and the two mares were able to see a short pony, even shorter than Fluttershy, with a fiery orange mane and tail streaked with yellow, and the coat was dyed a pale shade of pink. The mare looked at her guests and smiled warmly, narrowing her eyes a little.

"Good evening, my dear guests, Fluttershy and Rarity," Miss Cup said in a calm and motherly voice, for her middle age she sounded quite resonant, "Please come to my humble abode. I hope your stay here will reflect positively on your mood."

Miss Cup opened the passage for the mares and extended her right hoof towards her apartment, tilting her head just a little.

Fluttershy, without hesitation, began to enter the place with her friend. The adult pony followed them and when all three crossed the threshold of the apartment, Miss Cup closed the door and hurriedly invited her guests into the kitchen. But…

Suddenly, the landlady overtook Fluttershy and turned around to face the puzzled ponies. She stepped closer to them and pulled them both into a warm hug. Fluttershy looked at Rarity in confusion, but the unicorn did not look surprised and only looked at her friend in confusion, then at the adult pony.

"I'm so glad that you came. It's just that the situation is very difficult for me. This whole problem appeared relatively recently and there were no troubles. But still, I would like to ask you for advice in order to avoid any risks. This is your field of activity," at the last sentence, Miss Cup freed her guests from her hooves and looked at the pegasus.

Fluttershy exhaled calmly from the knowledge that nothing terrible had happened: "I will be very glad to help you, Miss Cup," the yellow mare said in a soft tone, spreading her wings a little.

"Any time, dear," Rarity entered the conversation, fixing her purple locks with magic, "But first, let's visit the kitchen. Our journey has been long and tiring. I would like to relax and discuss everything in a calm atmosphere."

The earth pony shuddered and perked up, her face took on the look of surprise mixed with naive confusion, as if she had been caught in some childish prank. She turned sharply towards the white unicorn and tilted her head in embarrassment. Then she began to apologize, in parallel inviting us to the kitchen. The dining room itself was surprisingly small, you could even say that it could only fit four Big Macs.

Yes, it's rather strange to give a size estimate like that, Fluttershy thought, looking at the wallpaper with a reverent look, What unusual patterns and colors. Green tones in the kitchen, light blue in the corridor, and most likely in other rooms as well. But such accurate detailing is very rare. Rarity said that Miss Cup is working as a theater actress at the moment. Hmm... perhaps this was to be expected.

Both ponies were already seated next to each other at the table and were waiting for service from the owner of the apartment. At that time, she was already pouring boiled water into both bowls. Then, from the top shelf above the sink, the pony pulled out two small boxes. One was red with purple subtle drawings, the second was the same, but green.

"Would you like some green tea or some strawberry flavor?" Miss Cup turned her head towards us.

"Strawberry flavored, please," Rarity replied casually and looked at her friend, who timidly nodded in her reply, "We both, if you don't mind."

Miss Cup didn't need to be told twice. She opened the red box with a smile, took out two tea bags in some incredible way and lowered them into mugs. Three minutes later, she poured two spoonfuls of sugar into it for Fluttershy and one for Rarity. She put the used tea bags on a small plate.

Rarity was the first to bring the amazing drink to her lips and take a sip as she sucked in some extra air, which created a special sound when someone was drinking hot tea: "This tea is just incredible. I always knew that you never fail when it comes to choice of drinks. And no matter tea, coffee, wine, cider, cocktails - you always know what is best for the ponies, "said the unicorn, after which she took two more delicate sips.

"It's true," the pink-maned Pegasus added to her friend's words, carefully holding her mug in two hooves and drinking two sips too, then looked at the landlady with her most gentle and calm but grateful look, "It's very tasty, thank you very much"

"Oh come on...hehehe," the adult mare got nervous and sat down opposite them. Her cheeks were slightly reddened, "We...we're not here to praise me, are we?"

"Indisputable fact," Rarity said, and again magically brought the mug to her lips, "But first, let's deal with the problem for Fluttershy."

"Um...I'm not in a hurry, Rarity. You don't have to worry about it," Fluttershy said softly and warily, turning her head towards the unicorn and slightly lowering her hooves with the mug. She considered her friend's words strange, because even on the train, Rarity said that she urgently needed to resolve some design issues with Miss Cup.

"Oh, you don't have to worry about that, darling," the fashion designer said with a little laugh, "when we were getting to my adorable friend across town, I suddenly became interested too. I know your pet, a cat named Betty. She so cute and fluffy! I can't believe she's having trouble transporting her to Ponyville"

Miss Cup bent over a little and put on a guilty smile, wanted to take her mug to take a quick sip, but remembered that she had made portions only for the guests and was even more embarrassed. Then, unexpectedly for the two mares, she got up and with slow steps approached the door leading to the corridor. When she was close enough to the door, she stopped and did nothing for half a minute.

Rarity set her half-drunk mug down on the table and arched an eyebrow in surprise as she looked at her old friend. Fluttershy became a little nervous and looked at Miss Cup with concern. They had such a warm and relaxed atmosphere and suddenly something suddenly went wrong. Pegasus doesn't like it. Her thoughts were interrupted by an earth pony as she opened the door and slowly turned around to face the guests. She closed her eyes and lowered her head with a very loud sigh. There was a deep silence in the room.

"Fang...Fang! Come here," she suddenly said loudly, still holding her head down.

Suddenly, both mares turned their heads towards the exit from the kitchen, where some sounds began to swell. These sounds were difficult to identify, but mixed with the sounds of a small animal running lightly. Fluttershy breathed a sigh of relief, thinking it was a cat...But isn't Miss Cup's cat called Betty? Fluttershy was about to ask about that.

Yes, that's just her mouth could not utter a sound and seemed to have dried up from the all-consuming horror.

She and Rarity looked fearfully at the bottom left corner of the exit to the hallway where a cat suddenly appeared and came and stood next to the adult pony. If this creature could even be called a cat. It was completely black, every part of its body was completely covered with "darkness". Due to the poor lighting of the corridor, it is difficult to see this creature, but Fluttershy clearly saw every inch ... from that it became even more scary. Rarity's horn went out and the mug fell on the table. It hadn't broken, but the tea was now covering some of the table's surface. This "cat" had an unusually large physique, his face was in the shape of a normal feline, only the chewing muscles were more developed. His eyes glowed a poisonous green... literally glowed, and it was because of this that they saw him in a dark passage. But what was the most terrible and made the two Elements of Harmony tremble with fear and reluctantly remember not the most pleasant moments before the great victory over their sworn enemies.

This monster cat was emitting dark purple waves of magic from the corners of its eyes. His body emitted thick emanations of shadow energy, it could be said that this creature probably consisted of shadows. The lower part of his body swallowed up the darkness of the corridor and the shadows literally stuck around the tail and hind legs, not allowing them to be fully examined.

There was deathly silence in the kitchen.
> Chapter 2
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Honestly, none of the mares thought that today would have at least some surprises. Fluttershy relied on a quiet time in her cottage and the usual performance of her duties as a veterinarian and teacher at the School of Friendship. And right now she was visited by similar thoughts, because neither she nor her friend expected this. Her idea was that Miss Cup had problems transporting her pet due to a leg injury, severe fur burns, or a severe rare disease. With all this Pegasus could cope with a hundred percent guarantee. After all, she loves animals very much, absolutely everyone and is ready to spend all her efforts in order to help, or to find a way to solve problems. Fluttershy couldn't believe that for a split second she was able to question her ideals just because she saw this... "cat".

There was silence in the room... the silence of fear. The Element of Kindness wanted to take her eyes off this mystical creature and try to look with her eyes for something that would help them escape from here. But she didn't succeed. An unpleasant cold ran down her back, her hooves began to tremble, and she herself could not help but look into those empty green eyes-lanterns. The creature moved its tail, which escaped from the swirling black energy from the darkened passage into the corridor and stood on all fours.

Fluttershy does not want to see this monster, she wants with all her might that it return to Tartarus or any other forbidden place. If only not next to her: These shadows...shadows...like that time...they came to life again...crystals...

Suddenly, the Pegasus' head abruptly rebooted and it felt like someone was burning her mind. She was able to tear her eyes away from "it". And look down, covering her face with her hooves, desperately trying not to let the thoughts of a particular past appear in her memory. This blackness with cat ears and a tail unconsciously made both mares mentally relive the loss of Ponyville and the destruction of the Tree of Harmony and meeting with...

"Oh no, oh no, oh no, oh no, oh no, oh no, oh no, oh no," Rarity repeated the words of horror as if she were mesmerized.

Fluttershy looked at her in a panic, wrapped her hooves around the unicorn in a sharp movement and covered her mouth with one of these. Rarity began to stifled screams, but it was good that it was quiet. Fluttershy's heart began to beat at the speed of a locomotive at full speed. Her fear did not allow her to do anything, her hooves continued to firewood, and the wings refused to obey at all. Rarity herself did not take her eyes off the creature and twitched and writhed in the arms of the pegasus, trying to break free and run away. But Fluttershy couldn't let that happen. Some animal species are very sensitive to the behavior of surrounding creatures and they may regard some "unexpected" actions as a sign of aggression. Fluttershy knew this because she had to deal with the ferocity of her predatory friends more than once. But here is another case ... she was afraid to imagine what this creature is capable of. At the same time, the cat-like cluster of shadows approached the mares a little closer and sat on its hind legs, nervously waving its tail around.

Please, Rarity, the pony veterinarian couldn't find the strength to say the words and just stared at the perceived threat in front of them, Calm down...I can't do it without you...I'm scared, but please get back to normal.

But the unicorn did not answer the mental request of her friend. She kept trying to break free of the pegasus' grip. Her moans, mooing and crying were the only thing that everyone heard.

Soon, Miss Cup herself recovered from the shock and quickly approached the white pony: "Rarity, my sunshine, please calm down. It's not so bad, let me explain everything," the adult pony spoke in a motherly and half-whisper, but she realized that this would not help and quickly rushed to the sink. She poured cold water into a glass and splashed it in Rarity's face. At the same moment, the body of the unicorn went limp and stopped moving. The only movement from her was the contraction of the muscles of the lungs. Drops of water and dripping mascara dripped from the pony's face. She slightly relaxed her eyelids and looked down at her front hooves, which had already sunk to the floor. Fluttershy sighed in relief as her mane covered her face and she touched her forehead to her friend's right shoulder.

Miss Cup looked with calm sadness at her pet, then at her guests. She came closer to them and gave them the most tender hugs. She expected such a reaction ... but it still looks scary in reality.

The black cat continued to sit quietly and look at them.

Five minutes later, Miss Cup calmed the two mares and assured them that this creature was her new pet and there was absolutely nothing to be afraid of. She brought Rarity a glass of cool water and offered cake to both ponies, but they tactfully declined. This situation simply does not allow her guests to want anything. They all sat down at the table again - the pegasus and the unicorn sat next to each other, and Miss Cup sat opposite them along with the "cat", which settled down next to the left side of its owner and lay down, wrapped in a ball and purring softly. But even such acts of cuteness did not help Fluttershy relieve internal tension. She moved away from her friend a little to be as far away from the potential threat as possible.

"So...you're saying this creature is a cat, am I right?" Rarity finally broke the awkward silence after drinking half a glass of water, "And the reason you called Fluttershy was because of him"

“Yes, everything is correctly noticed,” the older mare said in a slow and even tone, she turned her head towards the creature and looked at him with a gentle look with a smile, then gently stroked his head, from which the cat emitted a deep purr, but did not open his eyes , "At first I did not see any problems in this, I was glad that my Betty would finally have a friend. I discovered him quite by accident. Fang walked along the corridor of my floor with my cat. Or rather, I could assume that they walked and nothing more "When I came to my door, I heard my Betty meow and turned around to the sound. They both came up to me and at that time mine was rubbing her muzzle with this little monster"

Miss Cup told all this without pausing to stroke her pet. Her caring eyes were still fixed on him. But Fluttershy noticed that particles of sadness and uncertainty began to be traced there, as if the owner of this animal wants to tell us something very much, but something is stopping her. Pegasus moved a little closer to the table and put her front hooves on it, her face was a mixture of surprise, doubt...and interest. Fluttershy looked at this creature with curiosity, she really wanted to understand everything that she now sees and hears. She could not believe it, but this situation now appears before her from a completely different angle. She and her friend have just discovered an unknown species of mammal that bears a noticeable external resemblance to members of the feline family. Fluttershy felt her lips twitch a little with eagerness to learn the habits and predispositions of this cat, and her wings relaxed a little after the previous stress. She looked at him. He continued to lie next to Miss Cup and purr from her caresses. Fluttershy sighed unnoticed by everyone from the realization that in front of him lies the usual code with the usual cat habits ... At least she thought so while they were here with him. Pegasus found the strength to smile at him, even if not completely rid of some anxiety. After all, she came here to help, so she must help.

Rarity was still sitting tense, but this time she remained calm. She does not like the fact that she exposed herself in a shameful way and forced her timid friend to be brave for everyone. She frowned at the thought of what everyone had to endure during her tantrum. No, she can't act like that anymore. Now they have a much bigger problem. Rarity levitated the glass down onto the table and looked at the creature with contempt and fear. It emitted smoky black shadows, not much of course but it did. Such strength is familiar to her. This power has caused suffering to many ponies in Equestria and the Empire, this power has swallowed up many innocents with its cursed aura before... This power has corrupted Sweetie Belle.

Dark magic, those two words echoed through the unicorn's mind as she closed her eyes for two seconds, she felt her pulse quicken and looked at the unholy beast again, My precious little sister had the same green eyes as she walked with a soulless gaze along with a bunch of mind-controlled ponies.

"Can you tell me, Miss Cup," Rarity turned her head to her older friend, "For what reason did you decide to keep this... animal? I think it would be wise to inform the special forces about this creature. Connect the Royal Guard to this problem. You could use my help to report this to Princess Twilight."

"Actually... you guessed my next words," the pony stopped petting her pet and looked at the unicorn with a sad smile, "I was originally going to call the wild animal service and report a suspicious creature that could cause us trouble. I already wanted to notify my neighbors to give me support in preventing the creature from going to the lower floors... But I didn't want to do that."

The two mares looked at each other in puzzlement, and then turned their heads back to the narrator. They both raised their eyebrows in a surprised, uncomprehending expression.

"Why did you change your mind?" Fluttershy asked quietly but loudly enough and carefully, not wanting to put pressure on the pony's feelings.

“Fear and Mercy,” Miss Cup explained, but she saw the blank look on the faces of the mares and continued, “At that moment, I had doubts. Would it be right to tell everyone that this beast was hiding next to us? I was afraid that panic might begin and other ponies can do...desperate acts out of fear. This species is unknown to me and it is not given to me to know what Fang can do to protect himself. Just look at him. It is obvious that this cat is unusual and capable of causing a lot of trouble. On the other hoof ", I saw in him something ... unique ... and soothing. A sense of anxiety and responsibility appeared. I wanted to protect this little creature, give him a house that he most likely did not have. In addition, he did not show me any signs of aggression."

After these words, the cat suddenly opens its eyes and meows loudly. Everyone noticed that he got up and began to look at the guests. When he fixed his gaze on the pegasus, he took a closer look at her face, not blinking at all. Fang tilted his head slightly to the side, causing Fluttershy to break out in a cold sweat again. She was scared and uncomfortable because of such close attention. She looked at Rarity then at Miss Cup for help. Her pursed lips and often blinking eyes spoke louder than any words. Rarity wanted to say something to the adult pony, but all she did was a short scream and move away from the table as Fang jumped onto the table and came close to Fluttershy. Everyone froze in anticipation of something not good.

