She picked up her pen, and wrote.

Sweetie Belle,

If you’re reading this, then you have just recovered from the effects of the phoenix amulet. I am told that it may interact strangely with the magic of this world, and that you may not remember much of what has happened. I have left you this letter, should you require guidance.

You are in the city of Vision, built beneath the water in the western sea. It is a terrible place, and you are in danger so long as you remain here.

There is a Twilight shard on the top floor of the Sparkle Enchantments building. You must find it, and leave this world as fast as you can. Do not stop for anything or anypony. Do not linger. Do not drink anything an alchemist gives you. If you see any treasures or magic, do not attempt to take them with you.

There is nothing for you here.

Everything in the city turns to poison in the end.

Goodbye, and good luck.

-Sweetie Belle

The light around Sweetie’s horn flickered as the wrote. She couldn’t hold the pen still. It trembled in her grip, and the characters it made on the paper were crude and jagged, like knives with a serrated edge. Finally, though, the letter was done. She sealed it in a glass tube and carefully stoppered the end.

With both hooves, she picked up the damaged tin cup on the left side of her desk. She uncorked the bottle of hydrofluoric acid, and filled the cup to the brim. Her hooves shook when she picked it up and she spilled acid everywhere. But she still managed to drink it.

She started to choke at once: half from her gag reflex and half from the burns in her mouth. She gripped her own throat with both hooves and forced herself to keep it down. She rocked back and forth in her chair and waited for the seizures to begin: jaw clamped shut, mouth drawn into a thin line, tears of pain running down her face.

When the seizures finally came, her legs thrashed so abruptly she shot out of her chair and kicked over the table. Down to the floor she went, limbs flailing, heart pounding, blood foaming in the corners of her mouth. Finally, she collapsed into a twitching ball on the floor. Her lungs struggled for breath, and her heart struggled to beat.

Then her struggle ended. Her glassy eyes stared at the ceiling, and a line of frothy foam ran from the corner of her mouth.

She lay unmoving. Her body cooled. The rodents living in the walls emerged, whiskers twitching as they sniffed at the air. One lapped up the blood pooling around her, and when it died, the others left her be.

Hours later, something changed. Heat welled up inside her, and the heart that no longer beat was consumed by literal fire. Smoke curled from her nose as the hairs and minor tissues within her face burst into flames. Within minutes, the intensity of the fire was so great that her flesh could not contain it. Her blood boiled. Her skin wrinkled like paper, and moments later blue and orange flames leapt from every part of her body. The fire consumed her, until nothing was left but a cloud of ashes.

Within that cloud of ashes condensed something new. Somepony new took form, build spec by spec out of the dust. She was a little eight-year old unicorn filly, with a white coat, pink and purple hair, and tail that was just a little bit curled.

Sweetie blinked. Then she blinked again. “What the heck was that!?”

Sweetie didn’t remember exactly how she came to be an eight year old filly standing in a ruined apartment. Last she remembered, she’d been about to kiss Blackjack. They had been at the abandoned station, and she’d been having the most depressing discussion so far with a Fragment. Speaking of which, she glanced at her flank. Twilight's broken cutie mark and the note were still there. "Well, at least I still have my Cutie Mark."

But the instincts she’d honed across a dozen worlds told her she was not in a good place. The apartment consisted of a single tiny room with no windows, and every wall was made from bare stone. It was like being trapped inside a casket. What fittings there were—some cabinets, a sink, a stove, and a bed—were all in states of severe disrepair. Cabinet doors hung at odd angles. The sink was covered in rust, and the floor was covered in water. An overturned table lay at an angle in the pool.

Next to the table was an empty metal bottle, surrounded by a couple of dead rats. Apparently, the owner of the room had at least attempted some pest control before abandoning it with her inside.

“Hello?” she called. The word emerged as a high-pitched squeak, and her voice cracked at the end.

Nopony answered. Sweetie laughed. “Did I really sound that way when I was a filly?” She sighed. It had been that long, hadn't it?

As the silence grew long, she looked down at herself. “Well. It's been a while since I've been a filly, is this temporary? I don't remember jumping worlds at all.”

Sweetie frowned a little, looking down at herself. Her body underneath the glamour was still the usual crystal and rock, but somehow the exterior wasn't an illusion. She had really become younger. Did rock get younger?

