The wonder that surrounded Applejack and Big Mac annealed as the days passed and the rest of the family arrived, Hearth’s Warming celebrated on the farm beyond its one given day. Hardly any work was done in that tender time of reminiscing, a burden that the town was willing to take on with all good cheer. When groceries were needed, they were procured without charge; when something needed fixing, there was always a volunteer to put themselves to it; when word got out that so-and-so on the farm wasn’t feeling well, someone would surely come by with a platter of brownies or a jug of spiced cider. For as long as the snow covered the ground and smoke spread from the farmhouse’s chimney, it was as though the orchard were sanctified, and when that smoke stopped and the Apple family shed its outer layers to leave only the core behind, life seeped back into the hallowed space.

Big Mac returned to the land with nary a word, asserting his tendency toward silence with the calm dignity for which he was known, and as Applejack spent most of her time indoors, the two did not speak much. It was not so different from before their adventure, and yet it was, at least to her eyes. Questioning whether it was her alone or both of them, Applejack reflected on her brother’s silence, at first in the safety of her mind and then aloud to Versus, who checked in a few times a week. For Applejack, news of the farm was always cagey and vague, for she did not know how much was hers to tell a non-immediate friend; the same was not true of Versus, who filled the time with news of the southern town and of her own life. Since the Elements’ departure, she had been more and more occupied with Snowdrift news, and it her. Most recently, she had revealed to Applejack—and Big Mac, shamefully listening through the wall—that her boss had been questioning her about her relationship with the Elements, and in what capacity she had helped them. Applejack, seeing no danger in it, advised Versus that such inquiries were natural, that she was the closest thing her interrogators had to the Elements.

Applejack had Versus, her thoughts and writings, and a room to pace; but it was to the cold earth that Big Mac did consign his thoughts and feelings. Versus’ smile, he stamped into the snow; her voice, he folded among the tarpaulins and stacked in the shed next to dusty carts and spades; the dance they shared at the first Contraction party, he sighed out under frosty branches. They seemed to be of similar ages, but thoughts of her, her youthful step and the open-hearted inflection to her every word, made him feel twenty years her senior. At times, often as he marched back to the farmhouse in falling dusk, he would turn to their shared trauma and wonder how she was handling it. Applejack never asked, and when Versus mentioned it of her own will, she did so obliquely and to no follow-up. In his fantasies, she and he would share the living room and comfort each other, free of judgment—even that to which they held themselves.

Selfishly, he would at times envision her in great distress at the loss of a friend or from some other generic tragedy, and he would be there to hold her tight. At other times, and these which he struggled to never think about afterwards, the positions would be reversed; and in those darker, more personal scenarios, it was never one of the Elements, but Versus. He had had feelings for Rarity for a long time before adventuring with her, and the occasional infatuation with Rainbow Dash and Pinkie, and most of them he now counted as his best friends, yet still it was always Versus to whom he turned in his mind, drunk with indulgent, impossible fantasy, beset with misfortune that was never strong enough to survive a warm hug and an admission of long-hidden, mutual affection.

It was clearest in the early mornings, when the air was still and it stung to breathe, when the frost crackled under his tread, when brown leaves were damp and fragrant under the dreaming apple trees. He would face the mountain and see his friends there, and the distance between them was only then what it was, not decorated with fantastical trappings or poetic exaggerations. Exactly as they had said they would: they had gone on, found their lives and started living them again, as natural as anything in the world; but, like he himself and Applejack, indelibly different. The pain of the final goodbye had never come, and for him, its recognition was a symptom of lovesickness.

For Applejack it was a symptom of spiritual dissolution, the same which she had seen and turned from time and again in the course of their journey. The inosculation of life-tracks such as theirs should not have come undone so easily, yet it had; and there it was, her hardest lesson yet to learn, the most painful and also the most beautiful: nothing in life is guaranteed. In a note for her to bring up in her next talk with Versus, she wrote, “life don’t care how good you done up to the point of a mistake. Bad is bad, and it’s easy to forget that.” Under that, circled, “Why do things happen? Because they happen.”

She would go outside to work as the holiday season closed, and it was not long before she discerned the lost spark. Physical labor gratified her as always, but times were she would get back in after a long day, too spent for more than a good meal and some family time; now she would go out, think, get back, think some more, restlessly pacing inside her own mind, carving arguments and debates for herself, puzzles to examine, quandaries to tease. When the last of the family had gone, it was routine for her to stay up one or two hours past her usual bedtime and ponder something, a nuance that had come to her that she might have previously overlooked or someone’s point that she had once dismissed. She checked out some light reading from Twilight’s former library, and a couple days later, checked out some heavier reading—and these books she would later offer to purchase, the start of her own collection of teachings and writings.

None of it escaped Granny’s notice, or Apple Bloom’s, and when they asked her about it, she told them the truth, that “something” had changed in her over the adventure, and she was exploring that change in a healthy, constructive way. No, it was not a sign of something wrong, she assured Granny, and no, she was not planning on leaving the farm, she promised to Apple Bloom. It was no more than a newfound hobby, and they were content to leave it at that. Fewer questions came than Applejack expected, and whenever she returned to the farmhouse with a stack of books, she would only see hints of how they felt about it in the sidelong glances.

Rainbow had only to suggest to Celestia that she stay with Twilight, and she was made Twilight’s personal assistant, given a badge and a uniform, and put on the royal payroll. No interview necessary, no résumé; the process took about twenty minutes to finalize. Twilight told her that her own job title was being pulled out of thin air, so it was no challenge for Celestia to insert Rainbow wherever she pleased.

Twilight knew her job would be more complicated than she expected when Celestia invited her to lunch the day after returning. With no small amount of trepidation, she met the princess and four lackeys in one of the palace’s conference rooms; of them, she recognized only Caramel, their PR pony. They introduced one another and made small talk, and Twilight, shaking her new coworkers’ hooves, was hit for the first time with the horrible idea that she had, perhaps, not made a mistake after all, and that work was all she had come to know.

“Let the meeting of the Grand Restoration Committee now commence,” Celestia announced, smiling wide. “First, let me just thank you all. It will be through your efforts that Equestria sees itself returned to its rightful place; the country is—forgive me, will be—in your debt. Eternally.” This final word she punctuated with a look into each of their eyes, and of them all, only Twilight looked away.

“Our first team member needs no introduction. Twilight Sparkle will be my resource for coordinating all ground-restoration operations. She’s in charge of maintaining a map of all the fault lines and their bridges, fault spacing, alignment, and later, reconnection to the planet. Here, Twilight.” She slid Twilight a map of the continent. “After this meeting, you and me will talk.”

Twilight looked down at the map, its face cracked with a maze of red lines that she supposed were the gaps. By the look of the ink, it had been drawn in a rush just before the meeting.

“Leaf Blower is our population coordination manager.” Celestia waved her hoof at an older mare in a loose, moss-green cardigan, whose platinum blonde mane fell in a thin, long rope to one side of her head, its end somewhere under the table’s edge. “Twilight, you and Leaf will be best friends by the time this is done. Where she’s in charge of the ground and the gaps, Leaf will make sure no one gets hurt when our geomancers do their valuable work. She’ll be evacuating villages, securing at-risk buildings, decommissioning bridges, just generally making sure we aren’t doing more harm than good in these coming months.”

Leaf Blower appeared about to say something, but Caramel interrupted. “Princess, you said there was lunch coming?”

“Fifteen minutes, Caramel,” Celestia said, unfazed.

“Sorry, Leaf.”

“You’re good, Caramel,” Leaf Blower chuckled. “I was just gonna say that I can’t wait to work with you all.”

“Twilight don’t know it, but this is the real dream-team,” Caramel continued, stretching, his tight vest straining against his chest.

“Caramel here is the face of the GRC,” Celestia said. “And the voice.” She indicated a short, freckled stallion with a gray mane and thick glasses, who sat up self-importantly. “Curlicue is legal and financial. Any paperwork that needs handled, any hoops you have to jump through, he’s here to navigate those with you all.”

With a voice as smooth as silk and louder than seemed appropriate for his small body, he told them all what a privilege it was to work with them, and Twilight specifically.

“And last, but not least, this lovely lady is Summer Joy.” An aqua pegasus with a shocking two-tone mane of crimson and yellow raised a limp hoof at the end of the table. Twilight’s immediate thought was that she looked like a beach ball. “She will be in charge of all of our scientific endeavors. She’s currently preparing teams of geologists, zoologists, microbiologists… am I forgetting anyone?”

“Forest specialists,” Summer Joy said.

“Yes, and forest specialists, to travel the country and collect as much data about our restoration efforts as they can.”

“Basically, we’re studying the environmental impact of The Crumbling and its repair, so we can prepare for any complications down the line. Once we get down to the planet, you know, there’s going to be all sorts of unforeseen problems to deal with. My job is to anticipate as many of these as I can, and hopefully let us deal with them now rather than later.”

“So, your highness,” Twilight began, “do we answer directly to you?”

“You answer to yourselves, my student,” Celestia said. “This project, I leave in your capable hooves.”

“What kind of funding do we have?”

“The palace has set aside a restoration fund of one and a half-million bits every month,” Curlicue said.

“That’s subject to review, my dear,” Celestia simpered. “For now, one and a half million is fine, but we’ll have to see what the next few months bring us in terms of tax revenue. A lot of cities are struggling.”

“Just let the Mansels fund the whole thing,” Twilight thought, bitter still about the contract she had signed. The Mansels had supposedly withdrawn their complaints about the Elements, but she didn’t trust it.

Her thoughts hadn’t time to germinate further, as lunch arrived just then, steaming silver trays of roasted vegetables, glazed fruits, and colorful soups. Twilight took a bowl of chilled and spiced pear soup, which she did not much enjoy, and obligingly pulled out a chair for Leaf Blower, who had gotten up and walked around the table to sit beside her.

“You and me, Twilight,” she snapped happily, shaking Twilight’s hoof again. “I can’t wait, for one. When I heard you were gonna be the fifth team lead, I was so excited, I about jumped up and cheered, which would have looked really weird to everyone else in the office.”

“Have you done something like this before?” Twilight asked.

“I was project manager for the northwest quadrant of the cloud convoy, R and D.”

“Rainbow and Dash,” Twilight thought stupidly, and a little smile escaped her.

“This is my first national project. I’m excited, but a little nervous too. Hey, working alongside you, though, wow, I couldn’t ask for better.”

“How many ponies are going to be under us?”

“Couple thousand, if you break it down to like the brick-and-mortar workers. But if it’s anything like my other projects, you’ll probably have like two or three ponies that report directly to you, and they’ll have two or three that report to them, and on and on down the line.”

“A couple thousand.” She nodded, keeping her face composed as the number rattled in her head. “Yeah, well, you were responsible for a lot more than that not a month ago, Twilight,” she reminded herself.

After lunch, she found Rainbow Dash in a corner of the palace gallery, studying a pair of paintings of the throne room, one in resplendent daylight and one in somber moonlight.

“Beautiful, aren’t they?” Twilight asked.

“I guess they’re okay. Your meeting go all right?”

“I have to verify that this map the princess gave me is accurate. She has all the splits drawn on, and I have to make sure she got it right before we can start formulating a plan to restore everything.”

They walked to a stairwell and went up to the library, the attic of which Celestia was having converted to an office. Twilight had already been up to look at it, and despite her reservations about the job ahead of her, the sight of her new space filled her with a sense of power. Her room was the third-highest in the city, and glass on all sides to afford a lofty view of the entire palace and its grounds, as well as a good portion of Greater Canterlot; of more interest was that she would have immediate access to anything in the library below or in the alchemy tower half a palace away. A narrow staircase would take her up to a small cupola, where the princess was having prepared a storage room for the magical supplies that Twilight had assured her she would require.

When they arrived, the attic was empty, and they helped the servants drag in Twilight’s new furniture.

“So what do you need me to do?” Rainbow asked.