Oh my goodness, oh my goodness, oh my goodness, the yellow-sand mare repeated in her mind, which, according to sensations, was “chained” to her place and could not run anywhere. She opened her eyes wide and pressed her front hooves to her chest, and her wings pressed tightly to her back. At that moment, none of them could move. Her gaze could not tear herself away from the calm, luminous eyes of the creature, which continued to study the poor pony. The shadows clinging to his fur began to move a little faster. Fluttershy let out a squeak when she saw that the cat sat on its hind legs and began to purr. He didn't stop looking at the ponies, but purple energy came out of his eyes.

"Looks like he liked you," Miss Cup chuckled nervously as she realized she hadn't been able to cheer anyone up.

But these words served as a kind of click in the mind of the Pegasus. The thought that animals love her made Fluttershy remember everything. Her profession is a veterinarian, her vocation is to help animals and, most importantly, for her care and caring attitude towards them. Every wild or domesticated creature loves her. And now what has changed? The pony now looks at the cat with more disappointment and sadness than fear. She was disappointed with herself, because today she allowed herself the thought of running away and giving up when she was counted on right here and right now. Fluttershy took a deep breath, her power is to help animals, and now she almost refused one of them. Of course, Rarity got it the other way around and moved closer to her friend, whispering soothing words and asking Miss Cup to move the creature away. But Fluttershy raised her hoof in protest. She slowly raised her head and looked at the black creature again.

"Fang," the mare called to the cat calmly, giving him her most loving look, "Come to me."

This caught Rarity off guard, who began to stammer nervously and hoof-twist against her wet face. She glanced at the cat and then at her friend and could not understand anything: "Fluttershy, dear, please don't. It's not worth it. Let's just..."

Her words were cut off abruptly as the cat slid forward with its shadows and jumped on its front hooves towards the pegasus. Rarity stood up from her seat and was ready for another outburst of emotion, but she was beaten by Miss Cup, who quickly ran up to the unicorn and put her hooves on the young pony's shoulder.

"Just look, my sunshine," the adult pony said, choosing the softest tone of speech, and she slowly nodded for more authentic persuasiveness.

The lilac-violet mare swallowed loudly the resulting lump of fear, but still listened to the pony. She slowly turned her head towards her close friend, subconsciously expecting the worst possible scenario. But that did not happen. The eyes of the unicorn widened with pleasant surprise when she saw that this monster was comfortably placed in the hooves of the pegasus and rubbed its nose against her lower neck. At the same time, Fluttershy gently caresses this black fluffy and strokes his back. Rarity opened her mouth in absolute shock, amazed that her friends had such incredible ponies. She slightly squinted her eyes at Fluttershy, trying to figure out what she was doing... or rather... how she was doing it. The designer has repeatedly made sure that her friend truly has a special connection with a world that is not fully understood by the rest of the ponies. Her ability is the most accurate sense of others, while she correctly finds the emotional conditions in which she and any other being are. What helps her find a common language with any animal, even mythical. And today Fluttershy proved it. But in Rarity's eyes, she had surpassed her limits. The unicorn rubbed her eyes with her hoof, thinking that all she was seeing was an illusion. But it's not. A normal pegasus pony was able to befriend an unknown monstrous dark creature that she had never seen before. Rarity continued to look with shock and skepticism at her friend's sweet communication with the beast, but now there are notes of pride in her friend and interest in this creature in her eyes. She raised her hoof and began to bring it closer to the creature, intending to also assess how safe it was. But she pressed her hoof to her with a squeak as dark splashes of shadows bubbled up on the animal's back.

"Well, I can't worry about you taking care of him now," Miss Cup said in relief, sitting to Fluttershy's right as she walked around the table.

"What?!" the mares asked in unison, causing Fang to playfully meow and turn his attention to Fluttershy's mane.

"You heard right, Fluttershy. My wish is that you take this kitty to Ponyville," the pony said with some concern, shifting her slightly hard gaze from her pet to the pink-maned pony.

"But...but why?" the Kindness Element asked a little excitedly, unconsciously hugging her new friend tighter, who was tugging at one of the pony's mane curls, "I mean, I don't see any reason to be concerned. This cute little kitty interacts well with a postponed pony and shows no ill intentions. If you are worried that you are not completely sure of the correct training control of the Fang, then I can help with..."

"No, no," the older pony waved her hooves quickly, "Don't worry about it, my dear Fluttershy. That's not the point at all. It's just...I'm just worried about the possible further consequences."

"Possible further consequences?" Rarity repeated after her questioningly.

Miss Cup got up from her seat and went to the opposite side of the table, she took the glass that Rarity had and carried it to the sink. Then she turned with a sigh and looked at her guests with a sad and tired face and said the following: “We all know very well that Fang is not an ordinary cat. And what surrounds him, I mean these black ghostly masses, is absolutely abnormal. I ...I read about this, about this magic... and even personally met something similar a month and a half ago in Canterlot. When he came to Equestria..."

Here Miss Cup's monologue ends when she notices how her guests gasp and turn away in different directions at the same time and close their eyes tightly, trying to drive away the terrifying and unpleasant memories.

"I'm sorry about that my dear children," the pony said quickly, hoping not to embarrass the mares, "I mean, I'm not the most reliable animal keeper and I can't exactly guarantee that it will be safe for my Fang here. My job is a theater actress so i spend the whole day learning the lyrics and dealing with my character's expression in the story while fang and betty are living on their own and only celestia knows what might happen so long as i can control his behavior but i'm afraid that the city with its chaotic and continuous flow of busy ponies can push my pet to the limit and happen..."

Miss Cup did not finish, it was evident that it was all hard for her. Every word she uttered was very hard for her. Fluttershy understood her perfectly and continued to look at her with a sympathetic look.

"This cat is dangerous," Miss Cup finally said her main point, "In the two weeks that he lived, nothing terrible happened to me. But I can not promise you that everything will be stable in the future. So please ... take him"

"Miss Cup..." Rarity couldn't find the right words and just looked at her friend.

Fluttershy continued to keep a black cat in her hooves, which, during the revelation, was distracted from playing with the mare's mane and looked at its owner with a look that no one could easily understand. But now it didn't matter. Pegasus is now carefully analyzing everything that Miss Cup told them. Fluttershy became more and more of the idea that there was nothing wrong with the words of her new acquaintance. She was well aware that not all animals can adapt to the conditions of a random urban environment. Moreover, there are some species that simply do not tolerate the appearance of high-rise buildings due to the fact that they are genetically predisposed to harsh arid conditions where almost the only flora of those places is bushes or thorny voluminous cacti. This is in no way combined with the abundance of shady places in a city like Manehattan. Or Fluttershy remembered those animals who lived all their lives in those conditions in which they had to listen to sounds, living in a quiet and temperate environment. And the idea of sending such individuals to live in a noisy city was doomed to failure in advance. What can a pony say when it comes to supernatural beings?

Fluttershy heard a soft sob coming from somewhere ahead of her. She pulled herself out of her thoughts and looked at the source of the sounds.

Miss Cup covered her face with her front hooves and wept softly. Rarity gave her a worried look and immediately got up from her seat and walked over to her. But the adult pony stopped her, "It's all right," she said a little cheerfully, sniffing, "It's just that I got too old, so I worry about all sorts of things."

She needs help right now, Fluttershy thought. She turned to me for help on how to say goodbye to her pet, now I know it.

Pegasus let go of the cat and walked over to Rarity, who was three paces away from Miss Cup. She's more than confident to take Fang back to Ponyville. Of course, this decision has a lot of responsibility, because they are now talking about a shadow monster, and such creatures have a different reputation in the society ... or rather, they don’t. Fluttershy only realized that she and the rest had not seen anything like it either in Equestria or in other lands, and therefore she nervously weighed all the pros and cons in her thoughts to announce her idea. Crazy idea. But for now, this is the correct one. Yet she understood how much it meant to Miss Cup. She looked sadly at the crying pony in front of her. It was obvious to Fluttershy that the pony was very attached to this mysterious cat and did not want to let him go so easily. But she, like Fluttershy, understood that it would be better this way. Though the very thought of her doing the same to Angel someday made Fluttershy feel a little moisture around her eyes and a tingle in her hooves. She calmly exhaled, now you need to focus on something else.

"I accept your offer," the words were confident and quiet, but for one pony, they were louder than thunder.

"What?" Miss Cup asked in a subdued voice, as if she couldn't believe her own ears.

"I will take your pet to Ponyville, you can count on me. I have experience with such cases and will monitor Fang's behavior during train transport. If anything happens, Rarity will help me," Fluttershy said her promise in a confident and soft tone and put her hoof on pony's left shoulder, "I have an animal shelter called Favorite Feather, where your pet will be happy"

A caring and gentle look makes Miss Cup have no doubts and believe the young veterinarian. Overwhelmed with a variety of feelings, she sat on her hind legs and silently repeated the words of gratitude to both ponies, again covering her face with her hooves. Rarity hugged her adult friend and assured her that there was nothing more to worry about, they could handle everything. True, she did not like the prospect of returning home with a monster about which she knew nothing. But what to do if you were asked to help.

"Fang," Fluttershy looked back and called out to the cat, who was literally hiding in the shadows under the table, "Your owner wants to see you."

The black creature jumped out of the blackness, leaving misty waves of darkness behind it, and landed in front of Miss Cup. From the outside, it looked like the ponies surrounded the animal from all sides - Miss Cup in the front, and Rarity and Fluttershy obliquely on the sides to the left and right, respectively. The pony actress crouched a little lower to get a better look at the face, which she will not see for a long time. The cat wagged its tail a little, dispersing the curly shadows, and raised its head up a little, looking directly into the eyes of the one who took care of him for a long time.

"I will visit you, my boy. I promise. In ten days I will receive my salary and then I will take a vacation. You just wait for me," the words came hard for her, because she was on the verge of crying, "I understand that you are here not so long ago. But during this time you filled my life with something other than work, your appearance and subsequent living with me gave me something that I did not receive for a very long time. No matter how strange it may sound, but the danger emanating from you gave me a reason to live"

The creature from the shadows continued to look at the owner with his calm and wise gaze. He carefully peered into every emotion that raged in her wet eyes. And finally he approached her and touched his forehead to the pony's stomach, while closing his eyes and purring loudly.

Pretty strange behavior for a cat, but Miss Cup didn't care. She could not help herself and hugged her cat very tightly and began to cry with stifled moans. The creature's head was between the pony's cheek and her shoulder. The shadows of the animal gently stroked the body of its owner, and he himself did not stop purring. Large drops of tears shattered into smithereens as they touched the wooden floor. The pony massaged behind Fang's ear with a trembling hoof, knowing that he loved it. And deep down, Miss Cup hoped that he would not forget it.

That he won't forget her.
> Chapter 3
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The trip back to Ponyville was smoother than the pegasus had expected. Although now she is responsible for transporting a particularly dangerous creature, but during this time there were no troubles. Which worried the pony a little. She turned her head to the left and looked down to where the cat transport container lay beside her. In the last fifteen or so minutes of the train ride, Fang did not show any "awkward" movements. All this time he lay in his little house and slept quietly. Fluttershy went over in her head various developments in which the shadow monster leaves its usual habitat. And each of them had a sad outcome. In the pony's imagination, Fang could lose control of his instincts, attack those around him, destroy property, or use his evil powers for...evil deeds.

But he didn't do any of that.

Fluttershy was able to relieve herself of tension, close her eyes for a second and now with great tenderness look at her new friend, who still continues to sleep in his little "prison". The sandy-yellow veterinarian had already become attached to him and did not want to see him as the cause of troubles and problems. Therefore, she must keep him as close to her as possible for everyone's safety. Which was very supportive of Rarity? The unicorn was still afraid and distrustful of Fang, and therefore sat opposite them on another sofa. She settled closer to the window and looked through the window at the rapidly changing landscape from the speed of the train. They sat in the fifth compartment, closer to the front of the train. Only occasionally did Rarity glance at the container, as if reassuring herself that everything was fine. Fluttershy, of course, noticed this, but did not want to comment on anything. She understood her friend very well. Now in their hooves there is a scientific and biological sensation, a new kind of life, and even one that has mystical forbidden powers. If all of Equestria finds out about this, then panic will begin.

The more Fluttershy thought about it, the sadder and more depressed her face became. After everything that happened, they all deserve a good rest. Everyone felt their pain and loss in those dark moments that occurred after the unofficial announcement by the princesses that Twilight was now their future replacement on the throne. Especially what happened to Ponyville now....

Tears filled Fluttershy threateningly. She shook her head sharply to drive away the negative obsession. Her mane swayed violently, covering the right side of her face and creating a small gust of wind. Pegasus stopped looking at the cat and wanted to switch her gaze to her friend. At the same time, quickly wipe your face from tears. But Rarity seemed to have foreseen the action of the mare and turned to her first. Only now she has completely turned to the pegasus. Fluttershy could have sworn she saw a moment of horror in Rarity's eyes. But she quickly pushed those thoughts away. The white unicorn moved forward a little, resting its front hooves on the table. She cleared her throat and looked uncertainly at the pegasus.

"So...", Rarity began awkwardly and uncertainly in her surprisingly clear voice, "We took Miss Coop's pet to take him to a more suitable habitat, right?"

"Yes...", the other pony answered cautiously and with confusion, placing her left hoof on the container

"And ... our ... your task is to adapt this creature to life in Ponyville and monitor its behavior," now the lilac-purple pony is no longer asking, but as if stating obvious facts.

"Yes..." Fluttershy repeated calmly.

"And as you said, this monste... Fang will live with you for the first time in order to gradually accustom him to new conditions and..."

Rarity jumped a little in surprise, but then sat back down in her seat. Her speech was abruptly interrupted by Fluttershy, who slightly rose from her seat and took the unicorn's hoof in her hooves. Pegasus looked into the eyes of her friend, depicting a slightly inquisitive but warm and compassionate look. Fluttershy smiled slightly, but her eyebrows raised to the bridge of her nose showed a slight sadness. With all her behavior, the yellow mare showed that she understands everything and expects true words from her friend.

"Ha, how could I forget your insight, darling" Rarity made a hilarious and snide comment before continuing with a small sigh, "I wanted to say thank you for you"

At this point, Fluttershy was caught off guard, her wings fluttered and her eyes widened in surprise, "W-What, but I did't..."

"Trust me, you did a lot more than you can imagine," Rarity interrupted her, predicting the mare's next words. She wrinkled her face and turned away for a moment, then looked back at her friend and continued, “My unexpected desire to accompany you on this trip must have alerted you. In fact, you could have sorted out this problem without me. You could also find the place where my friend lives. But anyway, I went with you... I didn't hear anything from you. I mean, you didn't say why, you didn't give me any uncomfortable questions or complaints... You just listened to me and agreed... I ...I do not know what to say."

The pony fell silent and lowered her head slightly. Now she is not looking at the pegasus, her gaze rested on the table in front of her. She wrinkled her eyebrows a little and moved her eyes frantically, as if trying to find the right words in this furniture.

But she didn’t succeed, as Fluttershy abruptly stood up from her seat, walked around the table and sat next to her friend and hugged her, pressing her left cheek against Rarity’s right shoulder: “You don’t have to say anything, I never thought that your presence would be I'm even more excited when my little adventure is shared by the ponies I value the most in the world. You're my best friend, Rarity. I love you so much."