She considered her exit, but the apartment’s only door was made of steel, and it had a half-dozen locks on the inside. Little pools of water covered the floor, and papers from the overturned table ran through the mix. “Bad neighborhood, huh?” Sweetie again laughed at her own joke.

Halfway across the room, there sat a glass tube, sealed with a bright blue stopper. It had a label, “READ ME,” and inside was a rolled up sheet of paper. Sweetie tried to levitate it towards her, but a dull pain behind her eyes stopped her, and her horn glowed only faintly.

“Ugh. Whatever happened really messed me up. What am I, like, nine or ten now? I should be able to do this.” Sighing, she took the tube with her hooves, uncorked it, and read carefully through the message.

“Hhm.” She read through it again. “That’s not my writing. That, yeah. I don’t make my As look like Qs. Besides, if I was going to live somewhere, I think I could do better than this.” She let out a loud snort. “Even that abandoned building where Blackjack’s and the others camped out was nicer than this dump. Hay, a megaspell blast would improve this place. I could just live in the Hedge if it came to that.”

After a moment, she tried to summon her diary, but her horn let off sparks and nothing else. Sweetie had gotten used to being able to solve most problems with a flash of her magic forehead, and the realization that she was now half an earth pony made her frown. Whatever had turned her into a filly had messed up her inner magical paths. It would take some time for her body to get used to the restructuring.

So, she folded the letter away, then took a moment to go through the cabinets for supplies. She found food, most of it spoiled, but munched on a few ration bars to ease the gnawing in her gut. She found an extensive collection of medication—potions with fanciful names like Picket Fence or a bottle of pills with a bright pink logo that read Rest Easy. But none of it seemed worth taking. There were no weapons, only minimal clothing not fit for a filly; nothing she could really use.

The bed was messy, and the sheets were stained with oil and sweat. She sensed they hadn’t been cleaned in some time.

There was a picture frame on the nightstand. It showed two ponies wearing wedding rings. Sweetie wore her ring on her horn, and the other mare wore hers on a chain around her neck. They were standing side by side, each in a white dress, smiling like all was right in the world.

The other mare was an orange pegasus with a close-cut sea-green mane. She was cute.

Sweetie stared at the picture for a long time, her mind working over the scenario. Was this the local Sweetie Belle? It had to be, right? The Sweetie in the picture seemed too familiar and comfortable; there was clearly no urgency in her to move on, or she wouldn't have gotten married. Except, that letter.

She shook her head, looking down at the picture of the happy couple. There was no way she'd submit someone else to abandonment. She wouldn't be able to stay. She wouldn't do that.

This pegasus, she was honestly pretty, and the way she looked at the Sweetie Belle in the picture captured the palpable love they held for one another.

Sweetie bit her lip. That was what had been so appealing about Blackjack and why, honestly, she had been attracted to the mare: there was a sense of freedom about sexuality; no commitment, just fun.

True romance? It was something that she would never have. She'd never be able to fall in love and settle down. She'd never have a family of her own unless her travels ended, but before that? Could she really do that to herself? Could she do it to somepony else? Marry them with the knowledge that at any given moment she would fade away?

Still, it was her only clue, so she slipped it out of its frame as carefully as she could. She rummaged through the cabinets until she found an old saddle bag. The cloth was cheap and fraying, but it held around her barrel, and gave her something to carry the picture and letter in.

“Right!” She lifted a hoof to the air. “Let’s…”

Her burst of enthusiasm petered out, and whatever she was about to say went unspoken. After a moment’s hesitation, she went to the door and began undoing the locks. She had to hop up high to get them in her teeth, and the thick deadbolts made a loud clunk when they turned.

Finally, she pushed the door open, and peered into the outside world. The damp smell of brine assaulted her nose at once. She was staring into a stone hallway with many apartment doors just like hers, and the ceiling dripped. Pools of seawater formed on the floor, under doors, in the cracks and crevices. Small rivers trickled across the stone where it rested at an angle. Every other door was steel, as solid as her own, and shut tight.

For lack of anything else to do, she followed the hallway. It merged into a larger corridor, which in turn merged into a small enclosed roadway. Everything around her was dilapidated, except for that which had been actively destroyed. To her left, a vendors’ fruit stall was overturned, the fruit long since reduced to a pile of rotted mush. To her right, what used to be a series of storefronts gutted by fire and abandoned.