“I’m not really sure yet. I just… I need to take all this in first, and I need to figure out my first step.” She lowered her voice for the servant who was still in the room. “Princess Celestia wasn’t very clear. She just told me that she had faith in me.”

“Faith well-placed,” Rainbow said with a shrug.

“Maybe so, but I wish I had more specific directions. Oh, thank you, I can set that up,” Twilight said, levitating a box of divination supplies away from the servant. “I think I have an idea how to survey the country, but I’m not sure if it’s even plausible. Actually, here, Rainbow, you can help me by finding these books.”

“Books. Why am I not surprised?”

“Here.” She grabbed a piece of paper and stood at the box for her desk, not even put together yet, and penned a list. “Get these and bring them back to me.”

“You got it.” She looked over the list. “Twilight, what is ‘book about lumen transcription’? You know I don’t know what that word means.”

“If I can sweep sections of the country with a spell that automatically detects linear patterns, then I might be able to modify that spell to only return me images of the gaps between our pieces of land. Just ask the librarian, she’ll help you.”

Rainbow grunted and went downstairs, and Twilight had her office chair built by the time she got back, the unicorn attendant floating the requested books behind in a blocky cloud. Twilight spread them before her in an arc and began flipping through, hopping from one book to the other with rapidity that put Rainbow on edge, and when she found something she wanted, she would conjure a tiny quill of light to adhere to the page. After a few minutes of watching her, Rainbow took the initiative to start building Twilight’s desk.

For Rainbow, it was not so bad, working for Twilight. As when she had been on the weather team in Ponyville, she woke up at seven-thirty, clocked in at eight, and put in her hours. Instead of moving clouds, she moved books; instead of coordinating wind patterns, she helped test magic; instead of taking her lunch on a lonely cloud, she ate on the roof. Twilight, too, seemed content with her position. Since hearing of her plan to return and work for the princess, Rainbow had worried that Twilight would embitter herself still further, but after she had settled in, an unexpected peace fell over her—a peace that Rainbow trusted until Rarity cautioned her not to. They met every couple days for lunch or an early dinner, depending on schedules, and it was for one such meeting that Rarity told Rainbow her opinion.

“Twilight is a ticking bomb, dear, or so it seems to me.”

“Explain.”

“Do you really need me to?”

“Don’t do that. Obviously I think something’s wrong, but a ticking bomb? I think she’s better now. Maybe she needed steady work instead of relaxation. I get that, sometimes you don’t want all the time to yourself. And Twilight’s smart, she probably spends too much time in her own head anyway.”

“She’s running away from her problems. She’s forgotten what real life is like, so she’s replacing it with this. And what happens when this is complete, or heaven forbid, if it turns out to be more than she can handle? It’ll be like Snowdrift but a hundred times worse.”

“I don’t think she’s like that.”

“I don’t think you know for sure.”

“Oh, psh, like you do.”

Rarity took a dainty sip of her tea, looking Rainbow in the eyes over a new pair of sunglasses to make sure she noticed the affectation. “What does she have you doing up in that tower all day?”

Rainbow took a deep breath before sighing. “If I’m not helping her observe magic, I’m marking page numbers.”

“Page numbers?”

“She’s supposed to get a map of Equestria with all its gaps and bridges and things, and like phone lines too, and where the rivers are split, and all sorts of crap. But she needs to know how the country looked before it got split up so she can make sure it gets put back together right, and for that, she needs documentation of… basically everything.”

“Is an atlas not enough?”

“Not detailed enough. She needs every tiny stream, both above ground and below, and train tracks, and phone lines like I said.”

“Below the ground too?”

“I haven’t started that yet, I’m already dreading it. We need to make sure… Celestia, I can’t even remember what all she said, she talks about so much stuff all day long, you’d think her voice would give out. What is it? Underground streams, oil deposits, water tables, like lava tubes or something, caves, and on and on. Rarity, this mare is making a giant map of Equestria from the bottom of its bedrock to the top of its trees.”

“There’s not enough paper in the world for that.”

Rainbow laughed. “She has some magic system for all this. I haven’t asked her how it works, I’m scared she’ll talk about it the rest of the day.”

“But it sounds very interesting, at least.”

“Trust me, it’s not interesting if you’re in the room with her. Monotony, Rare, plain and simple.” Recalling the original point, Rainbow started. “But she’s not gonna blow up on me, okay? Like I said, she seems content.”

“For now.”

“Once her stupid map’s done, she gets to order ponies around, tell ‘em where they have to fly.”

“Ahhh, so she does have ponies under her.”

“Couple thousand, that’s what she said.”

Rarity dropped her croissant. “A couple thousand?”

“I know, it’s weird to think about.”

“How long until the map is complete?”

“I have no idea.”

Rarity shook her head. “Incredible. Well, I have my opinions, and you have yours, so I won’t belabor the point.”

“Mm. So, how’s the boutique coming along?”

“Early February. Until then, it’s the royal treatment for me.” She sighed dramatically. “I suppose it could be worse.”

“Have you thought about just staying here? I’m sure they’d let you.”

“And rot away in luxury for the rest of my life? I can’t let that happen. As it stands, I’m more than happy to take this month for myself, but after that, I’m sure I’ll be ready to get back to work. I already have an idea for the spring line, but I don’t know if I can have anything ready in time.”

“That’s good. I’m glad you’re holding up.”

She smiled, clearly thrown off. “Thank you, Rainbow Dash. And I you.”

Rainbow waved her off. “I’ll make it. If Twilight doesn’t work me to death, that is.” She shared a polite laugh, and the two went their separate ways. Sometimes they would see each other in the palace on one errand or another, and sometimes Rainbow would see Pinkie; to the latter, she would give a stern nod that was always returned with a cheery greeting.

Fresh from one such discouraging encounter, Rainbow found herself, days later, following Vinyl down to the bar. It was two in the afternoon and Twilight had given her the day off while she attended to some small issue with her magical map. The bartender greeted Vinyl and Rainbow with a professional smile, showing no inkling of the hour or frequency of her patron’s visits. While Rainbow looked around, wondering whether Colgate would show up as she so often did when Vinyl was drinking, she espied Celestia through one of the windows, apparently speaking to no one, her horn lit with a tight ball of sunlight. When she looked again, the princess was gone.

With a hurricane glass in the crook of her hoof, Vinyl popped a plum light off her horn. “Had to tell someone. Everyone! Dash, this is it for little ol’ Vinyl. I’m back!”

“Oh my gosh! Congratulations! Back to what?” She waved her hoof at the bartender, who left her with her glass of soda.

“Music, buddy. I’m in the studio the day after tomorrow.”

“Oh. Oh! That is awesome! You already have new material?”

“I’ve been coming up with material the whole time I was with you. This new album, I want it to be a double, I’ve got the material for it I know. I’m thinking the last song has to be a representation of our fight with Discord—like, obviously, right?”

“Sure, sure, obviously.”

“And I’m gonna get Octavia to guest-star on a track or two. Get some real classical samples in there, make it not such a straightforward piece, you know? You play any instruments?”

“I…” She pretended not to be put off as Vinyl gulped at her colorful drink. “I messed around with choir when I was in high school, if that counts.”

Vinyl shrugged. “Might as well. Wanna do some vocal samples for me? How do you sing?”

“As good as anypony else, I guess.”

“I’ll take vocal samples whenever I can get ‘em. I’d do more myself, but my voice, you know.”

Rainbow grinned. “You can’t just hold the microphone closer?”

“Makes it sound weird. Ah! Bartender.” She ordered something else and offered, again, to buy something for Rainbow, who kept to her soda.

“Colgate’s gonna give me some saxophone,” Vinyl continued.

“She plays?”

“I doubt it, but she offered. It’ll be neat to see her try, if nothing else.”

“How’re they doing? I haven’t seen either of them lately.”

Vinyl rolled her eyes, which, with the goggles, looked like an awkward head shake. “I haven’t seen Octy since Hearth’s Warming, which honestly doesn’t surprise me. Cole says she’s in one of her moods.”

“I hope everything’s okay.”

“I’m sure she’s just peachy. You know her, ray of sunshine.” She took a hearty sip out of her next drink and smacked her lips. “Now that is some good rum.”

“You’re pounding down rum?” Rainbow grabbed a menu and looked through it, and Vinyl wiggled a dot of light on the most expensive rum on offer. Five hundred bits for a snifter, and Rainbow could smell it from where she sat, cinnamon and cardamom and banana, with the burn of alcohol just at the tail end. Vinyl took another swig like it was nothing.

“If Cole isn’t worried, I’m not worried either. We figure Octy’ll pop up sometime and pretend nothing happened, and it’ll be back to normal.”

“Are you gonna pretend too?”

“She likes her space, so yeah. I mean, as long as there’s nothing obviously wrong.”

Rainbow looked away, frustration poorly concealed in her response. “There’s been something obviously wrong for forever.”

“I mean, like worse than it is.”

Rainbow shook her head.

“I’m not her guardian. Am I sad she’s sad? Obviously.” She drank. “Am I gonna help if she needs it? Absolutely. But she’s gotta want it, Dash, she’s gotta make the first move. Hey, howzabout Pinkie?”

“Ugh.”

The single syllable gave Vinyl pause, and when she picked up her thread of thought, she was mollified. “How’ve you been doing with her? I know you wanted time away in Ponyville, but now you’re here.”

“I passed her in the hall earlier today.”

Vinyl nodded as Rainbow thought, debated telling Vinyl her feelings.

“Maybe I will have something. Something!” She grabbed Vinyl’s hoof, which shot up to signal the bartender. “Something small, Vinyl. I don’t want to get drunk.”

“I gotcha, I gotcha. Barkeep! Yes, for my friend here, uhh, how about the Captain’s Chair? Thanks. Dash, you’ll love this, it’s got, uhhh…”

“Yeah, I can read, thanks,” Rainbow said, finding Vinyl’s order in the menu. The only ingredient she recognized was sparkling wine, and she knew she didn’t like that.

“So you and the pink menace.”

Rainbow barked out a single, surprised laugh at the appellation. “Yeah. Whenever I see her, I get this… Like it’s this sudden anxiety in my chest.”

“Sounds natural to me.”

“Really? I think it sounds ridiculous. Isn’t she dead to us?”

“That’s what you’ve been saying, but it’s not true.”

“It’s true for me.”

Vinyl watched her try her drink and wince at the taste. After a few seconds, she asked, “is it?”

“Yeah,” Rainbow mumbled. “Supposed to be.”

“What’s that mean?”

“I still think about her a lot, like a lot a lot, like when we were friends. I wonder how she’s doing and if she’ll ever be happy again, and when I see her, it’s not like ‘ugh, there goes that Pinkie Pie who I hate,’ it’s ‘oh, here comes Pinkie, I hope we don’t have to talk’. Like I’m nervous around her now.”

“If she did try to talk to you, what would you say?” She gestured at Rainbow’s drink. “I can finish that if you don’t like it.”

“If she tried to talk to me… Good question.” She slid the drink over. “I’m not sure. Not like how we used to talk, that’s for sure.”

“Do you see her as a stranger? Or are you trying to?”

“Trying to, and failing.” She lost herself in the countertop, not wanting to look at Vinyl and her daft goggles as she unburdened herself. “I thought I’d given up on her, but now that things have quieted down, I obviously haven’t. I don’t want to see her as a friend still, but I do, and I don’t know how to stop.”

“She betrayed you, but you can’t let go.”

“I can’t leave her like everyone else, like what she… Hell, I’ll say it, Vinyl, like what she deserves. She does deserve this.” She nodded to herself. “I forget that a lot, that Pinkie’s getting exactly what was coming to her. I guess it happened so long ago, it’s easy to write it off as an innocent mistake.”

“Isn’t that what it was?”

“Not if you ask me. Putting your shirt on backwards is a mistake. Getting tricked by a fake letter from Discord is a mistake. What Pinkie did… I can’t forgive it, and I don’t think I should. I don’t think anyone should.”