Such simple words but so important for a unicorn. She softened in the embrace of Fluttershy's hooves and, in turn, hugged her friend with her hoof and closed her eyes, depicting a calm and tired smile.

"Thank you, darling," Rarity said softly, "I really needed those words."

Then they were suddenly distracted by a loud meow. The heads of the two mares quickly turned towards the source of the sound and saw shadows erupting from the closed cage, and green eyes glowing with purple energy, looking at the ponies with interest, could be seen from the darkness. Rarity hurriedly warned Fang not to draw too much attention to herself. Surprisingly, the cat obeyed the pony's command and simply curled up again and closed his eyes. Of course, such actions greatly frightened the unicorn, but her stress was quickly disintegrated when she saw her friend rise slightly and frantically look around the train car, desperately hoping that no one saw this. Rarity mentally smirked at the thought that the pegasus, on the contrary, was attracting attention with its panic attacks.

"This trip is the most exciting thing that has happened to us in a while," Rarity laughed coquettishly at their situation and hugged her friend, making her sit down.

Fluttershy looked at the pony with a surprised and uncomprehending look, which continued to cuddle and look at her friend with a smile full of playfulness and tenderness. She slightly crossed her hind hooves under the table in embarrassment. But the realization of what Rarity meant quickly came to the pony's mind as she quickly reviewed all the events that they experienced that day: new acquaintances for the pegasus and opening of old wounds for everyone, a potential "dark" threat appeared and Rarity's sudden outbursts of tantrum ... and in the end, accepting all this and laughing at your fears in the face as confirmation that they will all overcome victoriously.

Fluttershy smiled broadly at her friend, her eyelids slightly closed, giving a warm and tender look. She moved closer to Rarity and crossed her hooves around her neck, resting her head on her right shoulder.

"Yes you are right"

So they sat for quite a long time. They had nowhere to hurry. The locomotive continued to pass through the night expanses of the beautiful country of Equestria, completely losing the great city on the horizon. The silence outside was broken by the violent thudding of the train as it moved, and the occasional ringing of the horn in the driver's cab. The speed was optimal, not as fast as in the daytime, but it was enough for our Elements. The way home was relatively short, but even this time was enough for them to clear their heads of bad thoughts.

In the deepest layers of her subconscious, Fluttershy hoped such cute moments would be repeated often.

No one will argue that Ponyville at night is very beautiful. It was already about nine o'clock in the evening and half of the houses froze in sleepy silence, without radiating light from the windows. Because of what, the small town was less noticeable in its area, from which small luminous sparks were clearly visible in the sky, filling everything around with mysterious and mystical beauty. It was dark and light at the same time, which perfectly complemented the image of the Night Princess' ideal realm. The moon, illuminating all the vast lands, stood out especially against the general background. It is beautiful. And what was more attractive to this celestial body was that the moon "allowed" to look at itself, to look at its light and beauty. At that time, the Sun could not afford it. Due to the cloudless weather, the entire area of Ponyville and its environs was clearly visible and the ponies could do without additional light to do their business at night.

But that was hard to prove to Rarity.

The unicorn had been unable to cancel her lighting spell since dropping off at the Ponyville stopover. Until they entered the busier and brighter quarters of the town, Rarity carefully illuminated each area of land, looking for possible "traps" in the form of damp mud or rain puddles. Perhaps her concentrated face was the most amusing in this moment. Slightly pouted lips, a focused look as if she is working on the selection of fabric for a wedding dress for princesses. Rarity didn't want to get her "beautiful" hooves into any "dirty" trouble. And this behavior can be justified. Miss Coop gave Rarity a special hoof polish, a raspberry purple ointment with a silvery powder. This item is very rare even in Canterlot and therefore Rarity has no intention of wasting such a "divine gift" in her words.

Fortunately, Fluttershy could breathe easy, because now they are walking past a street with closed shops. And such places are usually well equipped with light. As a result, Rarity relaxed and walked calmly, turning off the overly bright spell. Which was very good since Fang no longer growled at the unicorn. But Rarity wasn't afraid of him at the moment. All her thoughts were completely occupied with the desire not to ruin a gift of such high quality.

Speaking of Fang.

The container with the shadow cat was carefully strapped to Fluttershy's back so that the wings weren't too tight against her torso and could move a little freely. Rarity categorically refused to carry the creature herself. She said that he felt great sympathy for the Pegasus and that only she could restrain his impulses under unforeseen circumstances ... and Rarity was still afraid of him. Fang himself did not feel very comfortable. From the moment they landed in Ponyville to now, he was wary of the unfamiliar storefronts, the small, unassuming houses, the spacious roadways, and the absence of many off-flavours from industrial activities. All this was new to him and that is why he occasionally reacted with a defensive attitude to every unexpected action. For example, a pony will abruptly pass instead of him, unexpected clapping of bats over their heads, leery pegasus, festive cheerful sounds from some houses. But it's good to have Fluttershy around. At these moments, she turns back and with one eye looks at the cat peering out of the shadows of her cage with evil eyes, then she melodiously and quietly calms her little friend. And now she does it. The cat calms down every time and lies down on his stomach when the yellow pony gives him such signs of attention.

Their main task at the moment is to get to the Rarity Boutique and there everyone will go to their home. They didn't last long enough. Seven minutes or so. Along the way, Rarity and Fluttershy talked about what each would do tomorrow. And their plans were more than predictable. Rarity was going to continue to work on her design projects and exchange with colleagues from Canterlot. The pink-maned veterinarian plans to prepare a separate accommodation for his new guest tomorrow. She's not sure exactly what to do. After all, the preference for a supernatural look is unknown to her and therefore she will be forced to draw up various options for arranging apartments for Fang. But based on his biology, she could assume that he likes conditions with less light. She just has to figure it out.

Now they had come to a path that led away from the center of the town and led the way through a small, uneven area of grassy ground. From this point on, the light of the bright street lamps began to get worse to this place, and Rarity again lit her horn with magic to light the way forward. She walked ahead of the group and tried to turn her head to the sides for a deliberate survey of the area. Indeed, in the darkness of the night, neither a pony nor any other creature can navigate by its own capabilities.

At least Fluttershy used to think so. Her thoughts returned to the cat that lays at ease in its cage on her back. It would seem that everything is going well for them, but Pegasus still survived. She will soon have to explain herself to her other friends and explain the reasons for the presence of such a creature as Fang in their area. The ponies had similar thoughts as they passed the Sugarcube Corner. They couldn't visit Pinky. When they got there, Mr and Mrs. Cake said that she left for Twilight's castle three minutes ago. Here all other options are gone. Fluttershy did not want to show herself to her alicorn friend with a new guest with all the strength of her soul. She remembered how much she pursed her lips in nervousness at the thought. Luckily, Rarity thought the same, and they decided to wait until tomorrow for now. Their main goal was to get to the Carousel Boutique and say goodbye there until the next day.

They continued to walk along the uneven path, occasionally looking around. Rarity would occasionally strike up a conversation with her friend. But all these were short in time. The ponies mostly asked each other how they were feeling or commented on the environment. True, the unicorn had to first convince Fluttershy that everything was under control and that they did not need to look again at those places where the light of their friend's magic did not reach. Pegasus was a little afraid to be surrounded by pitch and unknown darkness. Fluttershy, during their walk, instinctively looked at her back where Fang was. And every time she did this, her worried look softened from the realization that everything was in order with the cat and the obscurity of the invisible parts of the night did not harm him. Of course, this probability was extremely small. When later the yellow-sand pony thought about it, her nose wrinkled slightly cutely and her eyes closed her eyebrows to the bridge of her nose as a gesture of what the pegasus was thinking. She should not worry about Fang so often, because the mare's intuition suggested that such a creature should not have problems with being in scary unlit places. After all, she herself saw how he literally merged with the shadows of the corridor from the kitchen in Miss Coop's apartment. This sudden "dark" appearance made the veterinarian look through all the moments of her life in an instant and mentally say goodbye to her loved ones ... Of course, these are very exaggerated descriptions. But that's exactly how Fluttershy and her friend felt at that moment.

Fluttershy lagged behind Rarity a little and lowered her head slightly, posing with a calm, sad look. She was of course happy to help the pony with her animal problem. After all, it was literally her calling in life and no pony has yet been found who would not thank the young Pegasus for the fact that with her support each of their pets feels healthy and full. Even now, she cares deeply for this cat, even if it has...sinister features. But still. It's unfair that all this happened right now. Fluttershy shook her head, trying to brush away the negative thoughts. But it didn't work. She lifted her eyes to the front and looked around a little, catching up with Rarity.

They began to approach the right place. The unicorn gasped happily and slightly accelerated the pace of walking, which the pegasus did the same. After about four minutes, they reached the fashionista's place of work. Rarity looked up at her house with reverence and joy.

"Oh, how long it's been," said the pony, clinging to the door and stroking it a little with her hoof, "I missed you so much my sweet, my irreplaceable"

Fluttershy was certainly pleased that Rarity wanted to go home so badly. But she couldn't bring herself to smile. She closed her eyes and sighed doomedly, because she had suspicions that everything could happen again.

"Yeah... it's good to be back home," Pegasus said, still finding the strength to fake a tired and exhausted smile, "I'll have a good night's sleep."

"I can't advise you and myself better," the pony gasped dramatically as she stopped cuddling with her Boutique and looked at her friend with a playfully dejected expression, "This day turned out to be much more problematic than I expected. Forgive me for that, darling. I really had no idea what we will have to take responsibility for such a horror again"

The last she said with a bit of disgust and mockery, pointing her hoof at Fluttershy's back from where two green eyes were staring at the purple unicorn with annoyance.

"I'm sure I'll be able to make a better life for Fang. A good pony from Manehattan is counting on me," the pony said a little shyly and softly, looking at Rarity with tender but determined eyes.

"There is no other way for the Elements of Harmony," the unicorn said calmly, looking up at the top floor of her house. Fluttershy noticed that Rarity narrowed her eyes a little in a tired form of tender and sad look, she seemed to be thinking about something, "We should always be seen as a role model for others"

Fluttershy just now realized that their conversation is developing in a completely bad direction. She noticed it in her friend's voice and face. She urgently needs to do something to keep Rarity from opening up memories of THAT incident.

"Of course, but don't worry about the container. I'll give it to you tomorrow. Opal must be really missing her portable house right now," the pegasus quickly and nervously changed the subject and looked at her friend with extremely hidden concern.

Rarity looked at the pegasus in surprise, but then after a second she snorted merrily and rolled her eyes, saying, "Come on, darling. You can keep it, you'll need it more."

"But it's not difficult for me, I'm not going to..."

"Don't even think about arguing, dear. I've decided everything." The pony solemnly raised her hoof to interrupt Pegasus, "You are my friend. So you can consider it as a gift. Moreover, Opal has lost weight and now her slender body does not look aesthetically pleasing with primitive square corners of this box"

"I...thank you, Rarity," the pony said as she walked a little closer to her.

"Any time, darling," Rarity looked at the pegasus with genuine joy, she smiled, even though it was very difficult for her. Sadness and depression were betrayed by a weak smile and tired eyes, "Now let's finish. I don't know about you, but I can't stand on my hooves anymore"

On that pony, they decided to say goodbye and go to each of their houses. Rarity waved at her friend and entered the Soi Boutique herself. Fluttershy turned back to her path and walked further away from this place. Even if it was dark, Pegasus was not so afraid of it now, because she knew this path very well and was confident that it was safe here. She passed lush bushes, past low grass from which came the chirping of crickets and praying mantises. Fireflies flew through the air in some places and carved beautiful patterns of point light in the sky, they could easily be confused with the stars of the night sky. This sometimes happened when she looked up. Pegasus noticed that there are more of them this year than usual. She continued to pass through the peacefully sleeping nature, which seemed to be waiting for the coming of the sun. Fluttershy couldn't bring herself to think that she was feeling very good right now. Being in a quiet environment, surrounded by peace and tranquility, helps her clear her head of anxiety and breathe in the pleasant fragrant smell of night flowers that came to the territory of Ponyville from Everfree. Soft moonlight with a bluish-white glow revealed large lush trees that ribbedly pulled their leaves due to the low wind speed.

"I wish I could be in this silence forever," the pony thought aloud with relief, "The last days have been very loud and..."

Pegasus slowed down a bit and stared blankly ahead. It would seem that now everything was fine and she could return home without any worries. But apparently fate had other plans for her. After all, doubts still did not disappear. Fluttershy couldn't get it out of her head. She was worried that the news that a dangerous creature like Fang was in Ponyville might cause even more emotional wounds for her friends and the rest of the ponies. But she still tells them because she needs their support. So much has happened in those four days... and now it's Miss Coop's problem.

Fluttershy looked sadly back at Fang. The cat did not sleep, but only looked out of the lattice and looked at the ponies with calm curiosity, Let's hope that they will love you, the pony mentally told herself and smiled reassuringly at her little animal, slowly turning her head forward, If only you and I managed to avoid trouble with. ..

Fluttershy stopped abruptly in place and almost lost her balance when she saw the painfully familiar fence enclosing vast fields of crops and apple forests, a crimson giant barn towering over everything that her farmer friend had at her disposal. Fluttershy stared at Sweet Apple Acres in fascination. To her surprise, she had already scolded herself hundreds of times for forgetting that her way home intersected with her friend's farm. Fluttershy continued to walk, but even more slowly and with trembling hooves. She swallowed the resulting tide of fear. Pegasus did not want to be here, it was hard for her to look at this place. Because the Apple family's business lands no longer radiated ingenuous joy and hospitality. No one else allowed himself to come to them with a carefree mood ... Even Pinky tries to be careful every time she interacts with Applejack. But the farmer didn't care.

Nothing worries her now.

"Fluttershy!"

The pony had almost left the territory of her friend, and immediately she froze in place. A strong shiver ran through her body and she began to look around. She didn't expect anyone to call her at this time of day.

"Fluttershy!"

Now the sound of the voice was clearer and came from behind the pony and... Wait, I know that voice, the young pony exclaimed in her mind and turned back.

Running towards her at a distance of thirty meters was a tall, wiry unicorn stallion with a creamy-brown coat and a short golden mane and tail. The bangs, which were once carelessly combed a little to the side of the horn, now rose and pressed back. The poor pony ran so fast that he completely lost control of his appearance. He ran the middle of Fluttershy's path when she first saw her friend's possessions, and asked her not to leave, although there were obvious problems with the intelligibility of her voice greedily swallowing air.

Soon, he stopped three steps from the pegasus and strongly twisted his body. His chest expanded and contracted intensely, trying to stabilize the stallion's furious breathing, he wiped sweat from his forehead with his left hoof and made comments about his poor physical stamina.

"Oh Celestia, Trenderhoof, are you okay? Why are you like this?" Fluttershy recovered from her shock and was ready to help the pony, but he raised his hoof in protest.

"I appreciate your concern, but it's not worth it," the stallion said in a serious tone, standing in front of the pegasus. He looked at her with a mixture of sadness, tension and... relief?

"Ah...well, well, if you're okay," Fluttershy said awkwardly and a little flushed, taking her left hoof with her right hoof. She couldn't understand why the unicorn had appeared so suddenly at the time of day when it should be with the Apples.