Then the hallway turned left, and she came to a window. Rippling white light illuminated her face.

For her, at that moment, it was like standing in a forest of white stone. Skyscrapers rose up like redwoods, so tall she could not see their peaks. Railways were their branches. Walkways were their twigs. The lights from thousands of windows shone like fireflies.

A fish swam past the glass.

Despite all Sweetie had seen across a hundred worlds, she couldn’t help but stare. The city of Vision was the largest she’d seen yet—or at least the largest she had been able to witness from a vantage point that allowed such a view—it was a world of gold and white stone so large that Canterlot could live in its shadow. And there was more! Every structure was decorated with statues, images of ponies, and brilliantly lit signs and banners. Neon signs advertised entertainment, tools, good food, and gambling.

And it was all beneath the water. She could barely see the waves high above. And there! She saw one building that pierced the sky—the only building in all of Vision that passed beyond the surface of the water. It bore a single sign in purple neon: Sparkle Enchantments.

“Hah. Boom!” Sweetie said.

“Boom yourself!” said a voice behind her.

Whirling around, Sweetie found herself facing a unicorn stallion. At first, she thought he was a ghoul, warped and twisted by the toxic effects of the megaspells. But he wasn’t quite like the creatures from Blackjack’s world. His flesh wasn’t so much shrunken as misshapen. Deformed. Bulging.

His lips didn’t quite meet when he shut his mouth, too thin for his jaw. Cancerous lumps pushed out through his coat. A line of black dool ran from the corners of his mouth. And a stunning collection of tattoos covered his legs and face: test-tubes, gears, knives, flames, all painted onto his coat in exquisite detail.

And he wore a suit. A gentlestallion's suit. Complete with a bow-tie and spats for his horseshoes.

“Oh, didn’t mean to startle you there.” He laughed, advancing on her. “You know, this isn’t a very safe part of town. Little fillies really shouldn’t be out here on their own.”

“Uh.” Sweetie coughed, and did her best to make her voice sound even more childish. “Oh yes. Mister. I was just about to run back to my parents. Thank you for warning me!”

“No trouble. No trouble.” He gestured at her with his muzzle. “What you got there in the bag?”

“Oh, uh… just my homework. From school.” She struggled for a moment to remember what her last assignment had been. “Ms. Cheerilee gave us a book report on the history of unicorns. You know. Princess Platinum, Starswirl the Bearded, Clover the Clever. Famous, famous unicorns. Engaging topic, really. Did you know that princesses used to have some wizards carve tiny runes into their horns to resonate with three to four alliteration spells?”

“That’s good! Learned little filly you are.” He learned in close. “Why don’t you let me see that and then we’ll get you back to your parents?”

“Yeah, I think I’ll just head back now. I still have to work on the diagrams. But thanks, Mister! I’ll—” As Sweetie turned to go, she found her path abruptly blocked by his hoof.

“Just give me the bag, filly.” He growled. “I’m sure your homework ain’t worth your life.”

She sighed. Rolled her eyes. “Right,” she said, the saccharine-sweet childish inflections vanishing from her tone. “You wanna do this? Let’s do this.”

Sweetie glared at the thug before her, and charged a laser blast into her horn. She stepped back and braced her legs for two quick shots, aiming one for his face and another for his gut.

A faint whine escaped her, and a spray of harmless sparks emerged from her horn. “Ugh! Being a filly again sucks!”

“Yeah, right wizard you are!” The stallion laughed, then his own horn glowed, and he grabbed her saddlebag. “Now give it over you little—”

Sweetie leapt into the air, and putting all of her combat training to good use, delivered a perfect flying-kick straight into his face.

“Aaagh!” He staggered backwards, clutching his face with a hoof. “You miserable tiny bitch!”

“Sorry, gotta run. Don’t want my homework to be late! And I don't think they'll take the 'mutant ate it' excuse.” Sweetie laughed and ran off, her hooves clattering on the stone as she made her getaway down the hall. She broke into a sprint, weaving around piles of debris as she put some distance between her and her attacker.

Then a soft blue glow surrounded her, and she was lifted entirely off her hooves. Her legs flailed uselessly in the air as she tried to run, but she found herself moving slowly backwards.

