Diamond Tiara woke up in bed. A gloriously comfortable bed, soft and fluffy and thick with fat pillows, so deliciously soft and sweet-smelling that it was a shock to her system.

It was not just any bed. It was her bed. She took in the familiar ruffled canopy, the comforters and pillows custom made in her colors: pink, lavender and white, and smelled faintly of potpourri. Across the room she could see her dolls and toys, lined up on their shelves; she could see the wardrobe she knew was full of the finest, prettiest dresses for a little filly that money could buy. She felt a strange sort of disorientation. had it all been nothing but a long terrible dream? Then she felt the roughness of band-aids, the sting of her scrapes and bruises underneath, and the reality of the past two weeks returned.

It had been two days. She was home. She was back home, at long last.

There was a knock, and the bedroom door opened. A pair of unicorn nurses in little hospital caps came in, pushing a cart before them. "Oh, good, you're awake," one said with a professional smile. "That's very good. Come along, dear..."

She took Tiara by the hoof and pulled her out of the bed; Tiara meekly complied. The nurses led her to the bathroom. They didn't fill the tub; they had learned that lesson the first day. Even being near a bathtub full of water made the filly collapse in terror. A sponge bath with a basin was the best they could do. They helped Tiara into the warm water and helped her bathe, gently scrubbing around her cuts and scrapes. Tiara made no protest. They were very careful and gentle, and the warm water felt so nice on her rough fur.

Once she was bathed and dried off (oh the towels were so soft and fluffy), the nurses tended all her little hurts, daubing soothing medicine on them and putting little sticking plasters on the ones that still needed them. That done, they helped Tiara back into bed. One set out a breakfast tray and arranged a meal of vegetable soup and warm sliced bread, while the other took a brush and began brushing out her mane and tail. They had done this all before, that morning when they had found her, Diamond Tiara recalled. Her mane and tail were a lot shorter now; the nurses had been forced to cut the mats and tangles out, leaving her with next to nothing. She'd caught a glimpse of herself in the bathroom mirror; her tiara gone, her mane and tail all but gone; it was like everything that used to be her had been shorn away.

They finished brushing her short hair and set the meal tray in front of her on the bed. She quietly said "thank you" and ate. After she was done, she lay back in the bed, pulling her comforter up to her chin. It was warm here. It was safe here.

The nurses prattled on in quiet, gentle voices about nothing in particular. After a moment Tiara realized they were asking her a question. "...if you're feeling better, I think we could let your friends in from school to see you," one of them said.

Friends? She didn't have any friends. And they'd all seen her already. Chained like a dog to the school's front step. "No thank you," she whispered.

"And your Daddy? Can he come in and see you?" the other nurse asked gently.

...Sitting by Darth Vulcan's knee, watching the glowing ghostly image-- Rich's Barnyard Bargains, from a bird's eye view; her father trotting up to the front door, jingling his keys, whistling merrily like nothing in the world was wrong...

Tiara rolled away and curled up in a ball.

The nurses sighed. "We'll let you rest for now, dear," one said. "Maybe when you're feeling better..." She left the sentence unfinished. The two wheeled the cart out of the room, closing the door behind them.

Tiara lay there for a while, totally still. She could hear voices outside the door, down the hallway a ways; her father's voice, the voice of her nurses, what sounded like a filly's voice-- Silver Spoon? Her ears pricked up... then folded back down. Silver Spoon had only hung out with her because both their parents were rich. And when she'd been kidnapped..

...Silver Spoon prancing along happily to school, to Sugarcube Corner, in the midst of a throng of ponies. Diamond Tiara? Who was that?...

What friends?

The day outside was sunny, but cold. She could feel the cold radiating into the room from the picture window along with the sunshine. The huge, open picture window at the foot of her bed, that looked out onto the woods.... She got up from her bed, Made sure the window was locked.

She went to the bookshelves, retrieved two or three of her favorite plush toys-- Miss Pretty, Bumpkin the Bear, Mister Hugglesworth-- dragged them back to the bed, arranging them in a huddle around herself, hugging them close.