“But thinking that way is clearly causing you distress.” She grabbed the bartender and ordered a shot for herself. Rainbow couldn’t hear it in her voice yet, but she knew it would be fast coming. “You think you should feel one way, but you feel the opposite. Do I have it?”

“That’s basically it, I guess.”

“I feel you.” Vinyl rubbed the rim of her empty glass contemplatively, as though she had just given voice to the key to Rainbow’s problems, and Rainbow waited for the rest of the insight to make its way past her lips. Eventually, it did. “The duality of emotion is something we all contend with.”

“Okay, Applejack.” For a second, as Vinyl laughed with her unseemly, strangled voice, Rainbow only watched with bemusement, but then she joined in as the unicorn rocked back and forth in her seat. It really wasn’t that funny, and the fact that Vinyl thought it was soon had Rainbow cackling as well. The pair laughed for a good minute, and then the jokes came quicker, the laughter louder, the talk more animated. They circled back to Vinyl’s music ideas, Rainbow much more engaged than at first, and took turns spitballing song titles. Colgate showed up in time to join the latest chorus of laughter, and by the time Rainbow noticed her, she was seated with a foaming beer and a shot of whiskey for sipping. They moved to a booth, to better hear one another, and passed into early evening talking, joking, and enjoying one another’s company. Ironically, Vinyl would tell Colgate in a moment of partial clarity much later on, it was laughter and fun among friends that had staved off the dour specter of Pinkie’s failure.

Aloe and Lotus had spent their Hearth’s Warming on a Datura airship in the bleak, windy skies over the Everfree Forest. They were scheduled to land in Canterlot on the first of January, just in time to miss what their many sources bragged would be the New Year’s celebration of a century. Just in time to miss the fun, and just in time to get to work solving the country’s latest crises, of which there were three.

The first and most vital was Moondrop, which had been more than destroyed. The power and heat of Celestia’s prison, as well as her escape therefrom, had reduced civilization and the few hundred square miles it was built on to smoke and glass, and the lingering hum of expended magic was intense enough for a unicorn to feel up to seven hundred miles away. The ash was thick enough to coat a window in seconds, and it spread across the sky in great mantles over the Equestrian south, as well as the borders, filtering down to the planet in dirty precipitation or in freak dust storms, combining with the extant pollution raining from their country’s underside. Where once had been the crater that gave Moondrop its name, there was left a hole all the way through the ground, its sides smooth and still too hot to approach, weeks later.

Roan, Moondrop’s closest neighbor, was beginning to feel the effects of the drifting smoke, and they had certainly seen it. Those who took note with their eyes or with spyglasses were of little concern, but those few who saw the smoke with divination magic were not; for in addition to the incus smearing itself southward, there were the acres of glass and fire over which Luna had cast an impermeable pillar of darkness. She knew that hiding the southeast corner of Equestria from magical viewing was no solution, that it only invited more worry from those who observed it, but she hadn’t the time to find something less suspect, and Lotus didn’t blame her. However, it didn’t stop her from hating that the huge, mysterious problem was now hers to work out before too much of the country started investigating.

That was one. The second problem was the drowned city of Applewood. There was nothing covert for her to worry about, just a million common issues to juggle. Electricity shortages, rising crime rates, hospitals and shelters overwhelmed, millions of bits in lost businesses, the media stink surrounding the dam and its owner, the water that had stagnated and was beginning to turn the city into a vermin-infested ruin; and on and on, thousands of items: names of officials, dates and timetables for projects, possible sources of relief funding, priority areas, architectural and civil engineering concerns, police and Datura resources, unions. Each concern she had copied into a notebook for Aloe and for Luna, along with a detailed map; and in her cloud of thoughts, accompanying the list, were dossiers on every single business owner and government official in or significantly related to the city.

That was two. The final problem, which felt like the smallest but which could easily become the worst for her, was what to do with Passage Town. While she and Aloe had been in Moondrop, the two Daturas tasked with monitoring Passage Town’s window had not only abandoned their posts, but left a giant sinkhole where the window was hidden. A team had already been dispatched from Manehattan to contain fallout, but one pony from Passage Town could not be accounted for; Lotus had had to face the possibility of news spreading into Manehattan, and from there… She did not permit herself to catastrophize beyond that point. Containing compromising knowledge in a metropolitan city like Manehattan was possible, but posed enough challenges to keep her cloud of thoughts active for another several months.

The two Daturas in question had used the window in their escape into the changelings’ archipelago, where they had disappeared. Princess Luna was certain they would not stay that way for long, but all Lotus cared about was that the task of hunting them down had not yet fallen on her as well. In her frequent moments of self-doubt, she would wonder whether it was her conduct as an employer that had been the catalyst to drive them away, but Aloe assured her that it was not so.

Lotus had not slept much since packing up and taking off from the safe zone around Moondrop, which was some hundred miles away from Celestia’s prison and still had required extensive magical shielding, hazard suits, respiration equipment, and mandatory breaks in magically-reinforced “quiet rooms,” which served as refuges from the head-filling whir of ambient magic, and which had to be replaced every day. Everything she saw and oversaw, everything she did and that was reported to her, had to be catalogued and made ready to deliver to the top magicians and magic theorists in Canterlot—and though Lotus understood why the princess had prioritized the task, it felt like busywork after the harrowing weeks of heat and radiation.

Applied so, her cloud still had space to mull over the other problems, as well as what precisely had happened in the Moondrop crater, details of which Luna had been reluctant to provide. An unsolved puzzle was anathema to Lotus’ cloud, and every second her mind was off its immediate task, she was filled with the buzz of calculations and the shuffling of facts. When she slept, it intruded on her dreams, and when she conversed, she had to keep a tight hold on her conscious mind to stop the cloud’s output from leaking into her sentences. Aloe bore it as best she could, but her patience wasn’t infinite, and Lotus found herself less and less giving voice to what was bothering her, which was—and not easy to admit—everything.

On December thirty-first, at eight o’ clock, the onion-shaped top of Canterlot Palace’s solarium became a lurid eye of fizzing sunshine to pierce the royal ballroom’s skylights, where guards, attendants, a few hundred select visitors from the city, and those Elements who remained congregated to celebrate the passing of the year.

At quarter past eight, Vinyl and Colgate found Rarity still agonizing over what to wear, and at half past, Octavia joined them in the room. Not wanting to put her on the spot, Rarity made no comment on her reappearance, nor on the fact that she was missing all but the first half-inch of her raven mane; but Colgate did, and Octavia made promises to explain it all later, that she did not want to engage in such talk on a night such as theirs. To look past the dramatically shortened mane, Rarity saw what had made Octavia such an imposing figure in the days of her fame. Not a hair was out of place in her mane or tail, both a shade darker than their natural color and fairly bleeding into her flawless black tuxedo. The only spot of color was in her pocket square, not purple to match her eyes, but the pastel blue of Colgate’s coat. Colgate herself wore a loose, brown vest with turquoise beads hanging from its tassels and a pair of tan slacks, and she spent a few minutes rooting around in Rarity’s closet, looking for a cowpony hat, Rarity was sure. Vinyl wore a baggy, gray coat over denim overalls, and since last Rarity had seen her, had changed her mane color from electric blue to springtime yellow.

The four talked and caught up while Rarity dressed herself, and at ten to nine, they went as one upstairs to the ballroom, where Rarity saw with dismay that she had not come at all close to overdressing for the affair. In her ocean-blue charmeuse gown with flared sleeves and copper cedillas stitched onto the breast, a plum-colored beret and golden, honeycomb-embossed caps on her hooves, she had expected to be grabbing suitors’ eyes all night long, but most of the stallions themselves were more elaborately dressed than she. Imitating Princess Celestia’s idea on the night of the parade, many attendees had incorporated golden or jeweled peacock feathers into their outfits. One lanky stallion twirled in the middle of the dance floor with a train of cascading feathers off his back, which would stand up as a firework of gold and emerald at the activation of a hidden mechanism in his clothes. Others had chosen Octavia’s route, appearing in stiff black and white, looking more like servants than revelers in the colorful crowd.

Vinyl directed them to the wall and turned her back to the party, where she and Colgate each took a nip from the flask that appeared and disappeared from her coat so fast that Rarity only identified it when she was offered a drink, which she declined.

“I must confess, I have been really looking forward to this,” Octavia said in Rarity’s ear. “I am glad that you all are with me.”

“Dear, I’m happy to have you with us! I haven’t seen you around lately.”

“There is a reason for that.” Octavia left it there, and Rarity did not pry. The two faded into the ballroom while Vinyl and Colgate stayed by the wall, taking wine and hors d’oeuvres when they came, pulls from the flask when it pleased them. The first band was already halfway into their set, and Rarity and Octavia hadn’t long to wait before accepting dances, Octavia with a young stallion who hid his nervousness well when she took his hoof, and Rarity with a mare in a chartreuse cocktail dress and a laurel of rosemary sprigs on her head. They danced slow and close through the piece, and though Rarity knew it was the Element of Generosity that her partner wanted to dance with, and not Rarity herself, she separated from the mare eager for more—and was not left wanting. There was always someone who wanted to dance with the saviors of Equestria, and they found themselves happy to oblige.

Vinyl and Colgate had fortified themselves by nine-thirty, and Vinyl left Colgate by one of the food tables to dance with a tall mare in a dress of too many sequins, whose shimmering form cut through the crowd like a goldfish and which looked about as attractive. It was while Rarity was resting that Octavia sidled up to her, pointed out the mare, and said, “she wiggles her rump very seductively, would you not say?”

Rarity closed her jaw, looked at Octavia, saw that it was not a joke, and then giggled anyway. “Go ask her for the next dance, dear.”

“I will.” She sipped from a goblet of red wine. “Have you danced with anyone of note?”

“The undersecretary of the Equestrian Forestry Division said I have the most beautiful eyes he’s ever seen.”

“You do have beautiful eyes.” Again, Rarity glanced at Octavia, who gave her a tiny smile. “I danced with a most charming stallion who hummed along with every note. Oh, that is him, there.” She indicated a portly stallion in a pink and green suit jacket, a golden watch chain dangling dangerously close to his trotting hooves, and a trio of lilacs in a blossoming boutonniere. As Octavia pointed him out, he spun around to face the band, saying something to the group of laughing mares he had arrived with, and hopped a little jig with sparks shooting out of his horn.

The band played their last song, for which Octavia got her dance with the sequined mare and which Rarity sat out, wishing to pace herself. Colgate joined her with a glass of wine floating by her head, which she finished and replaced before speaking.

“It’s a hot night, huh?”

Rarity did not know what to say to that, and gave Colgate a smile.

“I gotta tell ya, Rare, something’s up with Octy, and I really like it. She’s acting like a happy pony. Look at that, she’s dancing and everything.”

“Well, it is a dance, dear.”

“Sure is. Sure is.” She nodded and plucked a disc of dried bread with garlic butter and capers from a passing server’s tray.

“What were you and Vinyl drinking earlier?”

“Wine.”

“From the flask?”

“Oh, the flask. That was peppermint schnapps. She’s a nice lady, huh?”

“She drinks a lot.”

Colgate shrugged and took a seat next to Rarity, and the two of them watched the dance without talking, not from awkwardness, but from having nothing to say. Colgate’s tail swished against the legs of Rarity’s chair and her eyes raced around the ballroom, and Rarity watched Octavia and the sequined mare. They were dancing with each other’s chins on each other’s withers by the song’s end, and Rarity was faintly surprised not to see a hug when they separated. Vinyl was farther off in a louder part of the crowd, only her yellow mane giving her away whenever it bobbed up into sight.

The clock struck eleven and the band changed, stately strings and woodwinds trading places with brass, drums, a standing bass, and a small piano. Beside her, Colgate whispered, “aw, hell yeah.” She hopped up and gestured for Rarity to do the same, and the two of them were dancing as the first notes shrieked out overhead, at first just next to each other and then together. Both were reminded of the live music in Snowdrift, the ripping trombones, the jangling piano, the swing and the shanty. All around them, gowns swirled and shoes clapped on the floor, and they were lost for two more songs, Rarity and Colgate hopping and bopping and laughing, and sometimes grabbing someone else’s hooves to swing them around or be dipped to the floor in a charade of mistimed elegance; and when it was over, both slick with sweat, Colgate folded herself into another group and Rarity turned around to see Caramel swaggering her way.

