“I will not hold up the others for this,” Octavia thought angrily. What little conversation there had been in the morning was entirely silenced, replaced with monotonous, plodding hooves on grass and dirt. Octavia walked in the back, limping more painfully with each passing minute, but determined to continue.

The others looked back frequently, flickering their eyes from side to side and up into the sky—looking for Discord, she was certain. She did not follow their example; it was all she could do to simply drive herself onwards, hating each step. At first, she had thought she had simply pulled a muscle or bruised her hoof, but as the knot of pain in her leg burned on, and the day crept along, she began to think otherwise. With each movement, a splintering rope of pain shot up her leg to jab her in the shoulder, and by the afternoon, she could think of nothing else.

“I do not need help. I do not need help.” She wiped sweat off her brow and bowed her head, taking only a moment to adjust the cello on her back. The sun was coming over a bank of clouds over the city, so close that they could hear the hum of life within. Pain pulsed inside her, and the sun, its rays truncated by the cool, northern air, felt like a wet sheet across her face and neck. Her vision squirmed, and she was tired. The last time she had slept was the night before Discord’s attack, and for only three or four hours. She felt as though she might fall asleep as she walked, but, at the same time, knew that she would not.

When they stopped to rest, it was three o’ clock. The bridge across Starlight Lake was in sight, its central support tower a proud, unbroken pylon in the distance, its cables fanning out like veins in a leaf. Bellflower Bridge, Octavia said: the shortest of five bridges to the island. It was mostly used for importing and exporting, with thousands of trains using it every day, but ponies would occasionally travel across it, spanning it on bicycles or in long-distance races.

Usually, she said, the roar of trains could be heard from miles away, but in the empty spring afternoon, the bridge was a silent monument. She asked Rainbow to fly up, to see whether the bridge was still intact; if it was not, she said, they would need to walk some seventy miles to the next one. It was with quiet tension that they waited for Rainbow to deliver her report.

She flew back down with a smile, and they let out a collective sigh of relief. There was damage, but the bridge still stood, and most of the cables were still in place. They waited a few more minutes, and then resumed the walk.

The empty land was peaceful, but unvaried; the grass and flowers were broken only by tracks of dirt and the occasional reservoir or gully, both unapproachable due to the clouds of mosquitoes and gnats they poured forth. They were forced to drink from their own reserves, which Twilight held in her pocket dimension, and by the time they reached the bridge an hour later, she was growing tired of continuously summoning and banishing their canteens.

They stopped at the edge and looked over the empty bridge. It sunk down slightly into the ridge on which they stood, wide and flat, and shining with hundreds of thin, crisscrossed train tracks. A slab of concrete, striated with metal. On the other side, they could hear the sounds of the city, but where they stood, there was only a light breeze shushing through the bridge cables. The sun was going down, and the bridge’s rough, dark gray surface was warm when they stepped onto it. The heavy ruin of an upended train rested in the far distance, and behind it, the menacing, dark tree that was Rose Tower.

Even from the middle, they could see Starlight Lake’s milky waters embracing Manehattan Island off the bridge’s edge. With the water drained, the island resembled a moldering tree stump in an eroded crater, pipes and chutes pocking its sides like flies. Many miles away, a shelf of water hung against the emptiness unnaturally, static and dirty, like frosted glass. The water, Octavia said, was not ordinarily so polluted; the silt and dirt had likely accumulated as the water level went down.

As they walked farther out over the water, the subtle smell of dirt and acid filled the air, mixing with the dusty, metallic tang of abandoned railroad tracks into an industrial, corroded, nose-wrinkling haze. Walking between the tracks in the spiderweb shadows of the bridge cables, Bellflower Bridge, soft yellow in the sunset, felt absolutely abandoned. Some of Canterlot had felt the same way, but where the older buildings had retained a sense of austerity and dignity in the aftermath, there was only emptiness on the bridge. The only signs of life were the sprawling train tracks, endless and strange in their bareness, and discarded pieces of trash: a bottle; a tire; a page from a newspaper, dated from the night of the attack. All faded from the sun.