During this time, a lot has really changed. After all, the most famous travel writer in Equestria is now standing and wants to start a conversation with a relatively ordinary pony from the village. Although four days ago this was unthinkable. Trenderhoof now lives in Ponyville, having abandoned his writing career and rented an ordinary apartment next to City Hall. Of course, such news was met with indignation from his readers and colleagues, but the stallion never worried about this. He has now taken a job as the mayor's secretary and is in charge of his most responsible documentary operations. Since there are no clear divisions in the duties of the mayor's secretaries in the mayor's administration, Trenderhoof now has a multidisciplinary specialization. Through his hooves pass documents and agreements on public services, organizing private meetings with the elite of other cities, settling construction issues, solving everyday issues of the town's residents and much more. In fact, he shares power over Ponyville with the mayor. That's how hard he tries. But it was more difficult for him to adapt to a new place. Fluttershy heard from Rarity that Trenderhoof was having some difficulty adjusting his lifestyle here. He needed to take responsibility for more household items, because now the unicorn is going to stay forever and not for three days, a week, as he did before in his travels. Most of all, he had problems with the arrangement of personal apartments. The Trenderhoof was surprisingly sloppy in terms of interior design, though in Fluttershy's mind it was just as demanding in design as Rarity. As for the interaction with the inhabitants of Ponyville, the ponies had no problems here. During this half week, he managed to make friends with many ponies, among which were like Pegasus with friends, Wonderbolts, teachers from the School of Friendship and the Apple family. True, Big Mac at first attributed Applejack to his "old friend" with noticeable distrust. He was well aware of the past connection between Applejack and the writer. On other occasions, he has been chased away by a pesky unicorn who comes to help them all too often. But not now. THIS incident hit the happiness of the Apple family very hard, especially for Big Mac... Now he has to leave town often to help... That's why Trenderhoof came to Ponyville to provide the support that Applejack needs. And he tries to fill in for Mac at work when the older Apple leaves, though he's not good at it.

"I would like to be as good as you say, Fluttershy," the stallion said sadly and calmly, but the pegasus could see that he was holding back more than half of his feelings, "I see that you recently returned to Ponyville and you were not here all day, right?"

"Yeah, Rarity and I just got here," Fluttershy answered the obvious question and looked at him a little puzzled.

"And you didn't meet any of your friends, didn't they tell you anything?" The trend loosened up a little here and slightly raised his voice in mute concern, he tilted his head forward a little, hoping that this way he would better hear the mare's words.

"As soon as we arrived, we immediately began to go home," the pony began to look suspiciously into the anxious eyes of the unicorn, "I did not meet anyone from my acquaintances, they were probably all at home. Trend, why are you asking?"

"I see, so you don't know...", rubbed his eyes with a hoof, ignoring Fluttershy's question, then he lowered his hoof and looked at his friend with a completely exhausted look, "Big Mac arrived an hour ago"

Fluttershy struggled to keep her hooves buckling in shock as she opened her eyes wide, looking at the unicorn in front of her as if she were someone else's pony. Immeasurably huge waves of surprise, relief and fear arose in the pony's heart. This news can be perceived very ambiguously. During all these unnaturally long four days, Mack periodically leaves to assist in the search. Although the Sky Guard Special Squad and its commanders are extremely reluctant to have a civilian pony interfere with their investigation, since Apple's older brother was on friendly terms with Shining Armor, he was still able to get him to be allowed to interfere in their work. Naturally, the red pony's occasional departures could be bad for his family's family business, but he and Granny Smith talked about it. The older pony certainly didn't mind her grandson's decision. On the contrary, according to her, she would have done something similar. Because the Apple family always sticks together...no matter what. It was more difficult, of course, with his sisters. Applejack sincerely understood her brother's intentions, but she tried to dissuade him from such a dangerous idea. She said that he shouldn't risk himself for the fact that he did not know the sure one and that his main duty now was to be with his family in this dark hour. Applejack didn't like her brother's emerging penchant for overdramatism, after only four days had passed. Not much can happen in four days. But Big Mac was adamant in his decision.

Fluttershy sighed heavily and lowered her head, unable to imagine how Apple Bloom felt when she told them everything. The little pony didn't want to keep it to herself, so she told her sister's other friends when she was at the castle. Applejack wanted to keep this problem a secret from her friends, so as not to worry anyone again, but apparently what happened - it had to happen. The poor thing listened to the conversation of her elders and could not do anything, she did not seek to impose her point of view on her brother, and she was just scared. She was afraid for her brother and couldn't argue with Applejack because she was right too. The foal just wanted THIS situation to never happen.

Pegasus the veterinarian prayed, very strongly asked the higher powers that everything would be fine. She wanted this nightmare to end so that Applejack and her family could live again... truly live. Fluttershy fought back the urge to cry again, her wet eyes just couldn't hold all the pain. And to distract herself, she raised her head to the tall stallion with eyes full of hope.

"And...they have some leads?"

"Even more... they found her," these words came very hard for Trenderhoof, as if he was defending his dissertation on the study of the physiology of Discord.

"Really?! Oh my... How glad I am, I...", the pegasus' fleeting flash of joy immediately faded as she looked again at the unicorn who no longer looked at her, he tilted his head down and twisted his face heavily and clenched his teeth like he's holding back... the pain?

"T-Trenderhoof, what's wrong," the pony asked in a squeaky, quiet voice, desperately pushing away any negative notions about it.

"A Sky guard reconnaissance group was patrolling the northwestern sector of the Everfree Forest at six o'clock in the morning. Later, an hour later, they stopped to rest and recheck their equipment. But one of their members, a pegasus named Thunderlane, discovered an important clue west of their camp "This evidence confirmed that Sugar Belle was in this part of the forest."

Fluttershy continued to listen to her friend, and the more he spoke, the more the mare's ears drooped, and her eyes filled with intense impatience and anxiety. Fang seemed to sense his pony's unease and raised his head from his paws and looked at this action with curiosity.

Trend took a deep breath, his lips trembling for a second as he had to say something he was willing to disbelieve: "They found Sugar Belle's hoof under a small stone rock."

Fluttershy collapsed onto her hind hooves. For her, the whole world has now stopped.

Trenderhoof heard his own rapid breathing, his head covered with cold sweat and he continued to look at the ground: “The examination in Canterlot confirmed that it was Sugar Belle. Her hoof was bitten off from the shoulder ... experts said that the time of the bite was about two days ago. ..Sugar Belle officially declared dead"

These words.

These same words. These vicious and repulsive sets of letters Fluttershy didn't want to hear. All these days she resolutely avoided these. In the back of her mind, she hoped that everything worked out well and that Sugar was just lost in the outskirts of the Evergreen and nothing else...she hoped for a better ending.

Fluttershy put her front hooves on the sides of her head and held on, held on very tightly. She felt how her soul was dying, how pain, despair and a desire to scream were stepping on the fragments of her heart with their thick legs. But when she opened her mouth, she noticed that she had no voice, she let out stifled sobs that Trend could hardly even hear. But their suffering was boundless. Fluttershy stared down somewhere, looking wide-eyed. Tears streamed from her eyes in large streams, the pony tried to wipe them away, but they continued to flow. The wings were relaxed and completely lowered down, she began to tremble as if it were winter with sub-zero temperatures. Pegasus tilted her head down, even lower than a unicorn, and wrapped her hooves around it so that she completely blocked her view. She wasn't worried about her wrinkled mane. She clenched her teeth and was unable to speak or scream. There were no more forces. Fluttershy began, without her own desire, to remember her "past life", a life before this nightmare, a life when she could enjoy delicious Sugar Belle pastries at any time, her pleasant and caring hooves always did not merge only the best for her and her friends, explaining this by the fact that every visitor to her nursery is her soul mate, for whom she must be one hundred percent laid out. Fluttershy fell even harder to the ground of the path near the farm. Memories of their many times spent together cut like sharp daggers into the poor pony's mind. For Apple Bloom's birthday, Applejack invited all her friends to her farm, even invited the annoying unicorn twins Flim and Flam, who were surprised and touched at the same time by such a gesture of kindness. On that day, Sugar baked the world's largest cake with her own hooves, decorated with the most expensive edible sequins and the filling consisted of soft milk cream, seasoned with applesauce, the dough for the cake was at the level of professional chefs of the royal palace - it was moderately tender and consisted of flour mixed with melted milk chocolate and crystal berry from the north of Equestria. Many were shocked by such a gift. Big Mac had no idea that this kind of massive project she could keep from him. Apple Bloom cried with happiness because her sister-in-law spent so much effort for her that she was even a little ashamed to eat her gift. But Sugar Belle had a different opinion, she repeated the words of Granny Smith that the family should always come first for every pony. Of course, no one wanted to argue with her. Fluttershy then sat next to Discord and Pinkie and was immensely happy for everyone, and even more so for little Bloom. After all, that day was truly amazing. Lots of competitive games, songs, dances and entertaining chaos from her powerful friend. Also during all this, Fluttershy accidentally heard that Sugar Belle was planning to repeat this kind of large-scale holiday, but only through her and Big Mac's "fault". They...they planned in the near future to be a complete family...with a child.

At least everyone was sure that this would happen.

At this point, Fluttershy, from the surging memories, replenished her energy and ... screamed. She screamed very hard. Her sobs were mixed with moans and coughs from the abundance of tears. Her friend is no more. Pegasus will no longer see her lush mane with a charming mess, will not see her well-mannered and sincere sympathy with any of them, she will no longer ask for her pastry recipes and cooking tips. None of this will happen again. Pegasus could not control her body, it became stiff and "magnetized" to the ground. Now she began to choke. Images of her dead friend formed in her imagination - white lifeless eyes looked directly at the pegasus, and words of indignation and indignation flew out of cold lips ... as if it was Fluttershy's fault.

"Fluttershy!" Trenderhoof noted the mare's critical condition and approached the pony with lightning speed, taking her by the shoulders, "Please calm down...I'm begging you. You're not breathing, please Fluttershy. We..."

But before he could finish, Fluttershy clung to him and hugged him and lifted her head to meet his gaze, her wet eyes were trembling, her lips were dry but she still very quietly asked: “Trend…please tell me it’s not true. ..Please"

The unicorn was in a stupor, he could not say anything that she wanted. He has no right. Instead of answering, his eyes looked with sadness and pain into reddened, wet turquoise eyes that were lower. He didn't answer. And for this reason, Fluttershy buried herself in the chest of the stallion and began to cry again. The stallion was ready to stroke Fluttershy's back as a token of consolation, but something prevented him. He felt her body go limp in his hooves and her crying became quieter...but it wasn't because of calming down.

Now it was his turn to feel strange. He noticed that it became noticeably darker around, although there were no clouds and the moon should have been shining in full strength. Then it only got worse. Trenderhoof began to breathe rapidly, his muscles tensing strongly from the pressing pain. He couldn't move. He could not explain these anomalies and began to look around, thinking that this was an external threat. But no one was here. Then it only got worse. The air around both ponies became unnaturally dense and heavy, something repulsive and...black appeared in it. The unicorn looked around them in panic. Black clots of magic pulsed in the air, sparkling with purple and green flashes. The unicorn suppressed the urge to scream and wanted to bring Fluttershy back to consciousness and take her to safety...

A medium-sized explosion of dark energy thundered and the shock wave threw the stallion a decent distance. He flew off to the farm fence and hit it. The unconscious body fell to the ground with tall grass.

Fluttershy felt energized again and awoke from her semi-conscious state, but there was still a noticeable weakness. She continued to stop crying and began to look around because she did not understand what had just happened. She became even more afraid. Too many events for one day. Her lips trembled, her pupils became small dots. She was afraid that danger was somewhere nearby. But suddenly her anxiety was overshadowed by the meowing on the mare's back. She quickly turned her head and looked at the shadow cat with a little relief. He looked at the pegasus with a calm, almost cold look. She forgot that his container was strapped to her back.

“F-Fang?” Fluttershy called his name hopefully, thinking that she was not alone now.

The cat pointed to the left of Fluttershy with its paw and stirred the shadows writhing from it a little. Fluttershy hurriedly turned in the direction of his little friend and looked at the most unpleasant sight she had seen in a while. Near the fence of the Apple farm lay Trenderhoof with a bunch of burns of wool all over his body, his eyes were closed and dirt and other things lay on the ground on his back and hooves. His breathing was calm. He was unconscious.

"Trend!" Fluttershy quickly ran up to the injured stallion, full of fear and confusion. She began to check him for serious injuries and tried to wake him up to take him to her friend's farm.

Every morning near the Evergreen Forest was like a fairy tale. A warm sunny dawn illuminated flowers with a wide variety of variegated colors, while creating a vibrant palette of colors in the beautiful outdoor fields of Ponyville. As night falls, the birds begin their choral aerial concerts. Their chants filled with the most beautiful sonorous sounds serve as an incentive to start their day right, those who have ever allowed themselves picnics in nature knew that being close to small but sonorous birds is a guarantee of a pleasant stay.

Fluttershy has a similar case. But now everything is different. She opened her eyes, which were stinging from the rays of the Sun, and turned to the opposite side to hide from the morning light. Before, she happily got up from her bed and kneaded her hooves and back, wrapped in warm rays. But now she prayed that the night would at least once be longer. Pegasus looked around her room with a sad look. Everywhere was clean, the furniture was intact, the books were all in their place. There were no mistakes or omissions. But Fluttershy didn't care. Instead, she struggled out of bed. She lowered her head, narrowed her eyes and looked down sadly. She stood like that for five minutes, and then she went to the bathroom to wash and comb her disheveled mane and tail.

Fifteen minutes later she came out completely well-groomed and clean. A towel was wrapped around her mane, and she looked at her watch as she stepped into the living room. It was half past seven in the morning. She got up pretty early. But on the other hand, at least he finishes his business earlier, the pony noticed to herself. But the main reason why she came here is to check on Fang.

It's been three days since her and Rarity arrived back in Ponyville. The situation with the Trenderhoof still frightens and terrifies her. What happened then she did not quite understand. But she managed to notice that the stallion's injuries were very strange, as if they were committed without physical contact ... Fluttershy swallowed nervously as suspicions about her new animal friend formed in her head all these days. She couldn't deny that Fang was fully capable of something like that. She didn't need to say why and everything was clear. But when she took him to the hospital, where he was returned to a sane state a few minutes later, Trenderhoof said that he felt strange and that he then abruptly passed out and did not remember anything else. Fluttershy didn't like this arrangement. Because she could not accurately declare to herself the innocence of the cat and assert about his calm temperament. Suspicions about his potential danger to other ponies only grew stronger, but...

Pegasus felt this "cute creature" rubbing near her leg and greets her friend with a joyful meow. Fluttershy, then and now, couldn't believe that Fang was capable of such cruelty, and...maybe that's why she kept silent about the cat when she was in the hospital with Trend. The feeling of guilt has not yet left the ponies. She didn't want to do anything to harm her friends.

The shadow creature jumped onto the pony's back and gently rubbed its muzzle against the back of the mare's head and purred loudly. Fluttershy sighed tiredly, because in order for him to caress like that, he removed the towel from her head, took the fabric with his teeth and threw it on the floor. The cat clearly did not feel somehow uncomfortable. That's the kind of courage Fluttershy expected from Angel... but apparently her favorite bunny has a rival.

"Well, what should I do with you?" Pegasus asked rhetorically, "Eh, Fang could you get off my back please. I need to do my job."

It was clear from the angry hiss and deep purr that the cat didn't like the idea. But he still did not argue with the owner of the cottage and reluctantly jumped onto the sofa and began to lick his back to relieve stress.