“Oh.” Sweetie coughed as she found herself moving back towards the creature. “Look, I can see we got off on the wrong hoof. How about I just give you the bag?”

She stallion wandered over to one of the piles of debris by the roadside. From it, he pulled out a length of steel pipe. Then he walked up to Sweetie Belle.

“Woah, okay. I get it! That mutant comment was a bit much. I see now it's less a mutation and more just general ugly, easy to get confused, right? Did I ever tell you that I talk a lot when I'm nervous? Drives my sister crazy, I tell you. Let’s just—”

He swung for the fences, and brought the steel pipe in across her head. The impact was so sharp it sounded like a firecracker. Sweetie went flying, and hit the stone wall hard.

The crystal inside her rang with the impact. If she’d been a normal filly, the blow would have killed her instantly. It took her half a second to realize that.

She didn’t have half a second. The stallion crossed the distance, and swung again.

“You think you can hit me you little brat!?” The iron bar came down on her ribs. It knocked the wind from her. Crystal sang with the impact. She tried to recall her training, maybe weave her way out, but it was too vicious, too fast. She was disoriented and magic-less.

“Think I’m somepony to push around!?” It came down on her neck. “Well you’re wrong!” Her front legs. “You’re all wrong!” Her rear legs. “Wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong!”

He swung it under and up. It caught her in the ribs and lifted her clear off the ground, slamming her again into the wall. Crystal sang. Then it cracked. Sweetie found she suddenly had trouble breathing.

The stallion beat her until he was sure she’d stopped moving. Then he took her saddlebag, found nothing but the picture inside, threw the bag at her, and kicked her in the ribs before he stormed off.

When she was sure he was gone, Sweetie dared to cough, spitting tiny rubies onto the floor. A flash of pain shot through her when she did. The crystal inside her didn’t feel right. Chips of it were loose, moving beneath her flesh independent of the rest.

“Ah. Aaaah. Ugh! Being a filly again really, really, sucks!” She laughed as she rose, and tears formed in the corners of her eyes. “Oh, that hurts. Oh that hurts a lot. Oh.” Something pinched inside her, and she had to bite down hard on her lip not to scream. “That might be some serious damage. I need a nurse. Or a Pie sister.”

With little baby steps, trying to keep telling herself that things were okay, she made it over to the picture on the floor. She picked it up in her teeth, and struggled to push it into the ruined saddlebags. Without the strength to throw the strap over her head and shoulder, she slid her hood through it, and dragged it behind her as she moved.

“Gotta find someplace.” She mumbled through her clamped jaw. “Just need to lie down for a bit. Stupid filly body. I'd have owned his sorry ass if I was normal.”

The window was to her left. She could see beautiful skyscrapers, statues twenty stories tall, whizzing high-speed trains and more. A giant submarine slowly navigated between the towers, and a huge sign on its hull read: “Happy Times Pleasure Cruise!” Through the glass, she could barely see ponies partying.

To her right was the rest of the building. Gutted storefronts. Pools of stagnant water. She passed the corpse of a mare no one had bothered to cart away, bloated by rot. She passed the remains of a school, the glass fronts broken and stained with blood.

She walked for what seemed a very long time. Her hooves splashed in the stagnant water as she walked, and the sound echoed off the hard walls. She passed a window with a crack in it, through which high-pressure water shot in the hallway. Every time something pinched in her ribs, she let out a faint animal cry.

Eventually, she saw another living pony. There was a cardboard box hidden in an alcove beside the main road, and a mare was sleeping in it—a filthy, off-brown earth pony with a docked ear and a noticeable overbite

She lifted her head when Sweetie got close, and so Sweetie asked: “Excuse me. I’m hurt.” She drew a shallow breath. “I’m actually hurt very badly. Can I sleep here?”

The mare scooted over to make room in the box. Sweetie sat down beside her, curled up into a little ball, and waited for unconsciousness to take her.

When Sweetie woke up, she wasn’t sure how much time had passed. The room around her wasn’t any brighter or any dimmer than it had been. Perhaps she’d only shut her eyes for a second, or perhaps it had been hours.

But she was hungry. Ravenous. Her stomach was a pit that felt like it would devour her own flesh from within if it was not filled.