It was six o’ clock when they approached the central support tower, leaning slightly to one side. Octavia still walked in the back, limping and panting; each hoofstep on the warm concrete was torture, sapping her will, but she only glared at the others’ backsides, forcing herself through the pain, first with steely self-determination, then with petulant anger at her potential assistants. “I do not need their help. I am not weak.” She remembered the night before, listening to Twilight crying in her sleeping bag. “I will show them all. I can overcome this.”

They rested at the central pylon, in the shadows of the cables. Even with the sun setting, the concrete had absorbed all the heat from the day, and radiated it out to them. They leaned against the rails and lay on the surface, staring quietly into the sky or the distance. For many of them, the memories of the initial night, and the first several days after, were still hard in their minds, but resting on the bridge, peace reigned.

They slowly began to converse, and talk went to Manehattan, and, specifically, the massive, black tower at the bridge’s end. Rose Tower.

“I have performed there many times, yes,” Octavia said, her tone measured. She lay in the middle of a set of tracks, eyes fixed blankly on the clouds.

“You said it was supposed to be an entertainment district. What kind of entertainment do they have there?” Twilight asked.

“All kinds. Stores, theaters, cinemas. There is an orchestra hall and two opera halls, as well as casinos and nightclubs. What else?” She thought for a moment, her face twitching as she adjusted herself on the ground. “Restaurants, of course. There are hundreds of those. And floors sixty through sixty-five are dedicated to a farmers’ market.”

“Five floors fer a farmers’ market?” Applejack said. “Ain’t that a bit excessive?”

“Yes.”

“What else?” Pinkie asked eagerly. “Are there any party stores?”

“I am sure there are.” Something in her voice made them look at her, and she closed her eyes.

“Are you all right, darling? You seem… off today,” Rarity said.

“Are you tired?” Fluttershy asked.

Octavia’s eyes shot open, and she regarded Fluttershy impatiently. With a grimace, she got to her hooves. Her breathing was hard and her brow was beaded with sweat, and she looked at them all. “I am not tired. What kind of pony do you think I am?”

“Geez, Octy, chill,” Rainbow said.

“No,” she said firmly. “Octavia, and nothing else. No abbreviations. No nicknames.”

“What’s wrong with you today?” Applejack asked.

Octavia stepped off the tracks and resumed walking down the bridge. “We have rested long enough.”

They watched her go for a moment, and, when it was clear that she was not going to stop for them, they followed. Her gait was unsteady, and they could hear her heavy breathing.

“I think she’s hurt,” Fluttershy whispered.

“She’s been limping since yesterday,” Twilight said.

“She jumped off the ship. Probably injured herself that way,” Rainbow said.

“Well, we should stop her and have Fluttershy take a look,” Rarity said.

“I’ve tried to ask her already,” Fluttershy said. “But she won’t talk about it.”

They all looked at Twilight, who sighed. “We can’t let her keep hurting herself like this. I say we tell her the truth.”

“That she’s being unreasonable?” Rarity asked.

“That we’re concerned about her.”

Rainbow was shaking her head. “That won’t work. She’ll just get defensive.” She leaned in a little. “You see this all the time in flight school. Ponies get hurt, but they don’t ask for help because they’re too proud. I almost failed some of my classes because of it.”

“Yer sayin’ she’s too proud to admit she’s hurt?” Applejack asked.

“But she doesn’t seem like a particularly vain pony,” Rarity said.

“She seems to place a lot of value on stoicism and strength, though,” Twilight said.

“She thinks being hurt is a sign of weakness,” Rainbow said. “So she’s hiding it.”

“Ugh. How… immature,” Rarity said, wrinkling her nose. “I can’t believe we owe our lives to her.”

“So do we talk to her about it?” Fluttershy asked.

“I say if she wants to make herself suffer, that’s her business,” Rainbow said. “She won’t learn her lesson if we force ourselves on her.”