“Girl, I been looking for you! I knew you had to be around somewhere!”

“What’s wrong?”

“Wrong? Rare, I was gonna ask for a dance,” he laughed, holding out his hoof daintily.

So Rarity and her PR manager danced their way into a circle of laughing guards, jived for a minute or two, and retreated to the periphery when two more replaced them in the middle. Caramel patted her on the back and told her she was a great dancer, and she reciprocated politely, though she had found him clumsy. Before the circle dissipated, Vinyl joined them and performed a disorganized dance and light show, after which she ran for the bathrooms and more wine, and Rarity joined Octavia and the sequined mare closer to the band. They danced until midnight, when the solarium exploded with silver scythes of light and the brass band bleated with scalding vim, the ballroom raising a cheer out of the recently opened roof and into the black sky, where fireworks burst next to oscillating unicorn magic and pegasi in scintillating jumpsuits careened in formation. The princesses appeared in vestments alive with symbols of each other’s celestial body, Luna beaming in a white and gold ball gown with dangling earrings of actual fire jingling in chains of transparent pearls, a decorative baldric of gold and copper dividing her gown into blazing chevron below and brilliant paisley above, with circlets of smoke perpetually rising from her back and coalescing into a pair of secondary wings, which glowed like the sun and imitated her movements; and Celestia in a multi-layered dress of black and blue that shimmered with stars and swirls of galactic dust whenever she moved, her long horn festooned with topaz and onyx rings, her mane split into long strands that orbited her head like spokes of a wheel and from whose ends black halos of magic winked in and out. Naturally, both princesses requested a dance with the Elements, and Octavia had the opportunity to feel humbled underneath Celestia’s towering, strange form. From below, the princess’ wild mane reminded her of the wicked spikes of a morning star.

When the princesses had quit the Elements, the four friends made their way to the refreshment tables. There, no longer worried about making a fool of herself on the dance floor, Rarity took a glass of wine, and Colgate and Vinyl passed the refilled flask back and forth, no longer attempting subtlety. The sequined mare came by briefly and shared some words with Octavia, and when she was gone, Octavia remained smiling.

“She likes you, Octy,” Colgate called over the music.

“And I her.” There was a quick shuffle as Colgate took Vinyl’s place between Octavia and Rarity. Vinyl, prompted by the act of standing, returned to the dance floor with a little streamer of lights flowing out of her horn.

“Will she be okay?” Rarity asked.

“Vinyl knows how to put ‘em away,” Colgate said, running a hoof over her head. “Octy, c’mon, I gotta know.”

“If she doesn’t want to go into it—”

“I can explain,” Octavia interrupted. “I did not want to earlier because we were about to dance. Now, we are resting. The mood is right.” She sighed shakily and took a flute of sparkling wine from Colgate’s magical cloud. “I will not go into the details, but I have recently discovered the truth of something that you all have been telling me since we met—to wit, that I stand to gain nothing by my persistent self-blame. It is something I have understood for some time now, but I never really believed it for some reason.”

“But you do now?” Colgate asked.

“I have decided to stop being that way. I… have chosen life, and I will do so every day from here on out. I am sick of the constant sorrow that should not be mine to bear. I am sick… I am sick of taking everything so deadly seriously.” She lowered her voice. “I have asked Princess Luna for a position in her… Uh.”

“Colgate’s organization,” Rarity said. “Yes?”

“She told me to ask her again after a month to unwind. I told her that my decision would not change, but she insisted. I also asked her for a recommendation on a psychiatrist. There are a few in the palace that she said were excellent, and I have my first appointment next week.”

“Octavia! That’s wonderful news, dear!”

“Please.” She frowned into her glass, holding it up to the streaming solarium light. “It is difficult to feel proud of this decision when I have had it shoved in my face for months.”

“It means you’re finally ready for change,” Rarity said. “And that’s marvelous, truly. Is that why you…” She ran a hoof through her mane.

“I am thinking of it as a way of paying farewell to my past self. For that, I am also considering changing my name.”

“You are? But to what, darling? Surely not back to Marble?”

“I am not certain, but I do not feel that ‘Octavia’ suits me. That mare was a terribly dismal pony, and I do not wish to honor her.”

“Let’s not forget, though, that’s the mare we all made friends with.”

“More than she deserved.”

“Hey, with the negative self-talk,” Colgate blurted. “C’mon.”

“Yes, you are right.” Octavia shook her head. “This is all terribly unfamiliar to me, and if I am honest, I would rather we stop the conversation here. I do not wish to get caught up criticizing myself, even if it is my old, dead self. Suffice it to say, I am going to be a better mare.”

“Starting tonight!”

“Starting several nights ago.” She nodded and squirmed, clearly uncomfortable, as Colgate patted her on the back. “Vinyl does not know yet. If she is still sober when I have a chance to speak with her, I will inform her of this recent change as well.”

“She won’t be,” Colgate said. “See those lights in the middle of the crowd? That’s not a pattern she does when she’s sober.”

“You’re making that up,” Rarity giggled, accepting another glass of wine from a passing server.

“Nuh-uh. She likes her pastels normally, probably ‘cause they’re easier on her eyes. That’s all garish orange and purple she’s blowing right now.”

“Psh, that’s just random colors.”

“All right, smarty, how about this?” She stole a glance at Octavia, who was watching them with a grin. “Vinyl does a lot of geometric shapes, like squares and triangles, because they require more skill. Those shapes there, though, they’ve got rounded edges, so you can tell her focus is lapsing.”

Rarity squinted at the light display, and she thought she saw what Colgate meant, but before she could be sure, the lights dimmed and Vinyl was gone from sight.

“Oh, thank you so much,” Octavia said, taking a glass of water from the sequined mare, who sat down beside her for just a moment before hopping up again and going after one of her friends.

“Was Dash gonna be here tonight?” Colgate asked. “Did she say?”

“I think she’s skipping it. Work with Twilight has left her rather drained,” Rarity replied.

“Go figure,” Octavia grunted. “Ladies, I am going to go mingle some more. Thank you for listening to me, and for… Everything.” She nodded stiffly and headed into the crowd, in the direction of the sequined mare, and Rarity and Colgate shared a knowing look.

“Why would the palace have psychiatrists?” Colgate asked.

Rarity took a sip. “Why not?”

Colgate stared, her mind working away at something. “You suppose the princesses use ‘em? I suppose they must, huh?”

“Immortality is not all sunshine and rainbows, after all. I’m sure they both see someone.” She reflected, watching a nervous stallion pace to and fro behind the mare he wanted to ask for a dance. “Do you ever wonder what immortality would be like?”

“Not really.”

“I do. I’m quite convinced I would despise it, eternal beauty aside, but I’d still like to try it. A year or so, maybe more.”

“Twilight can help with that.”

Rarity laughed. “I’m not so sure, dear.”

“Ask her.”

“Mm, yes, after restoration. She’d love it.”

Colgate gave her a look of veiled worry. “Just a suggestion.”

Laughing again to put her at ease, Rarity said, “I know. No, immortality is best left to those who earn it, I think. I’d go mad before the century was over.”

“Maybe that’s what the palace psychiatrists are for. Y’know, for immortality-madness.”

“Now there’s a thought.” Rarity adjusted her right sleeve, which had been bothering her all night. “Ponies start to go… soft, shall we say, in the twilight years of their natural lives. I can only imagine living as long as the princesses.”

“Yeah, pretty wild,” Colgate said, eyes on the crowd, and Rarity thought of Celestia, the princess ringing in another new year. She had danced with a pony who was born more than three thousand years ago, who carried herself as if not a day beyond sprightly middle-age, who smiled and laughed with as much gusto as she ate and drank. To everyone else, Celestia was celebrating with the famed Elements of Harmony, but from the princess’ perspective, she was just with the most recent batch of them. How much, Rarity wondered, was for show.

“Colgate, my friend, I think I am ready for more dancing,” Rarity said, rising and draining her glass.

The sequined mare did not tell Octavia, but it was her last night in Canterlot, for she was one of Celestia’s diplomats tasked with working with the changelings. Her name was Sweet Impression, and she rose with the sun the following morning, triple-checked her luggage, and made sure their airship was ready for takeoff. Sleek as a chip of flint and as quiet as the midwinter wind, it was their honor to ride HMS Mirdath across Equestria, over the edge, down to the ocean, and to the southernmost island in the changelings’ territory. The other four showed up as Sweet Impression was finishing preparing the ship for its journey, and Pinkie with them, red-eyed but still holding to her insipid, forced smile.

She had been with the diplomats for five days, enough time to learn the basics of changeling politics and etiquette. That had been her time in the palace: reading at a desk, occasionally asking one of them a question that they felt they should not have to answer. If there had been any doubt before, it was effaced the second Pinkie tried to speak with them on their terms. She had not one iota of experience in diplomacy, and the others, not enough time to teach her anything useful.

That had been a private discussion, days earlier. Did Celestia seriously expect them to drag the Element of Laughter down with them to the planet? There was no ambiguity in the princess’ orders, but the idea was so sudden and so ludicrous that they had exhausted two hours to search for a way around it anyway. When they failed, Sweet Impression decided then and there to try to warm to Pinkie, whom she was sure was just as uncomfortable as they.

So on the first day of January, the first of a brand-new year, in the frosty dawn that breathed through the airship lot’s open ceiling, Pinkie climbed aboard with a satchel of books on top of her other luggage, which she stowed below in her tiny cabin. Sweet Impression explained their route a final time, and when they had dispersed and the balloon was inflating, up strode their expert in maritime trade agreements, Stricken Chord. He spoke out of the side of his mouth.

“Last chance to ditch her.”

“Nope.” Sweet shook her head resolutely.

“Celestia won’t be able to do anything about it. We’ll be gone.”

“That isn’t the point, bub.” She knew he hated it when she called him that.

“Begging your pardon, but I think it’s a good enough point to…” He stole a look back at the stairs, where Pinkie had come back up. “Last chance, that’s all I’m saying.”

“I trust our princess.”

“You weren’t saying that yesterday.”

She hmphed, lacking a real retort.

Celestia’s idea hinged on Pinkie’s supposed ability to ease tension and lighten moods, a power conferred by her Element, and it was agreed that such a thing would be invaluable if she could actually do it. They had asked Pinkie to demonstrate her talent on the first day, just as soon as Princess Celestia had finished introducing her to the team, and Pinkie had given them a listless song-and-dance routine followed by a few jokes—which had been hilarious, but would not be down below. They had expected someone smooth and slick, who talked calmly and persuasively, and perhaps even had a touch of unicorn magic at her disposal to soften things further; what they got was a comedienne out of practice.

“Chord, where’d you put the sigil design?” The sharp-voiced mare trotted over and put herself between them, waving her tail obliviously in Sweet Impression’s face as she turned to get a better look over the gunwale; they were still on the ground.

“They’re in my bag, I told you.”

“You want me to check?”

“I—sure, yes, go ahead.” He gave her back a frown as she ran for his bags. “It’s gonna be on the bottom.”

“On the bottom?”

“You heard me.”

The mare groaned. Her name was Hyacinth, and Sweet Impression couldn’t help but let her expression turn sour as she rifled through her coltfriend’s bags.

“Pinkie!” Hyacinth snapped. “Get over here. Please. Here’s that sigil, you know how to draw it for yourself? Did Twilight show you?”

“We talked a little,” Pinkie said with her fake smile, hopping over.

“That doesn’t answer my question.”