And when she stretched, her limbs felt too long. Her eyes cracked open, and she saw long spindly forelegs ahead of her, obsidian little thorns poking out of her legs, slightly visible under the glamour of her coat. She examined herself, and found that her ribs no longer ached when she moved.

“Oh, hey!” Her voice was deeper, no longer that of a small child, but it cracked a bit when she spoke. She cleared her throat before trying again. “I get to be a teenager?”

“Yeah,” said the mare beside her. It was only then that Sweetie remembered the mare existed. Turning, she found the filthy creature staring at her with wide and uncertain eyes. “You kept growing in your sleep. I poked you, but you wouldn’t wake up.”

Sweetie didn’t know what to say to that. A long silence hung between them. Finally, the mare asked: “Are you a changeling?”

“Um, sort of. I guess technically you could say...” Sweetie coughed. “Yes.”

“Shapeshift in your sleep?”

“Not normally. It usually involves a lot more circumstances.” She clutched her gut with a hoof, and a loud growl emerged from inside her. “I’m sorry, but I’m starving. Do you know where I can get food around here?”

“Well.” The mare in the box considered that. “Alright. I guess I don’t have much else to live for. Can you turn into my husband? He died a while ago. I really miss him.”

Sweetie stared. Slowly, what the mare meant started making sense and her eyes widened. “Oh! Uh, hah! No. No.” Sweetie waved quickly. “I’m not um, I’m not that kind of changeling. I need regular food. Like grass. Or bacon! I don’t know.” Burned by the weight of the box-mare’s stare, she found herself rambling. “Bread? Anything like that?”

It was only when she recalled that they were sharing a cardboard box that she realized hoping for bread might be optimistic.

“There are dumpsters behind the restaurants up at Ceto station.” The box mare pointed up the hall. “First left, then second right, then keep going until you pass the statues of alicorns.”

“Right. Thanks.” Sweetie pulled herself up out of the box, then took the picture in her teeth. She stared down at the mare in the box. Whoever she was, her teeth were black for lack of care, and her ribs were showing. She was starving, Sweetie estimated, and probably sick.

“...well,” Sweetie finally said, looking down, unable to meet the mare's eyes much longer, and knowing that she wouldn't be hungry for long herself. What could she say, really? it was awkward and left her feeling uncomfortable. There was nothing she could really do right now, so she went for as neutral as possible. “Thanks. Good luck.” Then she left.

Once she was out of sight, she hid in an alley, making sure she was alone before summoning her diary. Except it didn't appear.

Frowning, Sweetie levitated a couple of things. Then she sent different, minor elemental blasts around her. She teleported from the alley across the street and back. Then she tried again, but it didn't work.

Eyes wide, Sweetie searched her memory, her spells, every link she had to the Diary until finally, she felt the thread. It was there, just out of sync, and she couldn't recall it for some reason. This had never happened before.

Sweetie started hyperventilating. What was she supposed to do without the Diary? Twilight's fragments were there. If she touched another fragment without it, she might end up absorbing it. She needed to get that fixed, but she didn't know how.

"Calm down, calm down," she muttered to herself. The link was still there. She just needed to meditate. Or something. Find inner peace. Recast the spell. Yeah! That would work.

A loud, rumbling sound from her stomach stopped her train of thought.

She needed food. And then she'd panic. Or find out what had happened. If she did, she might be able to figure out how to fix it. Hopefully without a city-wide matrix. Taking a deep breath, she set out to find the place she had been told about.

Following the mare’s directions, Sweetie found that the city around her gradually improved. It still looked like a slum, but it no longer looked like a warzone. Storefronts had bars in the windows, but the stores were open and doing business. She passed ponies going about their days. A stallion in a black uniform kept order, and seemed to be some kind of law enforcement. He warned her not to make trouble.

Finally, she passed two statues of Princess Twilight Sparkle, their wings spread and hooves held high like she was holding the ceiling up with her own strength. Beyond them was a large space that served as a train station and a market. Rails ran along the left side of the room, and two stories of storefronts and businesses ran along the right. Perhaps a hundred ponies milled about, waiting for trains or just going about their day.

Most of them carried weapons, she noticed. Most of them were covered in tattoos like the monster down below had been. But they were ponies, not mutants. And she could smell food in the air.

Picking a restaurant at random, Sweetie strode inside. She found herself in a rustic sort of place, with booths on one wall and a long counter on the other, everything made of polished chrome. There were only a few other ponies there, and so she sat at the counter directly, signaling the server behind it.