“I don’t like seeing her like this,” Twilight said.

“Trust me, Twilight. She’ll just resist us if we try to help her.”

“It’s the same thing as her staying up all night,” Pinkie said, jogging alongside them. She craned her neck to look at Octavia, who seemed to walk with a more purposeful, alert stride.

She trotted a few steps farther, then stopped, her ears cocked. She turned around quickly. “I can hear someone calling for help.”

“Oh, heck,” Rainbow breathed, and they hastened to catch up with Octavia. She walked quickly forward, and they stopped again to hear. In the distance, muffled, a small voice was calling out in frustration and strain.

They half-trotted, half-galloped down the railroad lines, Octavia hobbling behind them. The overturned freight train that they had seen from a distance now lay huge across the bridge, a black centipede of scraped metal, crushed wheel arches, and skewed doors. The tracks below were twisted harshly off their ties, and the concrete was striped with black gouges. They could hear a stallion’s voice coming from underneath one of the scratched, tarnished cars.

Octavia marched past them forcefully, scanning the long wreck of the train. “Where are you?” she demanded, crouching with a wince of pain to look under a tangle of metal.

“Oh, Celestia, help me!”

“We’re right here,” Twilight said. “But we can’t see you.”

“Down here,” the voice called, a few feet along the train’s length.

Immediately, walking toward it, Twilight knew with a pang of regret that she would be unable to lift the train car away. She squinted into a dark, oil-stained crevasse between a rack of warped wheels and the cracked bridge surface, but saw nothing.

“Further along,” Rainbow said, flapping over to a black, cracked, collapsed car. Its dull, coal-dark skin was an unctuous shadow in the gloaming, heavy and black where it had cracked open. A colorful stain was dried onto the concrete where it had split, and the air smelled of oil.

Fluttershy followed her, wary, and the stallion gave off another cry of distress. They crouched by the tank and looked under an elevated, destroyed wheel arch.

A light shape was squeezed down into the crack, and it looked out at them with brilliant, blue eyes. “Here! Right here! Please!” he called, squirming.

Rainbow brought herself down to the concrete while Fluttershy beckoned the others over, and as they approached, Rainbow backed out quickly. “Holy crap!”

Before Fluttershy could react, the oil car swiveled out with a screech of rusted metal and protesting wheels, its black exterior slamming into her with a powerful, breathtaking weight. The others cried out in alarm, and Rainbow in anger, as she was lifted off her hooves and sent falling down and back. Her entire body seemed out of her control; she careened through the warm air without intent, her head lolling back stupidly, her eyes taking in the sky. She could hear masculine laughter, and the car coming to a shrieking rest, but it was just noise. In her sudden flight, her stunned mind only perceived sky.

As she fell back down to the ground, the bridge cables turned in her eyes, and her wings flared. A rough weight slammed against her back, and sparks flew in her eyes; the pain came immediately after, hot and wet on her back. Her wings felt wrenched out of their sockets, her skin aflame, and even as she cried out helplessly, she heard the maniacal laughter of the stallion they had tried to free, disappearing into the distance.

Still, her eyes were fixed above. She knew she was injured; she could hear the others yelling and galloping, and she could feel their hooves on the bridge. Her eyes watered and her breath caught in her throat, and in the thought-stopping pain, she felt like she was underwater. Someone grabbed her by the forehooves and helped her up, slowly, languidly. Her mind sloshed in her skull.

A pale figure arced over the bridge’s end and into the city, and the laughter faded away. She could feel herself fading too.

“We need a hospital,” Twilight said, looking fearfully at Octavia. She had Fluttershy draped over her back, and was trying to ignore the stickiness running into her coat.