“I can draw it for her if she needs,” said the other mare, Soft Breeze. Where Hyacinth looked like something between a punk rocker and an art student with her pierced eyebrows and ears, her shock of blonde mane running down only one side of her head, and her carefully tattered clothing, Soft Breeze looked like the sort of pony who only left home when it was absolutely necessary. Her dark green mane and yellow coat gave her the nickname “Squash,” and in the flannel and pajama pants that comprised her usual wardrobe, she was easy to dismiss, if not to forget; though she cleaned up as well as any of them for official business. Soft Breeze was who Sweet Impression considered the team pushover. Swift and clever in the boardroom, her negotiating prowess never seemed to manifest when one of her coworkers wanted to shove an unpleasant task onto someone else, a discourtesy that Sweet Impression was as guilty of as the rest of them.

“Twilight showed me how!” Pinkie chirped. “Just gotta… Where’s my marker?”

“Did you not pack a marker?” Soft Breeze asked, eyes widened as though in serious concern.

“She can use a pen and paper,” Hyacinth said, trotting back to the rail next to Stricken Chord. “Girls, we’re lifting off!” Chord whooped beside her, and she echoed him faintly, their tails twisted together.

“Bye Canterlot!” Pinkie cried, leaning out to wave both hooves before they were even off the lot.

“Oh, wait, can we go back? I think I left the stove on,” the last of them called breathlessly, racing up from belowdecks. Butter Blossom was his name, the male counterpart to Soft Breeze. He was short and heavy, with a stub of a tail and muscular legs that he never showed off, his goldenrod fur silken in the premature sunlight. He was the only one who had dressed formally for liftoff, and in his snug suit jacket, he reminded Sweet Impression of an overstuffed doll, his crimson tie a spare thread from the yarn of his beard, which became one with his mane on either side of his face, a deep brick red that would be intimidating if it were not always smiling or laughing.

“You better not!” Hyacinth shrieked. Stricken Chord was giggling, and she looked at him after a second when Butter Blossom’s laughter pitched upwards, his body jiggling with the effect. “Ohhhh, psh, never mind. You scared me!”

“Last chance to look at the palace, everypony,” Soft Breeze called.

“Bye princesses! We’ll make you proud!” Butter yelled into the gathering wind, and they were properly underway.

The Mirdath, while not the fastest airship in the princess’ possession, still boasted the speed to get them to the country’s border in ten days with fair weather. Without realizing it, Twilight had copied its design with her pile of sigils and enchantments on their own airship, but instead of a pegasus flying behind to generate the necessary wind, the Mirdath’s three propellers alternated between sucking and blowing air, a delicate bellows system that respired like a living organism, and on whose breath they could sail under the power of only a few small engines. Hearing Sweet Impression describe it and speak casually with the others made Pinkie feel small, for she was so used to Applejack inexplicably handling the machinery of flight on her own.

They were off the mountain inside the hour and rotating slowly over the sprawling suburbs of Lower Canterlot, turning until their bow pointed resolutely north, the great red compass needle in the wheel waggling as the high-altitude winds rocked them. On this and this alone did Pinkie feel she had an advantage over the diplomats, for they were not as seasoned to airship travel. Where their steps faltered and balked awkwardly every time a stray breeze nudged them, Pinkie kept her balance without having to think about it, even when they caught the air current they wanted and shot into motion. She could hear the propellers gathering wind at the stern, and went back with Hyacinth to watch.

“Where are you in your reading?” Hyacinth asked.

“Middle of chapter twenty-one. Shapeshifting and its effects on commerce.”

“You’re retaining it all?”

“As much as I can,” Pinkie started.

“I don’t—we don’t expect you to memorize everything, that would be stupid. Just, y’know, get an idea. You…” She glanced back at Soft Breeze, who was struggling to open an energy bar with her hooves. “We just took off, she’s eating already. Anyway, Pinkie, none of us expect you to commit everything to memory.”

“I know. You just don’t want me to face-plant down there. I get it.” She sighed. “I get it.”

Hyacinth nodded and said no more. She got it too, Pinkie thought, but it was not in Hyacinth’s nature to repeat herself; and Pinkie, aware of her unpopularity, did not wish to push it.

“Aw, look at that!” Stricken Chord gasped, turning heads just in time for them to see the diffuse flash of gold as Princess Celestia took wing and shot off to parts unknown.

“Do you think she’s preparing the way for us?” Soft Breeze asked.

“You got it backwards, Squash,” Butter Blossom said, sashaying over to join her by the starboard gunwale. “We’re preparing the way for her.”

They stopped on the third day, ninety minutes for Sweet Impression to check the ship and for everyone else to stretch their legs, another luxury that felt strangely superfluous to Pinkie. She nonetheless debarked with them into the wooded countryside, following Butter Blossom’s lead down a small trail into the trees. While he, ahead, remarked on the scenery and joked with Soft Breeze, Pinkie kept quietly to the rear and pretended not to notice whenever Stricken Chord looked back at her.

“Hey, Chord! Check it out!” Hyacinth gestured to a clearing, and Chord, looking at it for a moment, nodded and told the others not to wait up. The two trotted down an overgrown path to a sagging, dilapidated shack, standing on thick, mossy poles in the middle of a motionless brook. It being winter, there were no insects to cloud the air, but Pinkie could smell the algae and fungi from where she stood at the clearing’s edge and wondered how the two could stand getting any closer.

“They’ll be a half hour at least,” Butter Blossom said to Pinkie, and sighed, a contented smile covering his large face.

“Can we forage for these?” Soft Breeze asked, eyeing an oblong, crimson-capped mushroom.

“I wouldn’t.”

“We might be able to find some berries,” Pinkie said, trotting to where the ground sloped away from the brook and down into a dry gully. “If we can get down there.” She looked at her coworkers, neither of them pegasi. “Does anyone see a path?”

“I dunno,” Butter Blossom mumbled, inching toward the slope.

“I’ll do it,” Soft Breeze said with a sneaky grin. “I’m not afraid.”

“I’m not afraid, I just don’t wanna go down there.”

Pinkie followed Soft Breeze without a word, and when she glanced back and noticed, she didn’t say anything. Feeling safer, Pinkie let go of the breath she was holding, and the two traversed slippery mud slopes and rough patches of underbrush until they were sunken in the forest’s shadow and the shack was only visible as a splintered corner between branches.

“So how’s it goin’, Pinkie?”

Pinkie paused to consider her question, assess it for guile, and after a second of this, she laughed. Soft Breeze added her own nervous laugh, skittering her eyes back and forth as if looking for the punchline.

“No, it’s not you,” Pinkie said, adjusting the collar of her fleece sweater. “I was reminded of my old friends, that’s all.”

“Awwww, you miss your friends?” Again, Pinkie paused to consider, and decided that no sarcasm was intended, that it was Soft Breeze’s natural tone of voice.

“Not as much as you might think,” Pinkie admitted, putting her muzzle to the ground to search for berries.

“What happened?” No “if you don’t mind,” no “I hope I’m not being invasive.” Just the question, heedless of the fact that they had hardly spoken to each other up to that point. “Is she being nice, or is she trying to play me? No, Pinkie, listen to yourself, you’re being ridiculous.” She really had spent too long with the Elements.

“We had a fight before we split up, that’s all,” Pinkie said. “It was pretty serious.”

“Awwww.”

“So nope!” She perked up, did a little hop in place. “I don’t really miss ‘em at all! Well, I miss how they used to be, but they aren’t those ponies anymore!” Soft Breeze was nodding as though the explanation were enough for her, and Pinkie realized that it probably was. The mare was willing to take Pinkie’s words at face value.

“Is that why you volunteered to come with us?”

“I didn’t—” She stopped, noticing Soft Breeze’s expression. “Does everyone know I volunteered?”

Soft Breeze tilted her head imperiously. “Stricken Chord knows.”

“Ugh.”

“I don’t think he told Hyacinth, if you’re worried about that.”

“I’d rather she knew than him.”

“Yep.” She nodded long and slow, lips pursed. “I get that.”

Pinkie foraged for a time, Soft Breeze trailing behind her unhelpfully. When she was satisfied that there was nothing edible to be found in the gully, she turned back and caught Soft Breeze staring at her. The yellow unicorn didn’t try to play it off, but just lifted her big, brown eyes slowly and turned them back to the path upwards.

“I didn’t have a lot of options,” Pinkie said.

“Uh-huh.” Totally placid, Soft Breeze sounded neither surprised nor put-out by the conversation’s resumption.

“I didn’t wanna go home to Ponyville. Didn’t really have a home anymore, they found someone to take my place there. And I didn’t wanna stay in Canterlot like my sister.”

“I’m not mad at you for coming with us.”

Pinkie snorted.

“No, really. I’m mad at Princess Celestia for forcing us to bring you along.” She held up a hoof to stifle a nervous giggle. “That came out really nasty, I’m sorry, that’s not what I wanted to say.”

“That’s all well.” Pinkie had heard Applejack employ the phrase before and had taken a liking for it. “But whoever everyone’s mad at, I’m here and Celestia isn’t, so what does it matter?”

“It matters a ton! I guess.” She thought. “Maybe not.”

“Squash!” Butter Blossom called from overhead. “You missed it! There were these squirrels playing on the other side of the river! They were so cute!” Soft Breeze hastened past Pinkie to her friend.

On the fifth day, they were in Fillydelphia, and it was the first time Pinkie had seen it since visiting with the Elements in late May. Pristine and whole once more, the city wore evidence of Discord’s tornado in a sash of newly constructed buildings down its length, from downtown through the suburbs and even into the wealthy gated communities on the other side. They landed in the city center at four and a deluxe carriage brought them to their hotel, where they were to stay just for the night. While Sweet Impression checked them in, Pinkie explored the reception room, admiring the fingers of stone with backlit water slithering down into a rectangular pool of river rocks, watching the harried travelers coming and going, smelling the overpriced coffee and pastries from the lobby bakery, and drinking appreciatively of the cucumber and mint-infused water by the elevators. She had not expected to be, but Pinkie was excited to be somewhere new.

They got settled, she got out her books and answered a volley of questions from Stricken Chord on her progress, and then they went for an early dinner at the hotel restaurant. No one ordered excessive drinks or silenced the table for a round of planning, no one stared into space with the burden of their troubles, and no one argued. Hyacinth proposed a toast to the general wellness of the country, and Butter Blossom cracked a joke, and Sweet Impression laughed a little too loud and embarrassed herself.

“Pinkie, have you been in contact with Twilight yet?” Stricken Chord asked. He had graciously waited for the first course to arrive before pinning her with his disarming blue eyes, aglow with friendliness and a touch of condescension.

“Just to confirm that the sigil worked,” Pinkie said, tapping her hooves together. “It, uh, it does.”

“Well that’s good news,” Butter Blossom said cheerily.

“I don’t get it, she’s supposed to be feeding us information by now,” Stricken Chord said.

“She clearly doesn’t have any yet,” Hyacinth returned.

“She’s a busy mare,” Soft Breeze said, taking a tiny sip from her rosé. She was the only one who had ordered alcohol.

“I can ask her,” Pinkie offered.

“No, don’t bother her,” Chord said. “Actually, let’s say if we don’t have anything by the time we’re over the edge, then you can bug her.”

“If we don’t have the map, we don’t have it,” Sweet Impression said with a shrug. “Chrysalis is gonna have to deal.”

“Yeah, you go ahead and tell her that.”

“Chrysalis?” Pinkie asked. To her knowledge, they had not yet heard who they were actually meeting, just “the changelings” in general.

“Did I not tell you?”

“You didn’t tell her?” Soft Breeze echoed.

“It’s Queen Chrysalis,” Hyacinth said. “Ruler of the changeling nation.” She slapped Chord playfully, but her voice was serious. “You didn’t tell her?”

“You didn’t tell her?” Butter Blossom repeated in an attempt at levity.

“We’re meeting the queen? Not, like, one of her representatives, but the actual queen?” Pinkie asked. “Gee, thanks for letting me know so early!”

“See?”

“I thought you knew!” Chord cried, then cleared his throat. “We’ve been exchanging letters with her representatives for months, since before Discord went down, and the princess was down there for a while too.” At this, Pinkie widened her eyes; Celestia had been imprisoned in Discord’s dream, not with the changelings. “My Celestia, do I tell them?”