The voices outside were still talking. The nurses were quiet but firm; the younger voices and the voice of her father sounded disappointed, but resigned. She heard them all walk away, hoofsteps receding in the distance. For the briefest moment she wanted to run to the door, to call them back.

She just lay there in bed, staring out the window as the hours drifted by, wondering if she would ever feel safe or happy ever again....

She nearly screamed when a head popped up in the window.

It took a moment of heart-stopping terror for her to realize that Diamond Dogs didn't wear horn-rimmed glasses or pearl necklaces. They certainly didn't rap on windows with their hooves, mashing their noses against the glass and  looking aggravated. "S-silver Spoon?" Tiara said. She jumped out of bed and ran to open the window.

Silver Spoon tumbled inside. She sat up, adjusting her glasses. "Diamond Tiara, why didn't you--" she looked at Diamond Tiara full on for the first time and gasped. "Tiara... what happened to your mane?"

"Hey," somepony outside the window barked. "a little help out here, wouldja?"

"Oh!" Silver Spoon ran back to the window and reached down over the sill. Diamond Tiara stuck her head out the window. Right below was a five-filly tower. Down at the bottom were Applebloom and Babs, followed by Twist, Sweetiebelle and Scootaloo. "She would have her room on the third floor," Scootaloo growled as Silver Spoon and a reluctant and confused Diamond Tiara pulled her in.

"It woulda been easier if somepony hadn't forgot the rope ladder we made," Sweetiebelle groused.

"Hey, not my fault!"

"Was too!"

"Get off my back!"

"Would alla youse get off OUR backs and get in there??" Babs yelled, losing her temper. "Youse guys are heavy!!" After one or two minutes of this, along with a lot of huffing, straining, pushing and pulling, the filly daisy chain managed to pull itself up the wall and in through the window. They sprawled on Diamond Tiara's throw rug in a pile, groaning.

Diamond Tiara backed up from them warily. The Cutie Mark Crusaders? Why? "What are you doing here?" she demanded, a trifle angrily.

Scootaloo scowled. "Ya got me," she said. Applebloom socked her in the side.

"We wanted to see you," Sweetiebelle squeaked.

Tiara retreated around the other side of the bed, out of sight. "Why?" she said, her voice quavering. "So you could laugh at me some more? So you could see if I still had my collar and my doggy dish?" The memory, the humiliation, found chained to the front step of the schoolhouse like an animal--

"No! Tiara, they're, they're not like that," Silver Spoon pleaded. "They're not bad ponies. They kept me company when I was scared and lonely, when nopony knew what happened to you." She pointed at the Crusaders. "Applebloom has felt horrible that you got kidnapped off her farm.  Scootaloo and Babs wanted to start a search party! And not a day didn't go by when one of them didn't ask about you." She stepped a little closer, trying to peek around the corner of the bed. "We've all been so worried about you--"

It exploded out of her. "LIAR!" Diamond Tiara burst around the corner of the bed, screaming in her best friend's face. "LIAR! I know the truth. I saw you all!"

"Saw us?" Silver Spoon said, baffled.

"He showed me," Diamond Tiara seethed, her breath coming in gasps. "He used his magic to show me. A magic mirror to let me see Ponyville." They all looked surprised. "Yeah, that's right," Tiara gloated bitterly, a hateful smile on her face. Her eyes welled up, streaks of tears ran down her face. "I saw you all. You were all running and playing together like nothing happened. You, and everypony else--  going to the park, and going to work, and going to school, and to Sugarcube corner like nothing at all happened. You were GLAD I was gone! 'Cause it was PERFECT, wasn't it? 'Cause it was just... like... I'd... never... been... born..."  She trailed off into hiccuping sobs.

None of the fillies said a word in their defense. They just... mobbed her. Silver Spoon was the first to throw her forelimbs around Tiara's neck, the others barely a heartbeat behind. Tiara screamed in anger and thrashed, trying to push them away, but they just wrapped around her tighter, hugging her and nuzzling her and refusing to let go. Her screeches turned back into sobs and she gave in, the group hugging her and rocking her back and forth.