It had happened too fast. One moment, Rainbow was poking her head under the train, and the next, the entire beast was sliding across the bridge, propelled by an unseen force and scattering the pegasi, Rainbow into the air and Fluttershy off her hooves down a separate set of tracks. While they burst apart, the stallion flew out of the wreckage in the opposite direction, so fast that Twilight thought he was a pegasus at first. When he landed, however, twenty feet away and with a small clap of hooves, she saw no wings on his pale, angular body. He was a spark of light in the sun, and with a flick of his back hooves and a sinister laugh, he was gone, flung into the city.

In his wake, the car lay on its side, dislodged from the rest of the train and giving them a dark, stained passage, yawning several feet away from a gasping, bleeding Fluttershy. Her back was shredded on the tracks; the dull wood and smooth metal had ground her wing joints apart and open, and there was blood on the concrete. The air was filled with the greasy smell of oil, and their ears rang from the sudden disaster.

Octavia was the first to move, her limp no longer slowing her down, while Rainbow flew ahead, shouting at them to hurry. Applejack helped get Fluttershy onto Twilight’s back, and they ran. They moved through the dark gap, where the smell of old oil was almost overpowering, and Fluttershy coughed and struggled on Twilight’s back. Her body was light, and Twilight had to suppress a shudder at the sound of their fur sticking and unsticking. She thought she could see blood in her peripheral vision.

The sun was almost down, and they were fast losing their visibility on the bridge. With Fluttershy on her back, Twilight stumbled against the train tracks, and with each misstep, the pegasus moaned and wiggled uncomfortably. Her frail body was a bundle of sticks against Twilight’s skin, her heart pounding unhealthily and her hooves hanging limply, bruised and throbbing. The others raced ahead.

As it had two weeks ago, Twilight’s head ran with the same desperate thought: “I can’t afford to fail here.” Fluttershy bobbed on her back, and her entire body ached from running across the bridge, but her mind refused to stop repeating itself. “I can’t afford to fail here. Not here, not after Canterlot.” She watched her own shadow skitter along the dark gray concrete, a fugitive with its bleeding burden.

When they reached the opposite side, the stars were coming out, and Fluttershy’s movements had slowed. She would occasionally lean in to murmur something in Twilight’s ear, but Twilight could distinguish nothing. Running into the city, the weight of her friend against her, it felt like a million thoughts were flying through her mind at once. Watching Octavia, hoping a hospital was close, remembering Discord. Concern and fear mixed inside her, and she hardly reacted to what she saw on the other side.

Over a small ridge, they emerged onto a sidewalk. Cars skated through the evening, glowing eyes of headlights filling the night and illuminating clean, clear streets, and interspersed with occasional, less-modern carriages. Stoplights blinked in their sequences, and buildings stood with blank faces, reflective in the starlight like still waters. They towered over them, taller than anything they had ever seen, taller even than the turrets of Canterlot Palace, hemming them in like silent giants. Ponies walked by quickly, flashlights wobbling on necks and orbs of light balanced on horns.

For Twilight, however, the details were lost. The grim-faced mass was a sea of blank statuettes, the dark buildings a wall of foreign construction to keep the night contained. They were simply more elements of discomfort, adding up to one more increment of reality removed from everything she knew. An injured pegasus on her back, surrounded by serious-faced friends and reliant on someone, who, despite a week of contact, was a stranger, to find a hospital in the dark, faceless city. She shook her head at the sound of Applejack’s voice.

“Octavia! Quit standin’ ‘round an’ get us to a hospital!”

Octavia stood on the sidewalk, leaning wearily on her cello case, one hoof aloft. Without turning, she spoke impatiently. “I am hailing a taxi. That is how you travel in the city.”

As she said it, a dull yellow car rumbled up and stopped on the curb. Its headlights swung momentarily into their faces, and they looked away; the brilliant flashes seemed hostile and foreign, the eyes of a grumbling monster. For many of them, it was their first proper look at an automobile; even with Fluttershy’s condition hanging heavily over their heads, they had to pause. The chugging motor, the rattling tailpipes, the sheer weight of the metal and rubber, all behind the powerful lights.