“It’s not as serious as it sounds,” Hyacinth said.

“It sounds pretty serious,” Pinkie said.

“Chrysalis is a sweetie,” Soft Breeze sighed.

“She scares me,” Butter Blossom said, twirling his pasta in tomato sauce.

“No, Butter, she’s a sweetie, didn’t you hear me?”

Hyacinth tapped the table, regaining Pinkie’s attention. “Chrysalis is just impatient to get things rolling, which, I think, is fair.”

Chord shrugged in agreement.

“It’s just a surprise,” Pinkie said, and, after a moment, continued, “but I’m not scared to meet her. I’m on first-name basis with the princesses, what’s one more ruler?”

“That kind of talk’ll get you thrown right off the island,” Chord said. “You better watch it.”

“I’m just saying.”

“Yeah, in this line of work, you don’t just say anything.” He threw a hoof up, blowing out air. “Five days. Five days, and you—”

“Hey, let’s cool it?” Hyacinth whispered in his hear, putting a hoof on his back.

“I’m just—yeah, okay, okay.”

“I think what Chord’s trying to say is that you want to be careful with how you, uh, phrase things,” Sweet Impression said.

“Am I a diplomat now?” Pinkie asked. She did not want to ask it, but before she could stop herself, the question was out, the nervous buzzing in her head drowning out the more rational-feeling thought to accept Chord’s admonishment and make no fuss.

“Apparently,” Chord blustered, rolling his eyes dramatically.

“Hey, hey, hey, what’s this?” Butter Blossom asked. “We’re just havin’ a good time.”

“Yeah, last I checked, I was here to bring the smiles,” Pinkie went on. “And since I’m not stupid, I know that means ‘just stay in the corner and let the real diplomats do their work.’ Do I have it?” She shook her head. “Apparently not, since you’ve got me reading up on these changelings. So you expect me to do something when I’m down there.”

“Let’s, uh, let’s just—”

“Pinkie, I don’t blame you,” Chord huffed. “It’s not about you at all.”

Hyacinth whispered something in his ear, and he softened a fraction. Pinkie didn’t let up from her stare, though, the same expression she had seen Twilight use so many times in their final months: bitter disinterest, haughty impatience.

“Personally, I think of you as an apprentice of sorts,” Sweet Impression said. “That’s all, honest.”

“Yeah. See, I like that,” Soft Breeze said, nodding along.

“To apprentices!” Butter Blossom announced, floating his glass of apple juice.

“Butter, shut up,” Chord said, and Hyacinth rubbed his back. The entire table went silent, and the waitress, who had been hovering for some time, took the opportunity to clear some dishes.

At length, Pinkie spoke once more. “All righty. Cards on the table. I don’t know what I’m doing here, and I think it’s stupid that Celestia sent me along, but I gather it’s too late for me to back out or for you to drop me off somewhere on the way, ‘cause they’re expecting me down there.”

“That’s right,” Hyacinth said after a moment of hesitation.

“So instead of fighting, let’s make the best of this,” Sweet Impression broke in. “Pinkie, you can just… be an attendant or something, when you’re with us.”

“You can get our chairs and refill our waters,” Soft Breeze completed. “That kind of thing.”

“Yeah, it doesn’t have to be glamorous,” Hyacinth said. “And it looks like you’re not looking for something glamorous anyway, right?”

“That’s fine, yes.” Pinkie took her gaze off Chord for a second before refocusing it on him. “What do you say? That sound okay to you?”

“Doesn’t matter what I think,” Chord said sullenly.

“Aw, c’mon, don’t be like that,” Butter Blossom said. “Your opinion matters too, you know that. C’mon.”

“Okay. Fine.” He refused to meet Pinkie’s eyes, and for the rest of the evening, he barely said anything.

Stricken Chord sulkily apologized to Pinkie on the sixth day, and she accepted it to be polite, and they made nice without trying to be friends. She suspected that he had only come to her to appease Hyacinth, which was good enough.

They were passing into the coastal lands on the eighth day, losing the woods and grasslands to rocky hills and cliffs, fragmented still, hyaline veins of river and lake pressed onto their savage shapes. They landed for one last time at a way station on the chipped tooth of a mountain, from which they could take in the view of tattered clouds, gray arrowheads of suspended stone, and the smoking chain of airships and cloud production plants that made up the root of Celestia’s cloud convoy. The pillar of seawater that fed it did not become visible until sunset, when they crested a ridge of rain-lashed granite and rode an air current over a basin of shattered valley.

Not half an hour later, Pinkie’s sigil glowed blue and emitted a tea kettle shriek that drew her from the deck to speak with Twilight, and after fifteen minutes with her, she returned to the diplomats with the news.

“We’re gonna have to wait a couple weeks for that map still, but once it’s done, we’ll be in business.”

“So what the heck are we gonna tell Chrysalis?” Butter Blossom asked.

“Well, that’s what I asked, and Twilight said… She said she didn’t know, it wasn’t her problem.”

“Oh, that’s great,” Hyacinth said.

“She’s trying her best to get a plan going, but she has to wait on her fault line map, that’s all.”

“What happens after the map’s complete?” Chord asked.

“She’s gonna work with one of the other mares on her team and start rounding up ponies, to get them out of the way for restoration. Then she’s gonna send teams of magicians out to start actually bringing things together.”

“At least we have a head start on that,” Soft Breeze said. “Most of the cities are already together. It’s all just countryside, right?”

“That’s what Twilight said.”

“It’ll still take a while, though, huh?” Butter Blossom asked. “Well girls, looks like we’ve got our work cut out for us.”

“What is taking Twilight so long?” Hyacinth asked. “Isn’t she doing this in Celestia’s name? Can’t she just pull palace resources and get it done quick?”

“You want me to ask her?” Pinkie asked dully.

“Don’t pressure her,” Soft Breeze said.

“Pressure?” Chord yelped. “We’re the ones under pressure, not her! She doesn’t have to talk to the changeling queen. She doesn’t have to travel twelve days just to tell Chrysalis that we’re sorry, we’ve got nothing yet, please wait more.”

“Didn’t Celestia say she’d been in talks with Chrysalis already?” Sweet Impression asked.

“Yeah, this feels like the first step still,” Hyacinth said. “Why are we being sent down here before we have something to show for it?”

“Maybe Celestia assumed we would by now,” Pinkie offered.

“I hope not,” Butter Blossom said.

“She might have, though,” Hyacinth said, tapping her chin. “She puts a lot of faith in Twilight.”

“And so do we,” Soft Breeze said. “We’ll just tell her we have our best and brightest working on the problem. Maybe if we can give her details on what Twilight’s doing, that’ll be good enough.” She looked at Pinkie.

“Uhh, I can call her back and get details on the map,” Pinkie said, withering inside at the prospect. Twilight had been short with her the first time.

“Go do that,” Chord said, and after a moment of hesitation, Pinkie vanished belowdecks.

“Ladies, this one’s gonna bite,” Sweet Impression said when Pinkie was gone.

“I still don’t get why we’re even out here if we have nothing new,” Hyacinth said.

“What if Celestia knew we wouldn’t have anything in time and sent us to diffuse a potential situation?” Chord asked. “Like, she knew Chrysalis would be pissed, so she sent us early so we could get in, get settled, and like… You know, we could be disappointed together. We can just blame Twilight.”

“We could,” Soft Breeze started. “It’s gonna make Canterlot look disorganized.”

“We’re fresh off the greatest crisis in pony history, though,” Butter Blossom said. “We can tell her that Celestia wanted to send us down as a show of good faith.”

“Isn’t that why she said we were going down anyway?”

“No, we’re supposed to be facilitating restoration,” Hyacinth said. “Which, I agree with Chord, only works if we have a plan for restoration in the first place. This, we’re just apologizing for being slow.”

“Better to do that face-to-face than in a letter,” Sweet Impression said.

“Better still to not have to do it at all,” Butter Blossom chuckled.

The Mirdath turned to give a mile of clearance to the cyclone of water rising into the cloud city. They had to slow for a couple hours, sharing the sky with fleets of convoy airships, and on the other side, the ocean opened up below them, expanding and darkening as they began their descent. It was one o’ clock on the tenth day, and the waveless water filled their horizons, the only sign of anything amiss in the too-flat line at the end.

Hyacinth was locked in her cabin with a pile of paperwork and research materials, and had been since the night before, which Sweet Impression told Pinkie was not out of the ordinary. Pinkie told her that it was fine, that Twilight did the same exact thing, and usually when she came out, she did so with a complicated solution to some problem that had been nettling her. Sweet Impression nodded and smiled, saying that Hyacinth and Twilight could probably be friends.

Then, prompted by Butter Blossom and Soft Breeze, Pinkie recounted their time on the ocean, the salt blocks and the perilous journey to the bottom for the Element of Honesty, embellishing little. As she was finishing her story, she looked to one side and jumped up with a squeal at the wall of water rising over them.

Butter Blossom laughed and patted her back. It was just the ocean; they were moving down at last.

“Yeah, Pinkie, it’s just the entire ocean,” Soft Breeze said.

Pinkie laughed nervously and said nothing of it, though the dark, rippling monocline too much reminded her of the river in Applewood. All it was missing was the sheer veil of magic to hold it back—and recalling the image of it, Rarity’s solitary figure on the hillside, her magic alone keeping them safe for the battle, a surge of love pounded in her chest. “Still don’t hate ‘em. Just done with ‘em. Good.”

“Look at that,” Sweet Impression said, awe in her voice, twisted around from the wheel to look off their port side. “There isn’t even a bottom anymore. It’s water all the way down, then air. How does that work?”

“I don’t think anyone knows,” Soft Breeze said.

“If anyone does, it’d be Twilight,” Butter Blossom said. “Sweet, have you met Twilight before? I thought you said you did once.”

“I saw her at one of Celestia’s receptions, but she didn’t say anything to me.”

“She looks like a nice lady.”

“When I saw her, she looked like the kind of pony to bite your head off,” Soft Breeze said, leveling her eyes at Pinkie, knowing she didn’t need to ask.

“She, uh, she has her positives,” Pinkie said.

“Story time!” Butter Blossom cried. “Positives first, then the negatives.”

“Don’t pressure her,” Soft Breeze said.

“She doesn’t have to talk if she doesn’t want to, I’m just curious.”

“Twilight’s a great mare,” Pinkie said. “Truly, genuinely, she is a great pony. She led us through our adventure. Discord threw so many curve balls our way, and Twilight found a solution every time. She…” Pinkie stopped, surprised to feel the love swelling for Twilight as well. She had been so maligned, and the Twilight she described was a much prettier version of the real mare, but the love that threatened to break into her voice was no less real.

“That’s what I heard, that she’s a magical genius,” Soft Breeze said.

“I think… Well, genius is a part of that, sure, absolutely, but she also has some really big willpower. We got to see it a lot later on, in Roan and Snowdrift.”

“Why do I get the feeling there’s a ‘but’ coming up?” Sweet Impression asked.

“She’s not very nice,” Pinkie said simply. “Which I get. She had to do some really nasty things—no details, sorry, that’s not my place—and it, uh.”

“That’ll change a pony.”

“That’s sort of the impression I got,” Soft Breeze said.

“Like I said, she is great,” Pinkie said. “I trust her to find a solution for restoring our country. If it can be solved with magic, Twilight can solve it, that’s what I learned.”

“I don’t suppose you have a story you can tell for that?” Butter Blossom asked.

“She said she doesn’t want to give details,” Soft Breeze said.

“No, not for us. I mean, yeah, for us, but I’m just thinking, if you can make an appeal for Twilight’s genius to Chrysalis, that might actually help, and if you have a story to back it up, that’s even better.”

“I can tell you this one,” Pinkie said, glancing up to see Chord approaching them.

“What are we talking about?” he asked brusquely, sitting down in their circle.