The whole story spilled out, a bit at a time. The other fillies were stunned over and over again as they heard it. The march to the cave. The Diamond Dogs. The horrible kitchen filled with blood and gore. The collar, the chain, the near-drowning. "He...filled a toilet bowl with water.. and made me drink out of it!" she sobbed at one point-- one of her escape attempts, swiftly punished. Just listening to the spoiled, hard-nosed filly weep her way through what happened was enough to haunt them all for the rest of their lives.

She finished by telling them how, every day, he had let her watch Ponyville through his magic window, how she'd seen the whole town going about its business, happy and carefree. Then he'd tell her about some rotten thing from her past that she'd done, and tell her this was why nopony cared-- because she was rotten and hateful and everypony, even her Daddy, would be happier if she was dead.

They only thought they had been stunned before. The faces around her were filled with expressions of shock, horror, pity, and even, to her astonishment, sputtering fury. "That--- that wicked, wicked, poophead!" Sweetiebelle screeched, her face flushed red, literally drumming the floor with her hooves in rage.

"What a TOAD," Applebloom breathed.

"That's... that's the rottenest thing I've ever heard," Babs said in agreement.

"You GOTTA know that wath all a lie!" Twist pleaded.

Diamond Tiara's head actually snapped back at this. All a lie... The idea was like a beam of light, bright and pinhole-thin, piercing through the fog of misery around her. "But..."

Scootaloo gave her a look. "You mean it never occurred to you that the bad guy might be lying to you?" She put her hooves on her hips. "Good grief, you really are dumb!"

"Scootaloo!" The shout came at her from half a dozen directions at once.

"Well come on!" she protested.

"He showed me... through his magic window..." Tiara said feebly. "I... I saw you all. Walking back and forth to school-- and--"

"School?" Applebloom said, cocking an eyebrow. "DT, we ain't had a single school day since you disappeared! Heck, practically every place has been closed!"

"What?"

The others shook their heads. "Everypony wath thcared that Darth Vulcan guy might try to kidnap thomepony elthe," Twist said. "To get revenge on the town. Miss Cheerilee cantheled thcool, cauthe nopony'd let their kidth out." She shivered a little.

"We were only at the schoolhouse that morning 'cause Miss Cheerilee asked us to help clean the classroom," Sweetiebelle said. "And there've been guards all over the streets the past two weeks..." She gasped suddenly and facehoofed. "Oh, doi. That was what it was! Princess Twilight cast an illusion over the whole town so Darth Vulcan wouldn't know what was going on!"

Diamond Tiara gawped in astonishment. She moaned and hung her head. "I'm a rotten pony, and a stupid one!" she said.

"Don't SAY that," Silver Spoon said, hugging her again.

Diamond Tiara looked at her friend, looked at the others. "Why are you being so nice to me?" she asked, utterly lost. "I've been so mean to you all."

"Well... yeah... you've kinda been a stinker," Scootaloo said, rubbing the back of her own head with a hoof.

"But you're OUR stinker," Babs said. The others giggled feebly.

"You're a pony," Twist said. "And ponieth are thpothed to care about each other."

"Even if they don't deserve it?" Tiara said weakly, eyes watering again.

"Either everypony deserves it, or nopony deserves it," Applebloom said. "And either way that ain't the point."

The waterworks started flowing again. "I-- I'll can't promise I'll be a good friend," Tiara said, sniffling and wiping her nose on her foreleg. "I'll probably be a jerk and do awful stuff again..."

"Like ah said, that ain't the point," Applebloom said firmly. "Forgiven's forgiven. And nopony changes all by themselves anyway."

They sat together, talking for a while. Commiserating over the fate of Diamond Tiara's cropped mane and tail ("I dunno, I kinda think it looks good," was Babs' verdict, given with a flip of her own short-bobbed mane) and Twist plying her with some soft peppermint sticks. (Tiara hated peppermint. They were the best thing she'd ever tasted.) It was when the topic drifted around to when school would start up again that Tiara started looking downcast again.