Octavia did not hesitate. Climbing in, she instructed Twilight and Fluttershy to do the same, then turned to the others. “You saw what I did to summon the taxi. Get another and tell it to take you to the nearest hospital.” She closed the door without waiting for a response, and leaned over to address the driver. “The nearest hospital, and fast.”

Twilight watched the others disappear behind them, their faces confused and afraid. She could not empathize; for her, the only important ponies were Fluttershy and Octavia. Her world, foreign and huge, was suddenly shrunken to the tiny taxi, and she watched the buildings go by through the window, one eye always on Fluttershy. She shook and trembled on the seat, blood matting her fur and her wings sticking awkwardly, like broken branches.

As the taxi wove through the bright traffic rapidly, Twilight felt the last vestiges of panic slipping away from her. The soothing dark, the relaxing pegasus, the pulsing engine mingling with Octavia’s insistent commands—she wasn’t sure why she felt it, but in her mind, things were slowing down. “Everything’s going to be okay. Fluttershy’s hurt, but it’s not lethal. She can probably heal herself. The others will find us, we’ll stay the night at the hospital, and then we can start working.” She smiled a little, and her chest fibrillated. The relief flooded through her, and she almost sobbed with its intensity. “We made it.”

“Not long now. I recognize this part of the city,” Octavia said. They were stopped at an intersection, and Twilight looked over Fluttershy. She met her eyes sadly, and Twilight could only smile encouragingly and take hold of her hoof.

When they moved again, Twilight looked back out the window, hoping for a glimpse of the hospital, a beacon in the darkness. Of all the buildings, she reasoned, the hospital was most likely to have backup generators.

What she saw instead made her momentarily forget her friend and the deluge of unsolicited relief. A building, its sides encased in shimmering windows, lay on its side before them, its roof cut away and its insides hollowed out. Large struts filled the corners, and debris and loose tiles lay scattered all along its length, pressed into a crude floor. Underneath, the ground fell away, and as Twilight followed the building with her eyes, she saw where the walls sagged downwards in the middle, windows winking yellow and red with the lights of hundreds of cars. Desks and chairs were pushed to the sides, forming a buffer against the glass shell, while cars passed through in a thin line, their motors buzzing threateningly in the improvised passage.

The taxi entered with a gentle stutter, its tires humming quietly on the floor, the building’s former wall. Octavia looked out the window passively, and Twilight followed her eyes. “These ponies are ingenious,” she thought dimly. “Only a couple weeks, and they’ve adapted.” She looked back at Fluttershy. “But it also means this building had to fall over.”

The thought filled her with dread, and they stopped again, caught halfway through the building, in its nadir. Cars in front of them and behind them, sagging the building uncomfortably. She looked at Octavia. “How much longer?”

“The hospital should be around the corner,” she said quietly.

They began moving again, and Twilight looked at Fluttershy. “Just hang on a few more minutes, Fluttershy.”

“She freakin’ abandoned us,” Rainbow groused, sitting on the sidewalk while Applejack tried to hail a taxi.

“She had to get Fluttershy to the hospital,” Rarity said. “She was just looking out for her.”

“Yeah, Dashie! It’s nothing personal!” Pinkie said.

“Still. I don’t like it,” Rainbow said. She looked around cautiously. The city’s artificial light bothered her.

“So, is no one going to ask about what happened back there?” Rarity asked.

“Ah was, but Ah didn’t know my cue,” Applejack said.

“No no, it’s fine. We can talk about it now.” Rarity followed Rainbow’s eyes around the streets. “Rainbow?”

Rainbow studied a defunct sign, the painted face of a smiling pony indistinct and dark over dead bulbs. “He wasn’t even equine, I don’t think. I mean, he looked normal under the train, but when I reached for him, his eyes started glowing red. Like, bright red, like a cartoon villain. And when he opened his mouth… I feel kinda dumb saying it out loud, actually. It sounds crazy.”

“Just spit it our, RD,” Applejack said.