Fluttershy, to her own surprise, was able to put on a warm and loving smile as she looked at the black cat. She hesitated for a second, but nevertheless scratched behind the fluffy ear. The animal closed its eyes in bliss and purred even harder than before. When she finished. She went about her morning chores: making a small breakfast of pancakes, cleaning the pigs' houses of dirt and other debris, replacing some defective bird nests, feeding all her little friends living near her cottage. All this did not make her very tired. But... she still wanted to not finish her duties so quickly. And so she did a number of additional tasks, with the rearrangement of flower pots that stood on her window, she also checked each pet that very often goes into the forest for the presence of parasites and ticks. She finished her work by watering the garden. She could do this for an infinite amount of time. But sooner or later it has to happen.

Time to pay Twilight a visit. Pegasus sighed timidly and calmly at the thought that now a very serious conversation with others awaits her. She looked down to where Fang was sitting next to the left front hoof, also looking at the pegasus. From the outside looking in, it was hard to tell what they were trying to achieve with silent glances. 

Fluttershy was the first to break eye contact and looked at the door leading outside. Part of her mind was trying to dissuade the mare from this idea, because it was still too early and against the backdrop of what happened in the Apple family, the news about Fang would only worsen the already unimportant situation of her friends. After all, the presence of a dark creature in Ponyville does not seem like a safe idea to anyone. There is a risk that the town's civilians may turn against her and inflict accusations and suspicions. Fluttershy was aware of this, but she also understood that it was impossible to play silent for a long time. She has information about an unidentified being, a being that clearly has powers. And the rest should know about it, at least to provide additional security measures.

"Why do you have such a gloomy face, dear?", the main instigator of stupid and ridiculous situations in Equestria materialized in front of the door, his dragon tail stroked the dark monster a little, who in response only knocked it off his head with his paw, "Today Cloudsdale is promised heavy rains ?"

Fluttershy could hear this playful and squeaky pleasant baritone anywhere. The Lord of Chaos himself decided to visit his best friend again in a non-standard way. Just teleported into the house and didn't enter it. Discord stood in front of a full-length pegasus, slightly stretching his eagle paw, with which he often casts spells. But still, there are noticeable changes in its appearance. Discord didn't act carefree or casual, he didn't try to do chaotic things in Fluttershy's house right and left, although he used to love to do it. It is not uncommon to see him often standing on the floor rather than flying through the air, ignoring the existence of his wings. No, he didn't do all that. The ancient deity only looked at Fluttershy with a calm look with a slight smile. Even for someone who calls himself a spirit of disharmony, such behavior was too much even for him. Pegasus could see notes of tension and exhaustion in her friend's eyes. He must have only recently learned of his friend's tragedy, the pony remarked grimly.

But in order to drive away the dark thoughts, she looked at Discord with that smile that she had not made for a very long time. Even if it takes a lot of effort: "Remember our contract?"

Discord silently stared at the pegasus for five seconds, then he extended his lion's paw to her: "Yes ... of course. Ready to ruin the day for the Princess of Friendship?"

Discord, in a quiet and falsely playful tone, asked an obvious question to which he already knew the answer. Fluttershy sat Fang on her back and grabbed Discord's paw with both hooves, "Ready like never before."

A moment later, there was complete silence in Fluttershy's cottage, there was no one in the house, only small sparks of teleportation swirled in the air near the place where our trio were.
> Chapter 4
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The Crystal Castle of Friendship, which Twilight owned, is the main attraction in all of Ponyville. What was fully expected, because it’s very external structure says that it does not belong to this small town. And earlier, when the six ponies defeated Tirek, local ponies and tourists at first thought that the Ruling Sisters were expanding their residence. Or some thought that Equestria and the Crystal Empire had a cultural exchange. And it took a long time to fully convince the ponies that the appearance of this building is a sign of the complete consolidation of Twilight's power as the Princess of Friendship. Since then, Equestria has had several political ruling geolocations. Because some administrative and state matters passed through the consideration of the purple alicorn. There have been instances where the mayor of Ponyville has sought Twilight's help to better prepare the conditions for peace delegations with other countries. Yes, Celestia has done this before and she continues to do this. It's just that it's easier for both princesses to control the situation from many fronts. There are cases when several delegations come on the same date and the Sun Princess has to give "practical tests" to her former student. She will meet some foreign representatives in Canterlot, and Twilight will negotiate with the other, since she is one of the Elements of Harmony, she can even surpass Celestia in her skill to maintain a "friendly" environment. Moreover, this will benefit her in self-development, yet someday in the future she will replace the older alicorns.

Sometime in the future...

These words have been following the Princess of Friendship for more than a month. She sits on her throne in front of the Table-Geomap of Harmony, propping her cheek with her right hoof and bowing her head. Old memories flashed through the mare's mind again. She took a small breath. She remembered that solemn day, a day full of great accomplishments and victories. She, her friends and other good ponies, dragons, sirens, changelings were able to completely take control of those bonds of love and friendship that bound them all and defeat the great evil. Equestria and the world are saved. The intercultural unity between different beings was stronger than ever before. They succeeded. She did it. This out-of-control mad test of the draconicus was able to determine the latent power of the ruler in Twilight. A ruler who responds to the call of his subjects and builds a wonderful future with their will... She thought she was worthy... She thought that Celestia would be proud of her.

But... something went wrong.

After a grand victory, everyone and even Discord were sure that this was the final point in Twilight's journey. Against the background of all the events that had taken place, the thought was more obvious that the princesses would officially make the young alicorn a full ruler. But Fate had her own plans in this regard ... Celestia declared in front of everyone that she would continue to rule no matter what. She caused a lot of resentment with her decision, especially from her sister and niece. The moon pony was in an angry shock that her sister could so suddenly say something that went against what they had all been working with all this time. Their goal is to create a decent future, but for some reason Celestia had her own plans. Luna did not like the fact that such a serious decision was made without her participation. As if the daytime ruler did not fully trust her own sister. All incredulous statements fell on the white alicorn, who accepted criticism with a calm and sad face. To explain her motives, she said that she saw a vision that said that this was not the end and that Equestria could not do without all the alicorns in the near future. Something is coming and it is something she and her sister must see for themselves. It would be hard to tell what state Twilight was in then. On that day, her world collapsed. It was completely reduced to elementary particles. She saw her mentor's eyes as she explained her motives and saw there something else besides concern for the future.

This is a disappointment.

Suddenly, the pony abruptly cut off the memories when she felt that she was ready to "explode". She raised her head abruptly and wiped the little tears from the corners of her eyes and tried to occupy herself with thoughts so as not to think about it anymore. But it wasn't easy.

Now the princess looked at other parts of the table where around it were the same thrones as hers. Nearly all of her Elemental friends sat on these thrones. It was eight o'clock in the morning and the ponies once again gathered in an emergency council. Or rather, she allowed them. Forty minutes ago, Fluttershy wrote a letter to her asking her to gather all her friends in order to solve a very important issue that was similar to the problem of Chrysalis or Discord. Twilight was naturally frightened by such an unexpected request, but still listened to the pegasus. She nervously wondered what could have happened that a quiet and unassuming pony like Fluttershy herself was requesting an emergency meeting.

Now they sit and wait. And everyone did it differently.

Rarity stared intently at her left hoof and polished it with a file, holding the tool with her pale blue magical aura. She sat with a disgruntled emaciated face and tried to notice the smallest irregularities on the outside of the hoof, even going so far as to ask Twilight for a magnifying loupe. Spike, of course, did not stand aside. He waved a large fan at Rarity to create a cool blast of air. The unicorn was so focused on her appearance at the moment that she was able to sweat a little. Of course, the lavender alicorn had seen such a cute scene more than once and always knew that her "little brother" was not only her personal assistant. But the truth is a little different now. Rarity practically did not look at the dragon and only communicated with him with short comments and requests. The pony herself, with her lifeless and tired eyes, looked only at her little business with a hoof, trying not to be distracted by anything. Spike was not stupid and understood everything. He himself experiences similar feelings.

Twilight sighed heavily and imperceptibly for everyone and looked at Rainbow, near which Pinkie is standing and trying to say something funny. The pink pony herself sometimes jumps on the table, then jumps around the fastest Pegasus and proves something. At the same time, not forgetting to laugh ... laugh ... The Princess of Friendship knew that when Applejack announced information about Sugar a few days ago, Pinkie took this information much more painfully than the rest of the six. This is not surprising, because both of these ponies loved sweets, loved to bake pies and cakes, enjoyed the fun of customers when they tried their dishes. And now she's gone. And while this mare gallops energetically next to the multi-colored pony, telling her the next jokes, it's hard to imagine that this pony took a little vacation after finding out the truth. Pinkie's mane was not smooth and even like Fluttershy's. But even now, the princess could observe that the former splendor and randomness of her friend's mane was lost. Although she should say thanks to her friend, the candidate, for the fact that even in this dark hour she did not deviate from her goal. To give joy and laughter to the surrounding ponies. From the moment he enters the castle, she tries to cheer up everyone she sees. Though half unsuccessfully, she continues to try. Behind the half-mad gambling look and stupid sincere smile hides the same pain that every inhabitant of Ponyville has.

As for Rainbow Dash, everything is more or less simpler. She is the most impatient of all Twilight's friends. The rainbow-maned pony is an elite flyer in the Wonderbolts, which means she's not the type to waste time waiting. Although the alicorn said that she had gathered everyone here much earlier than the official meeting time, it seemed that the blue pegasus was the least worried about this. Like everyone else, the news of their friend's death took a toll on her. But only in her case it was more anger and shock than screams and grief. According to Twilight's information, Rainbow was very angry with Big Mac. Just as her farm friend broke the news about Sugar Bell a few days ago at night, the pegasus rushed at the Sweet Apple Acres at transonic flight speed. There, she had a very serious conversation with Apple's older brother. She blamed Big Mac for everything, her eyes wet with tears. She screamed that he was acting irresponsibly when he did not give her a chance. The fact is, according to Shining, Big Mac, through the help of the Inland Rescue Command, prevented Rainbow from joining the rescue of Sugar. Pegasus desperately tried not to sit idle and personally help a friend. She applied fifteen times to join the Sky Guard squad. And every time her recommendations were canceled, regardless of her past merits. Big Mac, in some way Twilight could not understand, was able to influence the decision of the leaders of the rescue operation. Each time, he convinced them that Rainbow was incompetent at their job and that she would be of little use. The motives for such actions on the part of Applejack's older brother were not clear to the alicorn. But when she talked about it with her brother, the Prince of the Crystal Empire said that he fully understood his red friend. He took his own case as an example. The captain of the royal guard said that he had similar feelings with Cadance. When she and he became the rulers of the ancient empire, their government meetings with other dominant subjects of power only became more frequent. Cadance had to go to numerous meetings with ordinary ponies, with the elite of the empire, with the Supreme Court. There she communicated and resolved important issues to improve the life of the crystal ponies after the dark ages before returning to the real world. Shining himself acted as her main replacement, saying that he was also a prince and that he should also participate in the political sphere, albeit knowing little about it. The stallion battle mage had to organize delegations under his direct command and with his close stallion guardsmen. So he attended those royal meetings where his wife was not present. He explained to her that he just wanted to help her. But only in a conversation with his sister, he revealed the truth. Shining really wanted to help his special pony, but for a secondary reason. According to the stallion, small fanatical factions remained in the Crystal Empire who did not agree that the Crystal Empire became a protectorate of Equestria and that the Equestrians took the throne. They sought to convince society that the last reign was better and that HE was a much better king than any other. Of course, these fanatics did not pose a real threat. Shining's special soldiers caught these criminals day and night. But the fear of the stallion did not die away. He paranoidly thought that these crazy ponies could cross the line at any time and encroach on the life of his family. To weaken the position of the country-it is necessary to eliminate its ruler. And this ruler was his beloved wife. He knew that alicorns were much more powerful than ordinary ponies. But this did not convince him. Shining told his sister that he was still taking over half of Cadance's work to keep her safe. So he defends the opinion of the Big Mac. Apple's actions and motives for the captain are very clear - Big Mac does everything possible to prevent her little sister's friend from getting into trouble in their adventure where the danger can be very unpredictable and that an incident can happen where Rainbow can’t be helped by her phenomenal speed. He understood the risks of their rescue operation and was prepared for the worst case scenario...but he wasn't prepared for another loss. Returning to reality from her memories, Twilight snorted contemptuously and sighed doomedly, because now and then she could not come up with counterarguments to her brother, although she was sure that the help of her rainbow-maned friend would be invaluable at least in terms of aerial reconnaissance of the territory. But what's done can't be taken back. She looked at her Pegasus friend. Rainbow Dash was still sitting, frowning at the geomap table. She was occasionally distracted by Pinkie. Twilight wiggled her front hooves awkwardly and let out a low, nervous laugh. She probably won't tell Big Mac's true motives, otherwise the proud Pegasus might send the stallion to the highest part of Cloudsdale, from where he might not return.

Speaking of the elder brother of the Apple family, the princess looked at her wheat-orange friend, who had not said a word all this time. Not a single letter, except for "Hello" or "How are you." The earth pony simply sat on her throne and covered her face with her hat, her front hooves crossed over her chest. Nobody was going to judge her for it. Everyone understood everything. Although Rainbow was a little... unpredictable. At first, she looked at her friend with an annoyed and embarrassed face, raising an eyebrow. Then she wanted to correct the feelings of the earth pony that now is not the time to "stomp rotten apples out of anger." But Rarity stopped the lively Pegasus in time with a light blow to the tail to avoid unnecessary problems. But Twilight, looking at the farmer, understood that she was trying to keep all the pain in herself, not wanting to disturb her friends once again. But soon the former unicorn and the rest will still have to bring this topic up with Applejack. Remind her that pain can be shared with others.

The princess wanted to say something to her friend, but she was suddenly interrupted by a noise from the other end of the hall. The rest of the ponies were also distracted and looked at the source of the noise. The huge doors to the Hall of the Harmony Meeting opened the two paws of a lion and an eagle, from which multi-colored lights rained down for a theatrical effect. The Elements of Harmony could recognize this being anywhere in the world. The Spirit of Disharmony himself came to them, next to him on the right, a pink-maned pegasus walked quietly and with inaudible steps. The ponies did not immediately notice Fluttershy, since Discord is a big fan of drawing all the attention to himself.

"Greetings, my dearest and most beautiful mares. May my presence be a shock to you. But know that this most noble and humble dragonicus is ready to make his small contribution to the benefit of his second home," his every word was insincere, theatrically mocking. And when he said all this, he managed to fly around all the ponies that were sitting on their thrones. He hugged someone, he put on a clown wig and nose for someone, he levitated someone in the air and then put him in his place. Rainbow, he generally reversed the color of the mane and coat. True, Pegasus, with a blow to the head of the spirit, persuaded him to return everything back. He did not approach Applejack.

"Let's not move Discord," the alicorn snorted, rolling her eyes, and magically removed her clown attributes, "The letter said that the matter is very urgent and therefore we would like to resolve it as soon as possible"

"Yes!", Rainbow flew up and hovered over everyone else in the center of the table, "Flutters, what the hay? So suddenly and early in the morning to call us. I already thought that the Wendigo wanted to freeze us"

"Fluttershy!", Pinkie stood up from her throne and pointed her hoof at the pegasus while making a fake serious expression, "Do you feel like someone lives in your closet again?"