Scootaloo caught her look. "Oh come on, it's not that bad," she said. "Well yeah I mean school stinks but.."

"Ah think she's thinkin' about what ponies will think when they see her, Scoots," Applebloom said. Diamond Tiara winced, and nodded. Applebloom stuck her lower lip out, thinking. "C'mon, Tiara. I think there's some stuff you got ta see."

The household staff, not being foolish, were well aware of the "clandestine" invasion that had taken place upstairs by the Cutie Mark Crusaders. Largely because their chaperone, one Spike the Dragon, was down in the drawing room having a mug of hot mulled cider. The girls weren't allowed to go anywhere without someone to watch over them, but their families had come to the agreement that Spike was levelheaded, responsible, and trustworthy--- and more importantly was a two foot tall reptile with claws and fangs who was swordproof, magic resistant and could breathe fire. He had escorted the CMC to Tiara's house for their visit, then back to Tiara's house for their "super secret pony ninja mission," introduced himself to the butler and made himself comfortable downstairs while he waited for them to come out.

Granted, neither he nor the butler and maids were prepared for precisely how they made their exeunt. There was a thunder in the stairwell and six little ponies came galumphing down, herding a seventh in their midst. Babs was in the fore, clearing a path. "One side, one side, comin' through-- scuse us, Jeeves, we're heading out," she said as they brushed past.

"What's going on?" Spike said, nearly dropping his mug.

"C'mon, Spike, we gotta get a move on!" Sweetiebelle shouted. The tiny herd basically swept him up in their wake.

"And just may I ask where you are all going?" the butler said... with little real hope of slowing the stampede.

"We're taking Miss Tiara out on a constitutional, Worcestershire," Silver Spoon said, with the air of one long accustomed to servants. "We shan't be back till after two. We shall send word if we're going to be later."

"Um, very good, miss," Worcestershire said with a fatalistic mental shrug. The dragon was with them and there were guards on every streetcorner, after all... he and the maids watched as the seven ponies and one dragon piled out the front door, and were gone.

Tiara wasn't sure about this, not at all. She still felt the shivers just being out in the open. But having a tiny herd pressed around her, warm sides against hers, helped her feel better, helped her feel strong. She had to take deep breaths, and look around and remind herself that she was safe. She was right in the middle of Ponyville and she was safe.

Despite everything they'd said, Tiara had been doubting. That was, she doubted until she saw a few of the townsponies in person. There was nothing but sympathy and kind words to her. Even from ponies whom she'd never been very nice to... She'd broken down and tearfully blurted out more than one apology on the way. They'd been accepted with surprised good grace, when all she'd expected was indifference or hostility...  After the first one or two, her tears had dried and the reconcilings had come more easily, though no less genuine.

What was more surprising was how much Ponyville had changed. There were soldiers in armor on every block, some patrolling, others tending to pegasus carriages, even a few flying overhead. There were even some standing guard outside the library. "Where did they all come from?" she gasped.

"The Princesses," Scootaloo said. "Weren't cha listening? They moved like, a whole platoon of soldiers into Ponyville the moment that Darth Vulcan guy kidnapped you. They sent in the whole bunch in a big raid into the Everfree to try and rescue you!"

"I didn't know," Diamond Tiara said. "I never saw them."

"Not surprising," Spike said. "Twilight said they didn't even come close to finding Darth Vulcan's lair. While they were in there, fighting the guy in the middle of the woods, the Diamond Dogs were in here, looting and robbing and... well, leaving you chained to the front of the school," he said the last apologetically, shrugging.

"Yeah, it was a whole big shuck an' jive," Applebloom snorted. "Shining Armor was mad enough to spit his bit when he got back and found out..."

Diamond Tiara stopped in her tracks. "Shining Armor?" she squeaked. "The Shining Armor led the rescue team that came for me?" She made a sound like 'hyeeek' and clapped her hooves to her fire engine red cheeks.