“I think he breathed fire. Blue fire.”

Pinkie laughed loudly, and everyone looked at her sourly.

“He did!” Rainbow insisted. A taxi pulled up, and they climbed in, directing it to the hospital, as per Octavia’s instructions. “His eyes went red, he laughed and breathed blue fire, then he shoved the train off and ran away.”

“Flew away, it looked like,” Applejack said.

“No, that can’t be right. He didn’t have any wings,” Rarity said.

“I could care less about his wings. I wanna know how he managed to throw that train car off himself like that,” Rainbow said.

“Magic, Ah s’pose,” Applejack said dully.

“Oh!” Pinkie cried, jumping up in her seat. “I know what happened! Discord made him!”

Applejack leaned in, and the driver adjusted the rear-view mirror slightly, her eyes lingering on them briefly. “Pinkie, you wanna keep yer voice down?”

“Sorry, Applejack,” she whispered. “It was Discord that made him.”

“Yeah, we got that,” Rainbow said. “Keep going.”

“He came from Manehattan yesterday, but there’s no way he’s got his home base, or his castle, or whatever it is here. I bet he was making this jump-pony to cause trouble for him.”

“To spread chaos while he does his own thing elsewhere,” Rarity said, nodding.

“Celestia thinks he’s building an army,” Rainbow said. “So I guess it makes sense. He’d want to keep his influence as widespread as possible while he consolidates power. To keep ponies from uniting.”

“I don’t think he needs an army,” Pinkie said.

They looked at her, and she smiled back, her ears drooping.

“He seemed pretty powerful yesterday,” she said quietly.

“Um, yes. Can we talk about that?” Rarity asked.

“Do we have to?”

“We just wanna make sure yer okay,” Applejack said.

“Yeah, that was freaky, what he did to you,” Rainbow said.

“How he… came out of you,” Rarity said.

“Please, girls,” Pinkie whispered. She looked at the driver, who looked back in the mirror. “I’m okay, really.”

“I’m not buying that, Pinks,” Rainbow said. Her voice was uncharacteristically gentle.

“Please, Dashie. I don’t wanna talk about it.”

“We do,” Applejack said.

Pinkie leaned back and giggled self-consciously. “But I’m fine. I’m perfectly fine. Is it really so big a deal?”

“You can’t pretend that didn’t mess you up, at least a little bit,” Rainbow said.

“Didn’t it hurt?” Rarity asked.

Pinkie shook her head. “Come on, girls. Fluttershy’s injured. We should be focusing on making her feel better, not worrying about something silly like this.”

“But this is important too,” Applejack said. “Ya shouldn’t hide from it.”

“But I’m fine. Totally, totally fine.”

Fluttershy was immediately placed on a gurney and wheeled into the hospital complex, and Twilight, much to her chagrin, was not allowed to go in after her until she was stabilized. The hospital, as she had suspected, was lit, and she thought she could hear the hum of generators behind the walls. Ponies occupied the lobby sparsely, and for long stretches of time, there was no activity.

Octavia and Twilight didn’t speak, and after several minutes, she asked Twilight to summon one of her bags. She dug through it for a moment before pulling out a small identification card. With a curt “thank you,” Octavia went to the counter and spoke to the receptionist. Even with her voice lowered, Twilight could hear every word in the still hospital air.

“I would like to check myself in as soon as I can. My name is Octavia Melody. I have been traveling for two days now, and I think that my leg is seriously injured.”

Twilight watched with growing indignation as she answered the receptionist’s questions and signed herself in. She remained at the counter, not looking at Twilight, and a nurse came with a wheelchair a few minutes later. Her head was bowed as she allowed herself to be helped into the chair and taken away.

“That nag,” Twilight breathed. “That cowardly, prideful… ugh.” She looked up at a familiar flash of colors near the door, and dropped her angry thoughts as her friends entered, looking frustrated.

“Don’t be like that, Rarity. She owes you big time,” Rainbow said.