“Pinkie was gonna tell us a story about Twilight,” Butter Blossom said.

“Heck yeah, Twilight’s awesome. What’s the story?”

“Ladies, sorry to interrupt,” Sweet Impression said. “Just to let you know, we’re gonna be crossing into thinner air here in a minute.”

“I’ll go tell Hyacinth,” Butter Blossom said, hopping up and running belowdecks.

With the others, Pinkie took a deep breath of the salty air, then several shallower ones. When the country had initially lifted off, in addition to taking its piece of ocean with it, it had taken its atmosphere: one of the reasons their new elevation was not so difficult to forget in places where the gaps were closed. Outside the invisible wall of magic that held Equestrian air in place, though, they would be suddenly exposed to a thin and dangerous sky; it was why they had to descend right at the ocean’s outer edge, so they would be as low as possible when the pressures changed.

No one spoke much when the transition came, and Butter Blossom only came back up after an hour was past, when everyone’s bodies had adjusted and they were beyond the danger of passing out. There was a supply of oxygen tanks for that possibility.

“No landing until we reach the changeling islands,” Sweet Impression said. “Hope no one’s too antsy.”

Beholding Equestria from below for the first time, Pinkie felt like she had stepped into a dream. Not her time with the Elements, their fights with Discord, or the shocks and emergencies of Snowdrift and Applewood could match the view from the back of the Mirdath. By its sheer scope, Equestria’s hanging presence made their past achievements feel distant and imagined, and coming tasks impossible.

Equestria’s slice of ocean was huge, but it clearly terminated somewhere; its edge was flat and sharp, and as they had come closer and the sea floor had thinned to nothing, the water’s finality became more obvious. Equestria, the continent, curved gently across the sky, filling it like a demonic wing, its gaps only visible from the dust of moonlight that fell through in lines like imitations of the austral lights. One could follow the shape of the land to the southern horizon and see where black ground tucked down and out of sight, meeting the spots of shallow sea that had spilled in from the north. From there, one could see the alternating shimmer of water and brutal ridges of mountains and valleys. Liftoff, after all, had been no clean break from the planet, and the hole they left was not uniform.

“That’s gonna be a problem,” Stricken Chord mumbled, looking down at the black pit to the starboard. At its outer rim stood a circle of cliffs, keeping lakes of salt water from emptying into the earth, its interior too deep for them to see any details. To the south of the pit there ran a furrowed wedge of broken hills that eventually vanished under a sickle of dark sea that opened and deepened the farther west they looked, where it eventually became the ocean that separated Equestria from the griffon lands. In that direction, there was nothing to see but the wink of moonlight and the heavy anvils of storm clouds.

As Equestria loomed away from them, the ocean smoothed, gained visible swells, and became more itself. They turned into a stronger air current over a sharp island peak, which Sweet Impression said should be underwater. Pinkie made a mental note of it to tell Twilight later.

On the eleventh day, they passed into changeling territory, the border marked by a line of pylons, their painted tips yellowed and the exposed bases black from long-dried algae. The ocean had been sucked away to a giant lake in the seafloor, the exposed sand and coral eroded by tide and swept away by wind, sun-bleached whale bones lying like misplaced museum pieces on the rocks. Where the pylons had been completely exposed, they could see the huge, concrete bases drilled into gray bedrock, pipes snaking around beneath, emergency ladders ending a perilous two hundred feet higher. In both directions, the seafloor eventually rose and allowed for ocean to lap against the border.

When they were across, they slowed down and met a changeling airship, which kept a respectful distance for the rest of the journey, and on the twelfth day, overshot them to return to its home island. Not an hour later, they saw the beginnings of their meeting place, the slopes of the island nude but for a sheer four feet of ocean; and the glassy water, still beautiful, had erected a thin attempt at a beach atop the husk of a coral reef. Less than a mile farther north, they flew over the thick shoulder of a levee, and then over a sapphire lagoon toward the gray, rocky face of their island. Hyacinth and Sweet Impression were on the radio with the changeling meeting party, and the rest of them watched the desolate ocean move out of sight and be replaced by the changelings’ halcyon imitation. Perfect waters, palm trees, white-gold grains of sand, and the smell of tropical fruit and salty air as they were landing, the sound of sea birds, the hiss of wind through palm fronds and of the breakers.

After saying goodbye to Canterlot palace only twelve days hence, Pinkie and her coworkers set hoof on the foreign beach, manes touched by a tropical breeze. Pinkie couldn’t help it; she raised her eyes and opened wide her nostrils to the scent of the ocean, the trees and flowers.

“An honor,” Hyacinth announced, drawing Pinkie’s attention back to the approaching changelings. The delegates made no attempt at disguising themselves, and stepped directly to Hyacinth and shook her outstretched hoof. Their shells were beetle black and shiny, crinkled and imbricate at the joints. Pinkie was reminded of the grape leaves that had wrapped a dish of long-grain rice in Roan.

The changelings clicked when they walked, their legs articulating less smoothly than a pony’s as the sand sifted through the holes in their hooves. For them, traversing the beach was not as easy, and the Equestrian representatives walked more slowly to keep the changelings in the lead.

From behind, Pinkie could look at them without fear of being rude. Her books had contained numerous pictures, so the changelings’ appearance was no shock, but there was only so much that a picture could convey. She had been prepared for the diseased seaweed appearance of their tattered tails, but not for their thickness; she had assumed the tails were of hair, like hers, but what swished and juddered before them was two groups of hanging flaps, like strips of rubber or animal hide. She had noted the glassy wings that looked hardly able to support their own weight, but had not expected to see in those wings the branching reticulum of veins and arteries, sickly white like milk. Of their eyes, she had expected twin holes of glaucous, unblinking film; but when they turned back around to make sure the ponies were keeping with them, Pinkie caught a closer look and saw a soft, radial gradation of white to pastel blue, like robins’ eggs in the sun. One of them flapped its wings languidly, a show of common courtesy, to which Sweet Impression inclined her head.

Their goal was not located on the pristine beach, which they all realized as their path took them farther inland, up a small rise in the rocks, and to a road. There was nothing special about the road; it was a paved street on top of nature’s beauty, as black and impersonal as those that Pinkie didn’t even register in Equestria, but an affront to her senses in the new country. As if the tropical changelings somehow got by with walking and flying, sometimes taking to the sea with their quaint tribal canoes, and otherwise left their land undeveloped. Pinkie nervously shifted her weight back and forth next to Stricken Chord as they waited for their car.

When it came, it was like any other car Pinkie had ridden in, and this too disappointed her quietly. She had expected outlandish and obvious differences between the two races, but all she got was the gross disparity in appearance, and even that was not so insurmountable; the changelings walked similarly to the ponies, they climbed into the car the same, one of them mumbled and complained when it banged a knee getting up into the driver’s seat. Then they were off, trundling downhill into the jungle and then uphill out of it a few minutes later, hooking east in the direction of a tall, gray arch of stone. When they had parked, Soft Breeze stopped Pinkie from getting out, reminding her in a quick whisper that it was polite to let their hosts get the doors for them. Pinkie blushed and waited to climb out, her tail brushing the leg of one of her changeling companions, and reminded herself that they did not know her problems, did not care; to them, she was just another diplomat.

The arch oversaw another lagoon, much less picturesque than the one where they had landed, and where waited the hotel where they would be put up. A few of them gasped and complimented the building’s beauty, and Pinkie did as well to fit in, but in her heart, she was disappointed. Say what she would about Twilight, the unicorn had spoiled them with luxury suites as often as she could. Even from afar, she could see that the hotel would not have impressed her at all if it had been in her homeland. Two stories, artificial stone walls painted with tacky flower murals, plain light fixtures, and a seaside view blocked by the rising growth of more knotted jungle: she could practically hear Rarity struggling to find nice things to say about it.

To the front lobby they were led, and while the changelings handled check-in with Hyacinth hovering just behind, Butter Blossom took Pinkie aside.

“Not quite what I was expecting, but it looks good, don’t you think?”

“It, uh.” Pinkie saw no point in sugarcoating it. “I’m used to finer things than this.”

“Three rooms,” Hyacinth said, trotting over and bringing them to the group. “There’s a radio in each one. Here’s our room keys. Don’t lose ‘em.”

Hyacinth and Stricken Chord shared one room, it was no question; and Pinkie took a room with Soft Breeze, leaving Sweet Impression and Butter Blossom for the third. In their room, while Soft Breeze unpacked, Pinkie went straight for the window to see what she would be looking at for the next weeks. They were next to an extension of the jungle, but it was no flattering image: from their room’s angle, they could see gnarled trees overgrown with ferns and moss, broad leaves that sagged under the humidity, and pieces of gray beach on one side with a sidewalk cutting through the middle of all. Of exotic flowers, colorful birds, or delectable fruits, there was nothing to be seen, and to be heard, there was the ocean, the wind, and her neighbors.

“You can take the window bed if you want it,” Soft Breeze said.

Pinkie just shrugged, upending her suitcase onto the bed and leaving it for sorting later. They met in Hyacinth’s room and discussed the rest of the day. Chrysalis was scheduled to arrive at six that evening, giving them four hours to eat, get settled, and prepare their statements. For Pinkie, it was four hours to brush up on changeling etiquette and to pester Twilight for any last-second developments on restoration.

“So while we go down and take a load off, you get to be alone in your room and work,” Chord said with a grin, to which Butter Blossom laughed—the only indication to Pinkie that he was joking.

“Let her come down with us,” Sweet Impression said, “at least for a little while. I say she’s earned it.”

“Aww, fine,” Chord fake-grumbled, and in this Pinkie saw the playfulness. She shared a conspiratorial smile with Sweet Impression and went down to the lobby, curious to see what sort of food they could put on Queen Chrysalis’ account.

Of all the major races, a term Pinkie found needlessly belittling, the changelings were the least different from the ponies in terms of their socioeconomic structure and their hierarchy. Instead of two princesses, there was the one queen, and under her served the dukes and duchesses of their respective islands and the marquises and marquesses therein. Queen Chrysalis ruled from the capital island, her palace deep underground in the hollow chamber of a dead volcano, which was fabled to contain near a thousand outlets into her island, its closest neighbors, and even the seafloor, where lived a splinter principality.

Though the outermost islands made billions a year in tourism, the changelings also enjoyed a lucrative trading system with Equestria and the griffon lands, receiving magical items from the former and electronics from the latter in exchange for their tropical produce: a business that had been destroyed since The Crumbling. Relying more on the griffons to support their nation and cut off from the ocean that made their tourist hot-spots so lucrative, they had had to gut the interior jungles and what waters had not drained off in order to meet the demand in exports. Pinkie had not yet gotten to the environmental impacts, but from what she understood, the islands’ tropical beauty was being reduced to a thinner and thinner veneer with industrialization. This and so much more affected the international politics, which she did not even understand on a basic level anyway.

At least she grasped the main points of etiquette, she thought to herself; that was something. She knew, for instance, to expect to partake in what the changelings dubbed a “revelation,” a simple ritual in which meeting parties imbibed a potion that revealed their true physical forms. For Pinkie and her coworkers, sharing the potion was a matter of politesse only, but for Chrysalis, it was proof that she was who she presented as. Butter Blossom had brewed a gallon of the potion before leaving Canterlot, enough to sustain a week or so of meetings.

She knew not to address Chrysalis by her name, but by a generic “your highness” or “your excellence.” Names, to the changelings, were informal, where titles were not. It had seemed backwards to Pinkie until Sweet Impression explained one day, the practice resulting from a culture where practical identity was better expressed in one’s position and employment status, rather than one’s appearance or behavior, which might change ten times in a day. When dining, Pinkie was not to order anything the same as the queen, nor she they—“that’s just how it is,” Soft Breeze had said at one point.

And so on.

So when Queen Chrysalis whooshed into the hotel in the form of a tall, hot pink unicorn with a heart cutie mark and a prim golden tiara on her head, everyone at the table breathed a sigh of relief. The shape a changeling took for formal affairs was meant to be a reflection of their mindset; for her to come in the guise of a pony, and a regal one at that, indicated optimism, a sense of kinship.