"Ahem, let's not create unnecessary chaos ahead of time," Rarity raised her hoof, looking at Rainbow with a little annoyance. The unicorn guessed the reasons for their convening, "I guess Fluttershy wouldn't call the Trivia Council. Am I right, Twilight?"

"Why don't you like chaos?" Draconicus made a quiet and resentful comment as he turned away and crossed his legs over his chest.

"Definitely, Rarity," the princess said loudly and solemnly spread her wings, looking with an interested look at her friend who was looking awkwardly at the others next to Discord.

Applejack moved her hat slightly so that she could look at Fluttershy with one eye. She didn't say anything.

"Well...erm..Remember that Rarity and I went to Manehattan a few days ago?" Fluttershy said softly, trying not to make eye contact with any of her friends. The situation was too stressful for her, "We were solving a problem with Rarity's friend's pet."

"So what?" the blue pegasus asked impatiently, still hovering in the air.

"I've made the decision to take her pet because Miss Coop says her little friend is hardly fit for city life," Rainbow's short question served as the impetus that helped the pegasus to continue the pegasus. Her friends listened attentively, looking at each other along the way, not understanding the mare's nervousness.

"But in order to sort out the problem and help her pet adapt in our Ponyville and my shelter...I would like you to help me if I encounter a problem that is beyond my veterinary knowledge," Fluttershy took a deep breath and looked up at her friends, trying not to take a long look at each of them.

"What do you mean?" Twilight asked, slightly wrinkling the bridge of her nose and raising her eyebrow, "We are always ready to help you. It's true. But does working with animals require, for example, my knowledge as a professional magician?"

"Oooh... You have no idea," Discord drawled out the last syllable melodicly and dramatically.

Fluttershy touched her hoof lightly to the paw of the draconicus and smiled affectionately, asking him to let her finish. The Chaotic Deity darkened his face slightly and turned away from her mysteriously. Pegasus continued, "Her pet...an unusual creature unknown to me"

After these words, the Elements looked at each other a little scared, except for Applejack and Rarity. Even Pinkie fell silent in mute nervousness. But then they looked at Fluttershy in disbelief. But before Pegasus had time to say anything, there was a surge of magical soft purple energy in front of her, Twilight appeared from the back, which came very very close to the veterinarian. Her face was a mixture of things that Fluttershy couldn't exactly identify. Twilight's eyes widened and gleamed with scientific interest, her wings twitching, her face contorted into a wide and wearable smile. Twilight chuckled a little, and the pegasus took two steps back in fear.

"A-Are you saying that this animal belongs to an unexplored species?" The alicorn asked with a bit of disbelief at the words of the pegasus, Twilight's voice itself was... very awkward. It sounded like the impassioned voice of the horny mare she last felt like when she casually saw Flash toweling off at the hot springs three weeks ago, soaking wet. But now there was another case, her voice was still mixed with a deeper timbre, like Applejack’s, “If there are still unknown species of living organisms on our lands, then it is a great honor to enter an individual into the bioclassification of living organisms. To study its physiology, endocrine system, magical channels, belonging to a certain genus of animals, genetic relationship with others, mutational phenomena. Oh, if her pet is still and a mystical ancient species, then..."

Before the distraught alicorn wanted to complete her sentence on the “necessary” topic. The yellow-sand pegasus lightly, almost without touching, covered her scientist friend’s mouth with her hoof. She didn't do it of her own free will. The fact is that with every word Twilight said while exploring her little friend, the alicorn came closer and closer to the frightened pegasus. So she had no choice but to lean back a little, close her eyes and bring her hoof to her friend’s face.

"Hey, Twily, chill out. Spare Fluttershy's life," Rainbow said with a mixture of irritation and mockery, trying to pull the princess into the air from the poor pegasus.

“Ohhh...unusual animal,” Pinkie looked somewhere above Fluttershy, making her eyes more innocent and childlike when she began to think hard, then she instantly brightened up and looked at the pink-maned pony with a wide smile, “Does this look like a reptile? My Gummy would be very happy to meet a fellow friend! Oh! Can he shoot lasers from his eyes? Fly without wings? Hear over long distances? Does this little beast like to wear red capes? I really, really, really, really want to see it!"

At that moment, Fluttershy saw how the pink candy boy was jumping joyfully on her throne. And...it made her happy. Perhaps Pinkie forgot for a while what situation they were all in now and allowed herself to return to the past... to the past without tragedies. Surprisingly, during all this, Applejack didn’t say anything, but just looked at Fluttershy with interest. Her emotionless gaze was a little filled with something other than emptiness. The farm mare expects continuation from the pegasus. Rarity reacted to all this noise with only a doomed sigh. She understood where this was all going. The white unicorn closed her eyes and lowered her head, and then she looked up at the pegasus and nodded slightly. Fluttershy took this as a sign, a signal that told her it was time to act. An impulse of confidence ran through the pony's body like an electric current. Her confidence noticeably outweighed her fear.

“I hope, Flutters, you won’t speak in riddles,” Rainbow said in a frivolous and impudent voice, flying up to the pink-maned pegasus and leaving alone the lavender alicorn, who decided to sit back on her throne and, with her left hind hoof twitching, wait for pleasant news from the veterinarian. Rainbow continued, “Otherwise I feel uneasy when I realize that only Rarity is ahead of us.”

"I'll take that as a compliment, darling," Rarity said charmingly, batting her eyelashes and straightening her wavy mane, "It's always nice to know how insightful I am."

Rainbow sharply turned her head towards her fashionista friend and looked at her with such a grimace as if a plate of sour two-week milk had been placed in front of the blue pegasus, she stuck her tongue out at Rarity and with a look told her that such words sounded very ridiculously pathetic, which should not be in real life. Rarity chuckled and turned away. She slightly wrinkled her nose and proudly raised her chin, showing with all her appearance that Rainbow should be ashamed and embarrassed to show such primitive childish tricks. But she quickly calmed down when Spike approached her. The little dragon developed the skill of intuition during the time he lived in Ponyville. He, thanks to the characteristics of his species, can determine what emotional state his interlocutor is experiencing, combining information about the intensity of breathing, body temperature, the smell of emitted feelings, and the frequency of heart pulsation. The princess's first assistant can now perfectly adapt to a certain situation when communicating, and, if necessary, communicate with another pony on his terms if the conversation has reached a critical point. A similar incident happened with Rarity. And to somehow cheer her up, Spike brought her a large glass of cold strawberry cocktail. Obviously, such a noble gesture on the part of the purple dragon instantly destroyed all the tension in the mare and she instantly took this drink with her telekinetic magic, not forgetting to give her little knight a long kiss on the cheek. Fluttershy has always been touched when Spike wags his little tail out of excessive joy. No matter how many such “gifts” he received from Rarity, from the outside it always seemed as if each of his help was the first for him. Such sincere and innocent reactions from a child who had just begun his journey in life made this huge, rich and divine castle more comfortable and... simple... family-like. It's as if no one stole magic from Equestria and no one destroyed the Golden Oak Library.

Everything that she saw before her eyes was unlike the consequences that happened just a few days ago. Pinkie's hyperactivity, Rainbow's brave audacity, Rarity's noble behavior and Twilight's scientific obsession, Discord's playful mockery. All this is there for a reason. Fluttershy looked at the behavior of each of her friends and closed her eyes in understanding, this time smiling not at just one, but at everyone. She understood what her friends were trying to do. They want to cleanse their souls and Applejack's soul from all the filth that prevents them from living normally. The Sugar Belle incident shocked all the residents of the previously peaceful small town, the tragedy and burning pain of loss gripped the minds of almost all of Ponyville. After all, many personally knew how kind and responsible the pink baker pony was. And the very possibility that her fate would turn out to be so cruel...no one expected this. That is why almost all the Elements are now trying as much as possible to behave as if no tragedy had ever happened, trying to restore the previous atmosphere of a pure, friendly spirit of adventurism. Sugar would not want her to become the cause of negative and irreversible changes in her family.

“Okay, girls, I’ll call him now,” Fluttershy said with notes of relief and excitement in her voice, when absolutely all the ponies and Discord and Spike looked at the modest pegasus, “Fang... come out please.”

After half a second, the shadow of the yellow pegasus became noticeably darker. Only Spike noticed this and with bulging eyes, he was about to say something to Twilight when the words froze in his mouth. The shadows rose sharply and rapidly in swirling waves to the height of Fluttershy's withers, energetic clots of black energy began to expand from the pegasus in different directions, forming an uneven spherical surface of changing shape. Twilight was the first to come out of her daze and wanted to shoot magic at the danger that surrounded her friend. But the horn charged with magic was never used. The alicorn's widened eyes looked at a rather creepy and interesting sight. The cropped sveric dark field began to form shadow tentacles on all sides of the pegasus and its tips closed above the veterinarian’s head. Soon, all the unholy energy that had formed in the shadow of the pegasus began to be drawn into this point in space, and a large cat had already gathered together there. He softly landed on Fluttershy's head, then, after stomping a little on her mane, he jumped like a sliding shadow onto the floor of the castle next to the pegasus. His black fur transformed into a small smoky, writhing aura of darkness that from a distance it seemed as if his body outline was blurred. With his poisonous green glowing eyes without pupils, he examined a new place for him, while carefully maintaining a calm and semi-impartial gaze. Fang mewed towards Discord, raising his slightly bent right paw. Of all the new ones, he recognized only him.

"N-Now I'll start, if you don't mind. I..."

"GIRLS! NO!", Rarity jumped out of her seat, pouring her drink onto the table and jumped towards Fluttershy, looking somewhere to the left.

Fluttershy instinctively sat on her hind hooves, hugged the black cat to her and, with her wings pressed in from fear, watched the following scene in horror. Applejack and Twilight jumped towards her. The alicorn flew up from the left and charged her horn with some kind of spiral purple energy, her gaze was filled with determination and fear, while flying to her friend, she feverishly and with clenched teeth tried to aim better so as not to hit her friend, but at such speed it was almost impossible to do. At the same time, Applejack was holding a salmon in her teeth, her gaze was not as chaotic as that of the youngest alicorn. The earth pony looked at her "target" without showing any signs of doubt. Bloodthirsty coldness emanated from her eyes, all her attention was occupied by this creature, she did not even look at the pegasus. In order to simultaneously reach the shortest distance from the beast with Twilight, she, with a sharp contraction of all the muscles of the hooves, impulsively “shot” herself in a jump where she steps forward with her front hooves. While Twilight flew with her hooves pressed back.

Fluttershy didn't have time to think. She closed her wide eyes and rested her head on her shoulders. She needed to do something, do something to avoid unnecessary damage. There's nothing nearby. The half-empty hall did not provide any prerequisites for hiding Fang. She was thinking for herself at that moment. Instincts took over her. Pegasus jumped back a little and turned one hundred and eighty degrees away from the two ponies and covered her little animal friend with her wings. Now she sat with her eyes closed and trembled violently. Expecting the worst in her mind, the pegasus was ready to take the entire attack upon herself and not allow anything unforgivable to happen here. She understood the responsibility; it was she who brought Fang here. We should have predicted this outcome and acted more carefully. Fluttershy begins to cry quietly, now she will have to keep her friends away from the supernatural animal as much as possible. This is difficult, given Twilight's magical power and Applejack's physical strength...

“Oh, what a difficult situation,” a hoarse and slightly serious voice was heard somewhere behind, which seemed to reset everyone’s minds, diverting attention from the suspicious cat.

Fluttershy recognized this voice from this whole "battle". She quickly and with surprised eyes turned her head towards Discord, who now stood a little closer to her and crossed his paws on his chest. He sighed a little with relief when, through eye contact with the pegasus, he made sure that she was okay, then his face transformed, it lost the remnants of carelessness and was replaced with coldness and irritation. The Lord of Chaos looked at the two ponies who were trying to do the stupidest thing in their lives. Fluttershy calmed down a little and stopped her tears, then she looked worriedly and fearfully in the direction where her draconicus friend was looking. The sight was truly shocking. Fluttershy opened her eyes wide when she saw that Twilight and Applejack were stuck in a thick sugar-cloud mass that stuck to the side walls of the hall and the area in front of the yellow pegasus. Twilight's horn went out and was covered in this pink goo, her wings and hoof were also wrapped in a sticky embrace of chaos magic. The same thing happened to Applejack, only she, unlike the alicorn, was wrapped in a cocoon with her head open.

“Discord!” Twilight moaned pitifully, trying to no avail to summon magic in the sticky horn, “Let us go immediately!”

"Don't provoke me, Discord," Applejack growled in irritation, hitting the walls of the cocoon, causing large hoof-shaped protrusions to form there.

“Okay, the situation is heating up. Girls, we all need to calm down. I understand you, but...”, Rarity began to say, until her speech was interrupted by a gust of wind flapping her blue wings.

“CALM DOWN?! What do you mean calm down?!”, Rainbow shouted at Rarity and at the Spirit of Disharmony, trying to get past Rarity, who put her hooves in front of the fast pegasus.

Fluttershy looked in shock at Rainbow behind her, whom she did not expect to see there. Apparently, when the pegasus turned away from the alicorn and the earth pony, the rainbow-maned pony wanted to take this opportunity, fly up and snatch Fang from her hooves while the veterinarian closed his eyes. Fluttershy hardly suppressed another surge of trembling from the realization that she was not told that she was lucky that Rarity closed her, otherwise...

“What do you think you are doing?”, Applejack said this in a calm and cold voice, completely devoid of any feelings, she turned to Discord but continued to look at the little monster, “I advise you not to joke with me.”

"NO! Fluttershy, get away from this," Twilight said frantically, looking at the cat with a mixture of horror and anger; then she bit her tongue from the realization that she had given her friend a dangerous instruction, "Or no, stop! Just stay calm and don't make sudden movements...I...I'll try to lure it with dark magic now..."

“ENOUGH!” Rainbow got tired of waiting for this beast to do something and took the white unicorn into her arms and flew up. Fluttershy and the others didn't even have time to raise their heads when the blue pegasus spun around the steel and very roughly sat Rarity in her place. The fashionista felt bad from such a terrible load and bent down under the table, preparing to “release” her breakfast. Discord just grinned darkly and pointed his lion's paw at the pegasus, who was flying at full speed towards the shadow creature. But suddenly, Applejack's salmon grabbed Chaotic Deity's wrist and pulled him down. Discord's hand went below Rainbow and turned the floor into a huge mass of white cotton candy. The fastest pegasus was already half a meter away from Fluttershy, putting his hoof forward and preparing to carefully knock out the monster without hitting her friend, but... What happened?

The oily-colored pegasus opened her tear-stained eyes, thinking that now another massacre would begin in the castle... But nothing flew into her. She stopped her body from trembling. She had never seen Rainbow control her flight so well at high speeds in a small space. The veterinarian, suppressing dark thoughts about the future that fortunately did not come, began to look for her friend with her eyes and understand what had happened. But she couldn’t look at Rainbow because a sound entered her left ear... a very scary sound. The sound of a cat growling.