“It was an honest mistake,” Rarity replied, looking around and seeing Twilight. “Oh, darling, there you are!”

They went to her, and Twilight felt her mood sour once more as they looked around, first confused and then worried. “Where’s Octavia?” Pinkie asked.

“She checked herself in,” Twilight said shortly.

“What? Fer what?” Applejack asked.

“Injured leg, she said.”

“That nag!” Rainbow cried, drawing gazes from around the room. “So she’s too good to ask us for help, but she checks into the frickin’ hospital?” She turned on Pinkie quickly. “Pinkie, your sister is nuts.”

“Now Rainbow,” Rarity said. “Perhaps she was simply afraid to discuss it with us. She is quite private.”

“So instead, she walks with us for two days on a broken leg,” Twilight said. “Real smart.”

“I’m not saying she was, dear; I’m just trying to look at it from her perspective.”

“Her perspective sucks,” Rainbow said. She did not try to lower her voice.

Octavia was helped into a bed, given an injection for the pain, and told to wait for the doctor. While she did, she stared at the far wall, thinking. She was disgusted with herself.

“They did nothing to deserve this. They wanted to help, and you pushed them away. And now this is your reward. An empty hospital room and a group of angry, hurt ponies. Well done, well done.” She heaved a sigh and looked out the window. She had hoped returning to Manehattan would help her, perhaps give her a sense of purpose on the bizarre quest, but the sight of the concrete labyrinth and watchful buildings—even the overwhelming Rose Tower—only reminded her of her career. Her former career, she reminded herself. Before she could completely anchor herself in her bad mood, the door opened, and a wizened unicorn entered, her sagging face the color of mustard.

“Miss Octavia, is it? Doctor Vena Cava.” She looked over her with a kind expression before continuing. “So, a fractured leg, is it?”

“I believe so. It has been causing me extreme pain for the last two days.”

“Dear, dear. What happened?”

“I fell.”

She regarded Octavia mildly and clicked her tongue, lifting the blankets and gently running a coat of magic over Octavia’s leg, pressing and rubbing along the bone. “We’ve got a lot of swelling here, ma’am, but I don’t feel any deformities. We could be looking at a hairline fracture, but, of course, we need to take some X-rays before we can know for sure.”

“I understand.”

“Does it hurt?”

“Yes, but not much. The nurse gave me a painkiller.”

“Good, good.” Vena Cava smiled at her. “Just give me a couple minutes, and we’ll get you those X-rays.”

Octavia nodded.

Fluttershy was suspended over her bed, drowsily staring at the far wall, her back and wings wrapped in a rigid patch of bandages. The pain had been incredible, so much that she had felt catatonic, unable to express herself except in nods and muted facial expressions. She was given painkillers, and as they slowly took effect, she slipped out of reality, then consciousness.

When her friends entered, she was asleep, and a nurse was there to explain her condition. Her wings were fractured, her muscles were pulled, and her skin was broken in several places, but she was expected to make a full recovery. Her wings, the nurse said with a grave voice, would be useless for several weeks. They took the news with very little worry; Twilight had pointed out, in their walk to the room, that once Fluttershy was awake again, she would probably just heal herself. The recovery, realistically, would take a few minutes. They didn’t say this to the nurse, and when she left, they all tried to get comfortable in Fluttershy’s room.

There were only two chairs, and not enough room on the floor for them all to sit at ease. Eventually, Pinkie decided to try to find Octavia’s room, and Twilight went with her, eager to escape the cramped quarters and confront the reticent cellist.

The hospital corridors were empty and identical, but Pinkie turned corners confidently, trotting deliberately past the few nurses and doctors they encountered, who did not seem bothered at their presence. When Pinkie pushed open a door without hesitation, Twilight didn’t question it; she was drained, physically and mentally.

When they entered, Octavia looked away, and Pinkie ran to her bedside. “Hey sis! Feeling better?”

“Please leave me. I do not want company right now,” Octavia said.