She sat down, pressed their hooves, looked into each of their eyes individually, and then they shared in Butter Blossom’s revelation potion. The oily yellow liquid was sweet and grassy, with a hint of anise just at the tail end, and Pinkie was relieved that it did not make her gag. They waited the requisite ninety seconds, and Chrysalis’ pink fur melted away, her tiara sucked itself back into her skull, her face and body elongated, and her color turned to the shiny, grape leaf-black of a proper exoskeleton. With the disguise gone, she no longer smiled, but her lifeless green eyes did crinkle just at the corners—the changeling equivalent. The motion was almost lost behind her flowing, aquamarine mane, which resembled the material of her wings but did not run with white blood. Like the drones that had taken them to their hotel, Chrysalis’ hooves were perforated and her horn was jagged, and where the light touched their interior curves, Pinkie saw smooth continuations of her shell. Again, it was just confirmation of what she had already been told to expect, that changelings’ holes were cosmetic in nature and no indication of injury or incompleteness in their bodily formation.

The queen gestured with a wave and summoned the waitress, who appeared in the same aspect as the queen, but in miniature—another show of respect. When she had received her order, the other diplomats placed theirs, and when all the food and drink was on the table, talk began.

“The Hive sends its regards,” she intoned coolly, wafting a slow wing to the side.

“Equestria sends its regards, your excellence,” Hyacinth said, nodding her head.

“We are they,” Stricken Chord added.

Chrysalis slurped a mussel from its half shell and tossed her mane, clicking in the back of her throat: an indication of impatience.

“We’re happy to report that Princess Celestia has a team of the very best and brightest researchers and magicians together to coordinate restoration efforts,” Sweet Impression said. “At the forefront of them is our very own Element of Magic, Twilight Sparkle.”

“The firebrand in the north,” Chrysalis said. “We so are aware of the Element of Magic. It’s no surprise to me that she would be in charge of restoring your land; I’m told her grasp of magic is without mortal peer. What progress has been made?”

Pinkie withered inside when Stricken Chord gave her a quick, impersonal look. “Your highness, the team is completely formed, and is currently doing its very best to formulate a plan.”

“Formulate a plan?” More clicking, faster and in a higher key. “Her royal highness of the sun did lead me to believe that a plan was ready now, and you were so coming down to coordinate on your first steps. That was why I wanted to meet personally, that I could expedite our work. Are you telling me now that you aren’t even ready to begin restoring your own land?”

“It’s complicated,” Soft Breeze said, tapping her hooves together demurely.

“I know that.”

“What I mean, we need time to make sure everything will work properly. We have cities to consider, and villages on the edges, and, oh, what else?”

“Aligning rivers and mountains,” Pinkie said, earning a filthy look from Hyacinth. “We’ve also gotta make sure everything lines up underground too, like water tables and oil deposits and stuff. Otherwise—how did Twilight put it?” She found momentary refuge from Chrysalis’ intent gaze in her papaya and pineapple smoothie. “Uhh, if we’re not careful, the country’s surface might be okay, but it’ll all be a mess underground. Water can erode fault lines and oil can seep into places it’s not supposed to if we don’t fit everything together exactly right.”

“What she’s trying to say, your highness, is that it’s not like putting together a jigsaw puzzle,” Hyacinth said.

“I know that, royal diplomat, you said that already.” Chrysalis showed her fangs in what resembled an Equestrian smile, a sign of disrespect in changeling society. Hyacinth did not let its effect show on her face. “If the Element of Laughter can provide more details on what is causing this holdup, I’d be appreciative.”

“Go on, Pinkie,” Soft Breeze said, drawing a nasty look from Stricken Chord, who shifted in his seat with the pain of not interjecting.

She froze, but only for a second, the queen’s glare less penetrating than Celestia’s. “Well, there’s all that underground stuff, and making sure no one gets hurt when any land masses get smashed back together. We have to secure tall buildings, give ponies time to evacuate danger zones, and all that.”

“This is foundational work,” Chrysalis said. “Your princess did tell me that it was nearing completion.”

Pinkie held her gaze, but around her, she could just see her coworkers sharing a dark look.

“Your befuddled face expressions tell me that this is news to you. Tell, under what pretenses were you sent to me?”

Stricken Chord spoke up before Pinkie had the chance. “We were sent to negotiate for time, to inform you that our best efforts are underway, and to facilitate communication between Equestria and the Hive when time comes to begin actualizing restoration.”

Chrysalis studied them in much the same way as she had when she introduced herself, and Pinkie silently prided herself for not flinching when the monarch’s unflinching eyes hit her. Thin ladders of wrinkles appeared in the soft skin around her eyes, gleaming emeralds that held perfectly still, almost clear enough for Pinkie to see through them to the gray of the queen’s brain.

“You keep contact with the Element of Magic?”

It was a second before Pinkie realized Chrysalis was addressing her, and nodded nervously.

“Ask her for an update today. Ask her for any details on the Equestrian plan that she can provide. Concrete details, things that have been done, not plans for the future.”

“Sure—sure thing, your highness.”

“I’ll meet you again on the fourteenth.”

Chrysalis rose, the other diplomats with her, and they walked through the parting ceremony. Chrysalis flapped a wing, though without the vim of before, and then glided out the door.

Pinkie looked to her coworkers, thinking that the meeting had gone well, but seeing the opposite writ on their faces.

Not that Applejack was aware of either, but two days after Pinkie’s departure from Canterlot and Aloe and Lotus’ return to the same, Fluttershy wandered out of the Everfree Forest and forced her way into her overgrown cottage, where she spent the rest of the day clearing it of ivy, of invading flowers, of cobwebs, of dirt, of water spots, of ants and cockroaches, of mushrooms and lichens, of rotting baseboards and the area rug thick with mold and beetles and maggots. She distinctly recalled that her house had not survived the disaster, and the clear fact that someone had rebuilt it in her absence warmed her not at all. Rather than reflect on the fact and make herself bitter for the emotion lost, she put herself harder to work, and when she failed to open the windows in their warped sills, she broke them.

With the ruined furniture and baseboards tossed out onto the field outside and sprinkled with glass, she turned her attention to the floorboards, to the windowsills, to the yellowed and leaking roof, and to the peeling wallpaper, which by one in the morning that following day, she had stripped from the skeleton of her house and piled in the grass. Her quiet activity attracted one of the hospital’s nurses out for a stroll after her shift, and the two of them worked to turn off the water and disconnect her plumbing, which had rusted and clogged with scum and tree roots.

By six-thirty that morning, two others had joined them, and the four stood together on the uneven foundation of Fluttershy’s rebuilt and then re-destroyed house. She thanked them, got their names, and asked that they kindly keep the secret of she, a pegasus, using magic like a unicorn. Then, after a dip in the river, she strolled to the farm, where Big Mac was up and hard at work. She could have watched him from the treetops, but did not, announcing herself with a cough and lamely explaining that she was back from her furlough and ready to reenter society.

He did not have many questions for her, whether out of understanding or the lack thereof she could not tell, but his stoic acceptance was enough for her. His was perhaps the most appropriate Element, she thought. Patient, accepting, immovable, reliable. She was glad she found him first, though his sister had been the object of her return to the farm. Fluttershy found her back at the house, where she was in the larder with the jams and jellies, labeling jars, testing them for leaks, checking inventory, rotating the stock.

To Applejack, Fluttershy must have appeared as an emissary from heaven, she reflected afterwards. The sun had been at her back as she perched at the window, and Applejack’s jaw had dropped when she announced herself, her eyes momentarily flashing with reverence and fear.

Fluttershy alighted on the cool dirt floor, embracing and being embraced, dry-eyed.

“How’ve you been?” Applejack asked gravely. “Are you okay?” It was a just question; Fluttershy had been alone in the forest for eight days.

“I’m ready to be back. I, uh—I’m sorry, are you busy? I don’t want to distract you.”

“These jellies been waitin’ fer months, Ah reckon they can wait a few minutes longer. What’s on yer mind, sugarcube?”

“I thought about what you told me. It, um, it wasn’t difficult to see that you were right.”

“Mm?”

“Being alone opened my eyes. On the first night, even, I saw what you told me. Accepting it, that took a little longer.”

“Always does.”

“I was cruel to Pinkie, and I was selfish with everyone. The fact that what she did is worse doesn’t make what I did less awful to you.” Still not crying, she looked Applejack in the eyes. “I’m sorry, and I’m ready to be better.”

Applejack nodded. “Are you gonna tell her that?”

“I haven’t forgiven her, and I don’t think I will, not soon anyway. I’m not going to do anything to her, though. If we have to meet for publicity functions or what-have-you, then I’ll do it, I’ll be professional. Other than that, I want nothing to do with that mare. I hope… I hope she assumes that of us, that she knows forgiveness is off the table.” In a small voice, she added, “and I hope she’s at peace with it. I’m still not. I miss her—the pony I used to know, I mean. I miss the old Pinkie.”

“Don’t we all?” Applejack clapped Fluttershy on the back and led her up into the house, into the warmth, and cut her a slice of pecan pie from the day before. “I’m proud of you, Fluttershy.”

“Thank… you.”

“Not meanin’ to come off as pretentious. Is that the word?”

“Sanctimonious?”

“Thank you. Not meanin’ to come off sanctimonious to you, Ah am proud. It’s a very mature thing fer someone to admit their flaws like that.”

“You would know.”

“Ah practice it every chance Ah get, an’ believe you me, Ah get a lot of ‘em. Still get butterflies, too.”

“I know for me, my heart was pounding when I was coming up to the house. You’re my best friend, and I was still shaking like a filly. I still am a little.”

“Ah constantly thank Celestia fer the chance to learn from it,” Applejack said, getting herself a smaller slice and a glass of milk.

“So…” Fluttershy began, not wishing to continue down the road Applejack presented. Self improvement was one thing, but she had no interest in bringing the goddess into it. “What did I miss?”

“Mmm, not too much. Twilight an’ Rainbow are hard at work settin’ up restoration. Ah got a sigil fer Rainbow now too, she an’ Ah try to talk every day. Says Twilight was born to boss ponies ‘round.”

“We knew that already,” Fluttershy chuckled.

“Too true. But they’re doin’ fine, Twilight seems happier. Goes to show, some ponies don’t need time to relax, they need steady employment. Ah get it to a point.” She waved a hoof, as if dismissing an old point she didn’t want to repeat. “Rarity’s boutique’s comin’ along, Vinyl’s gettin’ ready to start puttin’ out music again.”

“Oh, good for her.”

“Colgate an’ Octavia are fine, Ah guess, whatever passes fer ‘fine’ with them. Octavia wants to be a Datura now.”

“Surprise of the century.”

Applejack laughed. “Yeah, Ah guess yer right. Ah never really saw it myself. Cole might join back up, but that’s a whole can of worms on its own, an’ Ah don’t really have much in the way of details. Versus ain’t doin’ so hot.”

“What’s wrong?”

“They’re puttin’ the squeeze on her down at the corkscrew.” Her voice darkened and became more solemn. “Legal troubles.”

“What happened?”

Applejack shook her head. “Her associatin’ with us, it looks like some ponies have taken offense. She hasn’t told me much, doesn’t like talkin’ ‘bout it, which Ah don’t blame her. But it looks bad.”

“How bad?”

Another head shake.

“I’m sorry to hear that. I hope we didn’t do anything to… I mean, with the Mansels, and Peaceful Meadows, and then Twilight…”

“It ain’t good, that’s fer sure. Ah told her to lay low. ‘Bout all Ah can do in this position.”

“I hope she’ll be okay. I liked her.”

Applejack studied her empty plate. “You got a place to stay? Ah went ‘round yer cottage a couple days ago, saw it wasn’t in the, uh, best condition.”

Her first impulse was to politely decline, but she stopped herself. “That would be wonderful. You’re right, my house has seen better days.”