"Yeah," swooned Silver Spoon. "He was just as handsome as his pictures..." Diamond Tiera went 'hyeeek' again. Several of the other fillies cooed in agreement.

Spike regarded them all with lidded eyes. "He's married, you guys," he said.

"We know," Sweetiebelle said wistfully.

"We jutht like looking at him," Twist said. The others, even Scootaloo, chimed in. "Yeah...."

Spike just rolled his eyes and mimed gagging himself. "Fillies."

"And I missed him," Tiara lamented, stamping a hoof.

"Nah, he's still in town," Spike said, knowing he'd regret admitting it. "In fact, he's going to want to interview you later, to see what you know about Darth Vulcan and his forces---"

"Hyeeeeeeeeeek!"

They trotted through the streets together, the others shepherding her along. It wasn't till they got to a familiar street that she realized where they were herding her. Up ahead was Daddy's store, Rich's Barnyard Bargains. She stopped in her tracks again. "Why are we here?" she stammered.

The others were still. She looked around at them. Applebloom was the one who finally spoke. "DT, maybe I ain't the smartest filly in Equestria, but I remember what you told us Darth Vulcan told you," she said. "I remember what you said when your Daddy came and unlocked those chains, too. You thought he abandoned you. That weren't nothin' but a horrible lie. "

"A horrible horrible poopyheaded lie," Sweetiebelle huffed, her face red.

"Whoa, easy there, Mallo Fluff," Babs teased. "Youse is gettin' all hardcore on us." Sweetiebelle tried to glare at her, but it only came out looking like a pout.

"She's right," Applebloom went on. "Your Daddy never abandoned you. Shoot, the Guards had to almost hog-tie him to keep him from charging off into the Everfree all by himself."

"I heard he tried to hire some tough commando type ponies, to do a rescue raid," Scootaloo said. "Which woulda been awesome, but the Princesses stopped him. They were afraid that if he jumped the gun, Darth Vulcan would see him coming and--" she gulped.

Tiara shuddered. She could figure out what Scootaloo was hinting at.

"He ain't done nuthin' since," Applebloom said. "Won't go to the bank. Won't open the store. Just sits there on the front porch..." Applebloom pointed. Tiara could see the silhouette of a pony, slouched over in one of the wooden rockers Daddy left on display for ponies to rest in. It was then Tiara realized that all the windows of the store were dark.

Applebloom gave her a nudge with her nose. "I think your Daddy feels like you did," she said. "Like the most horrible pony in the world. 'Cause as rich an' powerful as he is, he couldn't come and rescue his little girl.

"He loves you somethin' powerful, an' if you love him you won't let him spend another minute feeling like that."

Tiara looked at her Daddy. She felt something lurch inside, like something was trying to twist her heart in half. The others gave her a few more nudges. She started walking towards the store. Halfway there she started running.

"Daddy!"

Filthy Rich looked up. He was bleary eyed and haggard; he hadn't groomed; his once stylish pompadour was a stringy mess. He hadn't slept in two days. He could barely believe his eyes when he saw the little pink and lavender pony running for him, hell bent for leather. "Punkin?" he said.

She all but flung herself into his forelegs. "Daddy!" she sobbed. She burrowed her face into his neck, clinging like a vine, never going to let go. "I love you Daddy-- I know you tried, you tried-- I don't care, I love you Daddy--"

Filthy Rich hugged her close and showered her with tears. His baby girl was finally back.

Up the road half a block, six fillies stood sniffling and wiping damp eyes, a few of them threatening to punch anyone who blabbed. The dragon however was not so resolute. He was standing with kerchief in claw, bawling to beat the band. "Why are YOU so worked up?" Babs teased him, snickering through her own watery eyes.

"Iiii don't KNOOOOOWWWWW!" Spike howled, blowing his nose with an enormous honk. The others turned on him with rib pokes and hoof noogies, and maybe a couple of back pats and hugs.

It was a beautiful day in Ponyville, and everything was going to be fine.