“Octavia, we need to talk,” Twilight said. She closed the door, and Octavia glanced at them.

“How did you find me without a nurse?”

“I dunno,” Pinkie said happily, grabbing a chair. “Now come on, Octy—Octavia. Talk to me.”

“There is nothing to say.”

“Why didn’t you let us help you if you were injured this whole time?” Twilight demanded.

Octavia’s hoof twisted under the sheets, and she frowned. For a minute, she said nothing, and they watched her struggle without a word. Finally, she sighed and looked away again. “I do not know.”

“You don’t know.” Twilight glared at her. “You spent all that time thinking about it, and you don’t know?”

“I… did not want to cause a delay.”

“That’s crazy!” Twilight barked. “You didn’t want to inconvenience us, so you kept forcing yourself to walk on an injury? Are you insane?”

“Didn’t it hurt?” Pinkie asked.

Octavia looked at her; she looked exhausted. “Yes, Pinkie. It hurt.”

“You’d rather hurt yourself than admit you need help,” Twilight said bitterly. She looked into Octavia’s eyes, then her tone softened. “Why would you do that?”

“I really do not know.”

“How? How can you not know?”

“I am sorry.”

“Ponies don’t always know why they do stuff, Twilight,” Pinkie said. “We can’t all be super smart like you.”

“You don’t have to be smart to know how to not injure yourself,” Twilight said bitterly.

“Did you come here just to insult me?” Octavia asked.

“We just want to know why you did it,” Pinkie said.

“I said that I do not know.”

“That’s not good enough,” Twilight said.

“It will have to be. I have no other explanation.”

“Was it pride?”

“I am not proud of myself.”

Twilight huffed angrily. “Well, yeah, not now. You’re in the stupid hospital.”

“What do you want me to say, Twilight Sparkle? Do you want an apology?”

“Well… yes, but I don’t want you to apologize just because I tell you to. In a true friendship, friends don’t have to tell each other when to do things like that.”

“A true friendship?”

“No, I don’t mean it like that,” Twilight said anxiously. “I mean… when ponies know each other well enough, they learn how to do these things.” She thought for a moment. “Maybe she’s like me. I used to have problems with friendship too.” Her anger dropped away, and she smiled warmly at Octavia. “It’s okay, Octavia. You’ll get it in time.”

“Do you really think that I do not know how to behave with other ponies? That relating to them is something that I need to learn? Twilight, I have been a professional musician for more than ten years. I know how to be friends with somepony.”

Twilight scoffed, her momentary optimism burst. “I’m just offering to help you be better friends with us, Octavia. I don’t care if you’re a farmer, or a celebrity, or a surgeon, or a big, fancy musician. You can always learn more about friendship.”

“We’re just trying to be nice, sis. You don’t have to reject us like that,” Pinkie said.

“You’re just arrogant. You’re too full of yourself to see when other ponies are worried about you, so you wind up pushing everyone away. It’s all about you, Octavia. I should have guessed that when I heard how long you’d been famous.”

“Stop it,” Octavia snapped. “Why would you do this? You come into my room while I am recovering, and, when I am very clearly ashamed, and unhappy, you attack me. Fine. I made a mistake.” She gestured emptily with her front hooves. “I do not need you to condescend to me, Twilight.”

“I’m not condescending. I’m trying to help you,” Twilight said.

“No, you are trying to understand me.”

“I have to understand you to help you,” she growled. She could feel her patience wearing away.

“So you accuse me of insanity, insult me, and treat me like a foal who does not know how to socialize.” She looked Twilight directly in the eyes, and Twilight looked away.

“We’re just concerned, sis,” Pinkie said.

“I do not want your concern, or your help. I acted foolishly. I know that now. You have my apologies for upsetting you, but I want you to stop trying to help me. Let me make my own mistakes, and let me learn from them. Alone.”

Twilight digested the apology. It seemed genuine, but she felt bitter inside. Cheated. “You really like being alone, huh?”

“Yes.”