Fluttershy sharply lowered her gaze to her left hoof, which was hugging Fang and holding him above the ground. The cat remained in place and did not move an inch. During this battle, he only tensed up and pressed himself closer to the pink-maned pony. But he didn't do it out of fear. The cat tensed his facial muscles to the maximum, making a grimace of pure rage. Fluttershy broke out in a cold sweat, and she almost dropped the cat in her daze. She knew that her new friend might be capable of this, but...she couldn’t imagine that up close it would look very ominous. She pressed her lips harder when she heard Fang growl hissingly...in a demonic manner. His voice was like a deep ghostly sound, consisting of two voices superimposed on one sound. The black beast looked somewhere ahead, its eyes again began to emit violet energy and small black flashes began to flash around each eye. His new owner felt trapped. In her cottage, she could not observe the manifestation of his abilities. Just as she imagined in her worst fantasies, Fang's powers are truly terrifying. Pegasus didn’t even imagine that he could do something like that. She did not observe any signs of anger towards other living creatures in the cat, because from the moment of their arrival, Fluttershy actively began to educate her new shadow friend. Her plan stated that before she would place him in her animal sanctuary, Fang must undergo a course of adaptation to his new place of residence and not show unreasonable aggression towards others. Because he is an "unusual" animal. She made this a priority. And the results of the training were very positive, which made the Element of Kindness very happy, because she expected more resistance from the cursed beast... And today could undo all her efforts. The way Fang turns into a terrifying monster and even threatens her friends makes Fluttershy very sad. In a panic, she tried to figure out how to calm him down. She didn’t know for sure that caresses like ordinary cats could calm Fang down. She doesn't know anything. But the situation does not allow her to give up. After all, she won’t be able to hold the cat for long and the animal may not have enough patience not to try to grab Rainbow’s throat, who was trying to get him.

Rainbow.

Fluttershy quickly raised her head forward to look at the place from where the pegasus was flying towards them. Due to the powerful dark manifestation of the cat, the veterinarian almost forgot about her friend... But what she saw did not make the situation better... The rainbow-maned pony was no longer flying. She sat on the floor half a meter from the yellow pegasus. She didn't move at all. Fluttershy widened her eyes, her pupils became small dots in shock, and she covered her mouth with her hoof to hold back screaming and crying. Pegasus couldn't believe her eyes, she refused to accept the reality that was in front of her. Others also saw this and they all looked at the blue pegasus with the same reaction. Discord suppressed his excitement and just looked sadly at the fastest pony. But soon Twilight and Applejack began to shout something, either towards the Spirit of Chaos, or towards Fluttershy. But the pegasus did not hear them. She looked with a detached and hypnotic gaze at what her previously brave friend had become. Rainbow's wings did not stay close to her body and hung down. Her pose was frighteningly disgusting: her hind hooves were twisted in the wrong sitting position, her front hooves were twitching strongly in impulse twitches, but what attracted attention more was her face - a distorted grimace of horror with an open mouth from which saliva was dripping and with flowing tears. Rainbow didn't hate seeing herself like this. She didn't want to appear in front of her friends like that. She tries with all her might to overcome such signs of weakness so as not to appear weak. But Fang made this nightmare come true. What did he do to her?

"RAINBOW!", an unexpected cry brought the pegasus out of their thoughts; Pinkie, who was hiding behind her candy cannon and not wanting to fight, suddenly jumped out in front of Fluttershy’s eyes and she began to shake the blue pegasus, which with its red pupils and green sclera looked at the shadow cat with a doomed look, “Come on, silly, wake up... "You're scaring me... DISCORD, TWILEY! HELP!"

“Please everyone, silence!”, unexpectedly for everyone, the hall with the thrones of the Elements was cut through by the loud and thin voice of a shy pegasus, for a strong effect she took a step towards the alicorn and the farmer, the pegasus’s chest quickly contracted from the high frequency of breathing, she lowered her head down and closed her eyes , “No one will dare do anything...at least until I finish talking.”

Complete silence hung over everyone. No one dared to say or even do anything. The situation was beyond Twilight's control and therefore she found herself in the same trap as the others. Now we need to adapt the situation to their needs. If the beast has not yet attacked, then she and her friends have a chance to get out of this trap without loss or damage. While Fluttershy controls the creature, you need to remain calm and prepare for the next surprises.

Fluttershy took a deep breath and stood up from her seat, letting Fang fall to the floor. Discord immediately covered Applejack's mouth with duct tape to prevent her from making the situation even worse. Pegasus looked sadly at the silent Rainbow and at the tear-stained face of Pinkie, who hugged the blue pegasus and looked at the veterinarian with the hope that she knew the solution.

“Fang, please, let go of the pony with the rainbow mane,” the yellow pegasus said emotionlessly and quietly, looking down at the cat who sat down by her front left hoof.

The black beast tilted its head to the side in confusion, not understanding the meaning of his caretaker’s request. He slowly turned his head towards the other pegasus, looked at her with a calm gaze, then raised his head again to the veterinarian and... his eyes no longer emitted any violet energy or black flashes. The cat raised his right front paw to his face and began to lick it, he licked each claw thoroughly as if thinking that the floor of the royal castle was not clean enough. The pink-maned pony's facial features softened and small sparks of joy sparkled in her soul. He listened to her and she didn't have to use her "gaze" on him. 

"Rainbow! Oh Celestia"

Fluttershy turned her head in the direction of the sudden scream and without realizing it, with a quick movement she found herself next to the source of the noise. The blue pegasus suddenly fell exhausted onto the shoulders of the pink pastry chef. Her eyes were closed, her body was limp and her front hooves swayed on Pinkie's back like vines in the wind. Fluttershy's eyes widened again in fear and with trembling hooves she grabbed Rainbow under her wings, which hung casually and touched the floor with their tips. The pink pony at first looked at her friend in confusion, but then immediately understood her intentions and, fighting off another onset of tears, helped Fluttershy take the pegasus to the harmony card table. Both Elements laid their unconscious pony on her left side and began to feverishly examine her body for damage and something worse. She was breathing - that's the most important thing. Pinkie Pie blinked very quickly, trying to suppress her tears. She, like the others, was not ready for all this. And the yellow mare understood her in this. But her case was a little different. Fluttershy was mentally exhausted and devastated. She didn't have enough strength to simply cry like her friend. All she did was silently examine the body of the sports pegasus: she felt the skin to look for possible pathologies, opened her eyelids, looking at the shape of the pupils, brought the side of the pony’s body to her ear and counted the heartbeats, and the pegasus also put a hoof on her friend’s chest, determining the breathing rate . And Fluttershy did all this, mentally praying that now she had not made the worst mistake in her life by bringing Fang here... But fortunately everything is fine. She and Pinkie did not find any open or hidden injuries. Rainbow was just sleeping and nothing else.

"That's quite a change of events, if you ask me," Discord said sarcastically and worriedly, ignoring the angry look from Twilight, whose mouth he also covered with duct tape, "Fluttershy...is everything okay?"

The pony slowly turned her head towards the draconicus and, together with her pink friend, carefully moved away from the lying pegasus. Pinkie turned around to look at the pony with her worried eyes again, convincing herself that everything was fine. Fluttershy stood next to her chaotic friend and looked at her immobilized friends with a calm and tired look: “Discord, can you check Rainbow’s body for traces of magical influence?”

Maybe the unpredictable Deity was careless and childish at times, but he did not lose the acquired social knowledge over the centuries of his life. Discord knew perfectly well what Fluttershy wanted. And he is ready to help her with this without hesitation. He nodded silently to her and floated through the air to where the fastest pony lay. A second later, the slimy masses where the alicorn and the farmer were stuck disappeared in a flash of white light. Twilight and Applejack fell awkwardly on their tails in front of the yellow mare. They quickly shook off their fur and stood up on all four hooves. Silence hung between them all. The duo, who were trapped by the draconicus, stared at Fluttershy with expectant and worried eyes. They all wanted to solve this problem in their own way, but the current circumstances say that they will have to look for a solution in a way that is unfavorable for everyone. Twilight looked seriously and sympathetically into the eyes of the pegasus and took a step forward, spreading her wings. Applejack could not calm down, she continued to look with great hostility at the creature that sat down near the veterinarian's right hoof. Her salmon was still straightened and continued to be held in the teeth of the angry Element of Honesty.

Fluttershy tilted her head slightly and sighed softly. After all, next they will have a very serious and difficult conversation.
> Chapter 5
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Mornings in Ponyville always begin with positive and calming notes, sounds of nature and tranquility. Perhaps no one will argue with this fact - neither local residents, nor even tourists. Because the arguments always catch the eye of everyone: the gentle and warm rays of the cosmic star Celestia envelop with their embrace the entire space of a small town, which itself is replete with orange and yellow lights, marking the beginning of a new day; during the bright appearance of the sun, the life of nature flares up, which patiently preserved and accumulated the strength of its creatures to advance the next day, the animals begin their “game” of survival and competition in all the benefits that exist in the surrounding nature of the town, the plants are illuminated under the warming rays of the luminary, becoming more alive and fulfilling its own purpose for all living organisms. But all the beauty of the morning would not be so obvious and beautiful if there were no sounds in it. Those very sounds that are not present at any other time intervals of the day. When a Ponyville pony opens his eyes and gets out of bed, the first thing he or she hears is the rapid and intense chirping of birds. The little ones have just gotten up and are ready for their own work. Their noise of flapping wings mixed with the incessant energetic bird “conversation”, which will have time to fly around the entire Ponyville and be heard by everyone, is perceived by everyone as something that should be, which decorates the morning with its presence and allows other ponies to understand that the beginning of the day should always be serene and relaxed . The singing of birds will be complemented by the sounds of land animals, especially domestic ones. Their barking, meowing, howling and owl-like singing like Twilight's pet only makes the situation better. Almost every owner will be pleased if his pet bursts into the room with blind, naive and all-trusting joy and begins to stomp on the body or intensively lick the face, in the hope of waking him up as quickly as possible. This is all great. And with the area around the Everfree Forest, all this happens much more and more “magically”.

Fluttershy knew this better than anyone, not to mention Zecora.

Only now all the charm and miracle of the morning has no effect on her or her friends. The main meeting room of the Castle of Friendship was isolated from the pristine serenity of Ponyville's nature. Here the air was harsh from the various negative feelings accumulated in it. The Elements of Harmony and Spike sat on their thrones, their heads slightly bowed and a small shadow covering their eyes. All of them were tensely silent due to the fact that their pegasus friend was now telling the situation with Fang and his appearance in Manehattan. Only Discord tried to be more relaxed. During Fluttershy's serious story, he sometimes smoothly glided through the air; far from everyone, he danced in funk style, leaning forward forty-five degrees without lifting his heels from the floor and sliding backwards with a moonwalk. The Deity did many childish things, and Applejack paid attention to some of them. The earth pony looked at the draconicus with such a creepy look that Fluttershy, when she noticed this, stammered in the story and imagined that her farm friend also had a magical look. Discord was not a fool and saw everything... but was not going to do anything about it.

“...then the idea came to me to tell you about this, because I hoped that with your support and with Twilight’s knowledge, I would fully understand what I would have to work with,” Fluttershy finished speaking, taking a quiet breath and looking at the alicorn with patience. To attract more attention, Pegasus stood up a little from her seat, resting her front hooves on the table. She shuddered a little when, in order to explain the situation, she had to find not very pleasant memories, such as a night meeting with Trenderhoof. It was Fluttershy who tactfully kept silent in the story. She wants with all her might to forget how the stallion approached her with extremely terrible news and... his mysterious injuries and her unconsciousness at that moment. Even now, remembering this, Fluttershy begins to feel... strange... as if she should have understood all this, as if it concerned her... but...

“Well...”, the voice of the lavender princess returned the pegasus to the real world and she sharply raised her head towards her friend, “I can’t stop praising you, Fluttershy, for deciding to tell us. You made a very wise decision, I repeat. After all, such issues have always been a priority topic for us as guardians of Equestria. If something is always at the level of security and order in the country, we are always ready to contribute to it"

Twilight said this with a noticeable clearing of her throat. Her regal posture and formal tone were clear evidence of the seriousness of her words, while delivering them she looked back at her other friends receiving nods of approval. But this does not negate the fact that the tension in their communication has not disappeared during this time. The Element of Magic's voice was strained, slightly nervous but maintaining a grim calm. Her eyes exuded a little pain and skepticism as she glanced for a moment at the shadow creature, who lay down on the table next to Fluttershy and looked at the alicorn with deathly calm, almost never blinking. Small shadows continued to squirm from his body, covering his black fur. The eyes no longer emitted an ominous violet flame. Which, judging by Twilight’s observations, meant that the monster was not showing aggression and that he was not going to use... these powers.

The princess frowned and raised an eyebrow, looking at the beast again. Trying to understand the motives of his behavior and the meaning of being here. But she is not entirely sure that the false cat has enough intelligence to construct even primitive tactics. She didn't know anything.

“But it doesn’t make the situation any better.”, the alicorn princess added gloomily, looking a little sternly at her friend, “I hope you understand the consequences that can happen to this... this creature?”

Fluttershy opened her mouth to speak, but the words died in her mouth. She lowered her head a little and looked nervously at Fang. Twilight always used logic and the laws of cause-effect relationships when solving any serious problems. There were even cases when she simulated a pressing problem and conducted her own experiments to find the optimal solution. Documents with statistics, information data of national importance, calculations of event probabilities. Twilight has been doing her job with extraordinary seriousness lately. But no matter how erudite the princess is, Fluttershy is not a stupid pony either. She was aware of the responsibility, because every pet owner must undergo tests in the form of bureaucratic documentation to prove the pet’s safety in relation to other ponies. And the complexity of this process directly depends on the type of animal. Pegasus looked at the table, searching her head for the right words, then she looked at Rarity, who was sitting upright and already sipping some new orange drink with creamy foam. The unicorn took a sip from the straw and looked sadly and confidently at the veterinarian, as if she wanted to say that she needed to continue to act.

Fluttershy nodded slightly to her friend and straightened her back, looking at Twilight, the anxiety remained a little in her heart because now a lot could depend on their dialogue: “Yes, Twilight, I understand...”, the pegasus said in a quiet but calm voice, wanting to go a little softer in the topic of conversation, “Don’t misunderstand me, please. But for many years, I have occupied a central role in helping and exploiting all the animals that inhabit our town and its surroundings. I have directly communicated with their different species. And therefore I know their habits and preferences, know how to respond to their needs and desires. It is my duty as Ponyville's veterinarian to know all the fauna of our home... And I considered this case the same as the others. I was asked to organize a favorable stay for Fang in my animal sanctuary and for this reason I ...I...well..."

“You agreed, didn’t you?”, the sharp and loud question attracted the attention of all the ponies who looked at Rainbow. She flew up again and hovered above the throne - a clear sign of her irritation. Fluttershy got a little scared and fluttered her wings. She nodded carefully and slowly to the blue pegasus's question, looking anywhere but at her, “Wonderful... just amazing! What else are you going to tell us, Fluttershy?! I haven’t felt so exhausted since I with Daring Do they tried to get the Somnambula’s artifact from this slimy and nasty goo...ugh...Why do you think that you can make such decisions without us? Of course, I understand everything. Kindness and fair treatment of everyone and everything and something like that and blah, blah, blah, blah. But are you serious now?! Teaching him to be friendly in Ponyville. I've never heard anything dumber in my life... Did you see what he did to me?"

The pegasus's self-control suddenly began to quickly crack at the seams. Her body trembled and she looked at the other pegasus in amazement and shock. Rainbow looked sternly and expectantly at the yellow pony, her crimson eyes radiated anger, impatience, irritability and... anxiety. Yes, exactly anxiety. Fluttershy knew her flying friend well and she understood perfectly well that all the words spoken by Rainbow were not intended to offend Fluttershy. With this rainbow-maned pony she wanted to convey that she worries about all of us, about our lives. But Wonderbolt also mentioned the unpleasant incident with her and Fang. Fluttershy bit her lip, trying to suppress another wave of panic. They all witnessed when their bravest friend trembled and froze in place like a frightened baby pony who saw a monster from under the bed. Fang used magic on her... forbidden and evil magic. This power exuded only harshness and a mania for destruction, which her rainbow-maned friend felt. Unfortunately, this confirmed the danger of the cat for the surrounding ponies and this did not go in Fluttershy’s favor. She sighed, gaining new spiritual strength for further debate. Pegasus had to make sure that she was listened to and heard. She made a promise...

Fluttershy looked a little confidently, first at Twilight, then at Rainbow, and was about to start...

“Do you mind if I interfere?” Rarity asked rather rhetorically, putting down her half-finished cocktail and looking with restrained irritation at the alicorn, the farmer and the pegasus hovering above everyone, her voice unsuccessfully hiding her dissatisfaction, “It seems to me that on your part it's very unfair to talk about safety. Remind me who was the first to attack him? Hm? I'm certainly not an expert on animals, but even I can say that not only an animal, BUT EVEN a reasonable pony will act desperately if three ponies attack him with aggressive intentions."

Applejack huffed irritably and darkly. And Rainbow looked at Rarity indignantly and wanted to answer her, but the fashionista raised her hoof, which somehow affected the pegasus and she fell silent.

“Therefore, it would be extremely wrong to blame Fluttershy for negligence. Before this event, everything was fine. The beast... I mean... Fang lived in her cottage for three days and did nothing illegal. But I want to focus on Fluttershy’s decision to about sending the animal to our home. This is not a wrong idea at all, Rainbow. You think very categorically and in one direction. Do you really think that Fluttershy's refusal to transport the cat would be a good idea? Now tell me Twilight and Rainbow. what happened if Fang stayed in the city, out of our reach? Could we control him? I answer - No, we couldn't. That's why Fluttershy did us a big favor by bringing the beast here. Here he can be under our care."

Fluttershy now feels as if she is in the Garden of Eden, where joy and love flourish everywhere. She was immensely happy and pleasantly shocked. Her pair of astonished and widened eyes gazed intently at the unicorn, which without hesitation said what the pegasus so desperately wanted to hear. Few could have expected this. Rarity defends Fang's right to stay here. Initially, Fluttershy thought that the fashionista would be the hardest to convince given her initial reaction to the cat. But now she felt endless joy for Rarity. Fluttershy even stood up a little from her throne to fly up to the unicorn and hug her. But she stopped herself in time. Now is not the time for this.

“Um...” Pinkie began awkwardly when Fang approached her and began to rub against her left hoof, which was on the table. The pink pony carefully and tremblingly touched her other hoof to the shadow cat's head and began to gently stroke it. The animal closed its eyes in pleasure and sat on its hind legs, wagging its tail a little, dispersing the smoky shadows from itself. Twilight and Applejack became wary and their faces were distorted in a grimace of anxiety and fear, the Alicorn again lit the horn with battle magic, and the earth pony did not forget to straighten lasso. They all expected the worst, which did not come. To protect them from unnecessary actions, Fluttershy extended her hoof along the horizon, stopping them. She herself looked at Pinkie in pleasant hope. They need to see it for themselves. Fang continued to enjoy the caresses from the pink pony, he lay down on his back and began to playfully lightly hit his paws on the hooves of the pastry chef, who was trying to tickle his belly, which was very difficult to see because of the large clot of shadows. Pinkie managed to put a faint smile on her face and spoke to the others again, "Maybe...maybe the idea of leaving him behind isn't such a bad idea? I...I mean, maybe he can give us problems, but at least At least we will know about it. Moreover, now I see an ordinary cat...probably."

Rainbow raised one eyebrow and tensed her facial muscles as much as possible in a “Are you serious?” or “Are we just going to forget everything?” Twilight looked in amazement at the interaction between her pink friend and this monster and still had little faith in all of this. Then she turned her gaze towards Fluttershy, who was also looking at her in surprise. Pegasus somehow knew in advance what her alicorn friend was thinking and made her face like something between softness and wisdom. Fluttershy's eyes narrowed slightly and her cheeks lifted slightly from a large smile that was surprisingly very relaxed. The pegasus's shoulders tensed slightly and his wings flapped a little on his back. Twilight understood what Fluttershy meant. The pony silently tells the princess that they shouldn’t worry and that what they are seeing now is just the beginning.

The lavender alicorn sighed tiredly and leaned on the back of her throne, bending her back a little and spreading her wings down. Her regal pose disappeared: "I don't know, Fluttershy. Such developments will not be good for the daily lives of ordinary ponies," the alicorn placed her front hooves on the arms of the throne, her face drawn into a form of stern and cold wisdom, which is how Celestia usually behaved when she was involved in emergency situations; an attentive gaze was directed at the pegasus, Twilight carefully looked at her friend’s facial expressions, posture, and the frequency of twitching of the wings and ears, as if she was trying to find in this some important answer for herself; then she sighed and continued speaking, sadly lowering her gaze, “We all deeply respect you for your endless desire to help everyone you consider unfortunate. Your eyes never see monsters. You notice in creatures what they themselves have long lost in their souls. But do you really think that the current adventure is worth it? I...I'm not even sure that he has a soul. Don't think anything bad, Fluttershy. We all believe in your power to heal the villain with kindness. But what consequences will follow from this? What can Fang do before you teach him good manners? This... is an unusual creature, and I am still choosing my words politely towards him. I have never seen an animal that can use dark magic, and this unknown terrifies me."

Fluttershy lowered her head and began to think hard. Her friend's words could not be refuted. The Princess of Friendship loaded the pegasus' head with hard facts that pointed out the obvious flaws in her plan. The rehabilitation process never goes according to plan, at least not that pegasus could remember from her experience. But this does not speak about her competence as a veterinarian. Every pony and non-pony has such a problem when the pet is uncomfortable when changing the location of residence. New acquaintances, new surroundings, new neighboring pets - all these are obstacles and challenges that are natural. Fluttershy can remember every predatory animal that is under her care and that previously could not get along in the outer territories of Ponyville. At that time, her main task was to suppress the hunting instincts of large and medium-sized individuals. It was extremely difficult. Each of her animal friends, who has fangs and claws, used to show noticeable aggression towards the pony and often tried to get into the center of the town at night. At that time, Princess Luna was not there yet, so there was no point in counting on the help of the bat ponies. Therefore, Fluttershy herself took full responsibility for the behavior of these animals. She had to search out these sources of public danger for many nights and re-teach them to suppress their bloodlust. Scientific observations of everyone's metabolism, then social experiments with pony volunteers, then the right choice of a balanced diet to reduce the need for horse meat, and then the organization of walks in almost public places (under the supervision of pegasus). Naturally, Fluttershy could not do everything correctly in a short time, there were failures, because not all animals were compliant towards her. She tried again and again, the cycle repeated and repeated. With small steps, but success has been achieved: now wild animals do not perceive ponies as prey, they are used to the existence of Ponyville and its inhabitants and perceive them as part of the ecosystem, which makes no sense to disturb.

And now, Pegasus can't let doubts lead her friends down the wrong path. She took a deep breath, lowered her ears a little and silently stood up from her throne. Twilight and the others arched their eyebrows in incomprehension and looked confused as Fluttershy slowly approached Pinkie. Only the Element of Joy did not pay attention to this and continued to play with the sinister creature. Pegasus left soft clicking sounds on the crystal and smooth floor, her frighteningly calm gaze fixed sternly on Fang, but her eyebrows and eyes still gave her the look of that warming tenderness and care, which testified to the complete absence of evil intentions. And the lack of uncertainty. The latter was noticed by Twilight and Rarity when their friend came close to the cat. Rainbow, as usual, was not happy that everyone was trying to stall for time and communicate with actions rather than words. She made a slight grimace of displeasure and crossed her front hooves and snorted irritably, but the fastest pegasus did not want to distract Fluttershy and just waited, soaring over the card table again...although she really wanted to hear the right decisions and quickly. At the same time, Applejack watched as Fluttershy slowly and gently lifted her left hoof and joined the game between the pink earth pony and the shadow cat. She pushed her hat away from her eyes a little and tried to process in her head what she sees and what has happened recently. It was difficult to understand what was in her head: a chaotic stream of contradictory thoughts colliding with each other, one at the same time worse and better than the other; at the moment she was trying to find a way to cope with those feelings that distort her ideas about the right way in this problem, but it is not so easy and with each attempt it turns out It's getting worse.

"Um...Fluttershy," the Princess of Friendship said carefully and attracted the attention of everyone except the yellow pegasus, alicorn tilted her head forward a little and looked at Fluttershy with a little concern, wanting to end the awkward and long silence, "What else can you add in defense of Fang?"

Now Pinkie was distracted from the cat and looked at the pink-maned pony along with the rest of the Elements, Even Discord and Spike looked at her after finishing their conversation. Only Spike began to look nervously at Twilight, he did not want it to come to a vote.

Fluttershy tickled Fang's soft belly a little more and watched with a warm smile as this mewing clot of shadows neatly "fights" with the hoof of pegasus as with a plush toy. But still, she raised her head and looked at everypony who was present here and everyone's gaze expressed different emotions...not what Fluttershy wanted. Only Discord polished his claws with mystical calmness. Everyone expected an answer from her and she knew it:

"I know what I want to say," Fluttershy said softly in her thin voice, first looking at her hooves and then at the Princess of Friendship, considering all her chances and all that she had managed to go through lately, "This is our duty"

Well...it became even more unclear, all the ponies except Fluttershy looked at each other in embarrassment, trying to understand the meaning of these words. Twilight was the first to look at Fluttershy again and ask:

"Fluttershy...please explain yourself more specifically, I... we probably misunderstood you...", alicorn hesitantly fell silent trying to plunge deeper into the words spoken by Fluttershy, for some reason subconsciously she knew what pegasus meant. Then they heard the faint sound of knocking on the crystal floor, which in the normal routine of Princess Twilight would have been ignored. But not this time. No one dared to say or do anything superfluous: Rainbow Dash surprisingly stood next to Rarity's throne, Pinkie stopped squeezing Fang, Rarity took a cocktail again during the conversation but did not drink it, Applejack, as usual, just sat and waited, but she looked at the cat. Even Discord was distracted from his "extremely necessary" polishing of claws at the moment, Spike crossed his paws on his chest and also looked at the main defender of the monster. Twilight patiently watched as pegasus approached her. She never got up from her throne. No one should step back from their position now. It's too late. Even if the Princess of Friendship has taken up neutrality so far, this does not make her job easier. It's hard for her to see how her friends have different points of view on this issue, which causes unnecessary arguments and quarrels. And it will be even harder when she is forced to take sides in an argument. She always has the final word. 

Fluttershy stood three steps away from Twilight. Her delicate and sky-turquoise eyes stared into the mystical purple eyes of the disciple of the Sun and gave no hint of uncertainty or inner struggle. Pegasus slowly lifted the corners of her lips and carefully looked at the rest of her friends before saying: "My dear friends, you can only imagine how much I love you all," the veteran began and misled the others even more, but it was very pleasant and embarrassing for them to hear this, "Our adventures are a testament This is the formation of those strong bonds that led us to a better life. We proved to the others that nothing is impossible if not only you, but also your friends stand in front of an obstacle. Friends who are ready to follow you with blind loyalty. Friends who will do their best to get you out of a desperate situation, but if they fail, they will stay with you and will not allow your soul to suffer alone. Friends always consider your opinion important. Friends never put their problems ahead of yours. And even if they know that you are wrong, they do not go against you - they will try to help you and stay on your side," Fluttershy had to make her beautiful voice a little louder to make sure that every word was heard, in parallel with this she approached everyone and looked with the same tenderness and trust Into everyone's eyes, then she looked back at Twilight, standing next to Rarity's throne, "We embodied all this in the best possible way. It made us Elements of Harmony. Since then, it has become our duty to bring the same friendship to others, to show how to look at those who are dear to you. Every pony in Equestria is grateful to us for not leaving them in dangerous situations and allowing them to defeat evil together with us as equal partners...as friends," such noble speeches were new to Fluttershy, she had a slight tremor of her lips and wings, "Now it's the same case," Fluttershy turned her eyes for a moment towards Fang, lying on his paws and looking at Spike, then looked back at the Princess, "He is not a threat at the moment for all ponies, he is a lonely creature who needs the right changes and reliable ones who will give him the family he needs so much. He needs to be given a chance to feel the brightest parts of his heart. After all, this is what the Elements of Harmony do...right?"

Fluttershy exhaled deeply and stopped staring at Alicorn. It was hard and scary for her. To raise the topic of the purpose of the Elements, to select the right words so that everyone could feel the whole intention of pegasus and had to say so much. Fluttershy couldn't remember the last time she was the central figure in an important argument. Literally everything depends on your every word. It was too much for the shy pegasus. Fluttershy looked at Fang even more intently, she was already afraid to look at her friends. She couldn't imagine that they were now considering who was supporting her and who wasn't. She begins to feel that she has done something wrong and directed the others into the wrong way of thinking. Fluttershy begins to come up with new arguments for every possible bad outcome, as much as her imagination allows.

Her friends themselves were like a kaleidoscope of different facial expressions. The words spoken by Fluttershy and the topic she mentioned were absolutely clear to them. No one will be able to explain to them what useful work they do in relation to all living ponies, their positive impact on social stability in Equestria is visible to everyone and to them most of all. But for some reason, it is from the words of their pegasus friend that this seems to be something new. It's hard to explain, there's no way to describe it. Now the rest of the keepers of the Elements are trying to go over the definitions of friendship and the laws of Harmony, on which their School is built and the meaning of existence in the face of the entire community. 

Finally, Twilight attracted everyone's attention with a small knock on the table. As expected, all the Elements and others looked at the youngest monarch. Fluttershy looked at her purple friend with great nervousness, hoping in her mind for a good outcome. Pegasus's eyes widened slightly, her wings spread a little, and she bent her whole body slightly towards the Throne of Magic. Twilight saw it all perfectly, but her face turned regally cold, as if they were in a State Court and she was in the role of Princess Celestia. The pony closest to the Harmony Tree carefully examined the faces of all those present. She looked at Pinkie, Rarity and Rainbow, her eyes narrowed slightly and became less formal, the same thing happened with Spike and Discord...But because of the second one, it turned out to be an annoying situation. Discord noticed the gaze on himself and gave the Princess a seductive macho look and winked.

With great difficulty, she suppressed the desire to send this frivolous creature to Tartarus. Now her gaze met Applejack's. Only now Twilight stayed a little longer. When she looked at her farmer friend, she had an unpleasant tingling sensation on her back for a second. She took a deep breath and closed her eyes, "Fluttershy. In the name of the Princess of Friendship, the Fourth Equestrian Tiara," Twilight said as if she had read the official charter of the Royal Guard, she looked at pegasus and spread her wings; Fluttershy herself felt a monstrous pressure and bent down a little in a half-bow and not breathing, "I give you official permission to raise this beast near the town of Ponyville with its subsequent adaptation to the present..."

The princess could not finish her speech as she immediately abruptly rested against the back of the throne. Her breathing became a little harder and her hooves were immobilized in a tight grip. Fluttershy had already imperceptibly found herself in the arms of the alicorn. Her head was not visible, it was hidden by the Princess's right shoulder. Fluttershy pressed her face there and hid behind the bright purple fur. She was crying quietly. But this crying was full of joy.