“Hello there!” He greeted her. “I’m Golden Palm. What can I—”

“Four hayburgers, two milkshakes, a daisy sandwich, and keep the hayfries coming.”

He paused. Sweetie cleared her throat. “And I’ll tip you extra if you hurry! Please.”

For the next half hour, Golden Palm and the restaurant's other patrons stared as Sweetie devoured her food like an anaconda devouring an entire sheep. The phoenix amulet smouldered inside her, and as she recovered some of her energy, the feelings of pain and weakness left her limbs. She was healthier, and maybe slightly taller.

She levitated a milkshake in front of her, and heaved a sigh of relief as the soothing flavor cleared the last of her pain and headache. “Thank Celestia.”

Somepony in the back gasped. Another patron dropped their glass in shock. In a moment, the room went quiet, and Sweetie realized everypony was staring at her again. This time, their expressions were less friendly.

“I’m sure you misspoke,” Golden Palm prompted her after a moment. “Temporary milkshake-induced dementia. You meant to say, ‘Thank Twilight.’ Didn’t you?”

“Oh!” Sweetie grabbed onto the life-preserver he’d thrown. “Yes! Absolutely. Thank Twilight. Sorry—I’m really out of it. I needed the sugar here just to wake up.”

After a few moments of awkward silence, everypony went back to their food. Golden Palm leaned across the counter and caught Sweetie Belle’s eye. “Um, so about that tip? Like, not to press…”

Sweetie had no idea how she was going to pay at all, but that did not seem the right thing to say. Insead, she stalled for time with another bite of her fourth hayburger, then leaned across the counter and lowered her voice. “Sure. But uh, answer a quick question for me?”

Golden Palm considered that, then shrugged. He was only a teenager, not much older than Sweetie herself appeared to be. He was a dirty tan, with an unflattering square muzzle, and there was something wrong with his wings. They weren’t mutated like the other stallion, but they weren't right either. The muscles were too thin, and the feathers were sickly.

She held up the photo. “Do you know these mares?”

He squinted at the photo, then his eyes widened along with a smile. “Yeah! That’s Swiftwing and uh, her, wife. Whose name I can’t remember. Swiftwing worked a few shifts here like a year ago.” He glanced at Sweetie Belle. “Are you a relative?”

“Yeah. I’m, uh. I’m a relative. Of the wife. Her name’s Sweetie Belle.” She lowered the picture, fidgeting in place. “So um, if I wanted to find Swiftwing. You know where I could do it?”

“What? Uh. No. Sorry.” Golden Palm gave a forceful shrug. “They haven’t been around here in a few months.”

Sweetie slumped. So much for that lead. She then glanced up, milking the "mare in despair" approach. Tinge of desperation, yes, but also some reluctance. “Maybe anypony who knew them? Neighbors? Friends?” She cleared her throat. “I’m their daughter. And they didn’t come back to the apartment last week. I’m really getting worried.”

"Well, I, uh." Golden Palm paused, blinking slowly then glancing at Sweetie with narrowed eyes. "Heey, you don't look young enough to be their daughter. You look my age!"

Sweetie's mind went blank for a second. Then, "Oh. Well, we, uh, don't like to talk about it, you understand. It-I wasn't planned exactly and—"

“Oh! Oh, jeeze. I’m sorry!” Golden Palm put a hoof on the counter. “Well. I don’t know anything, but Swiftwing used to roll with the abstention crowd. There’s this mare named Apple Bloom. You know her?”

“Yeah.” Sweetie sighed. “I know her. Can you give me directions?”

As Golden Palm rummaged around for a sheet of paper and a pen, Sweetie eyed the other patrons. One earth pony had just pulled out his coinpurse to pay, placing a hoofful of coins on the counter. When he slipped the purse back into his bag, Sweetie levitated it, whisking it out in the half a second before the saddlebag flap closed.

She silently promised herself to make up for it somehow as she tucked it into her own bag just in time for Golden Palm to turn back. “Here you go. Hop on the train going west, it’s the fifth stop.”

“Thanks!” She pulled out what felt like a respectable pile of coins, laying them on the countertop. From Golden Palm’s pleasantly surprised expression, she suspected she’d overpaid. “One last question. How do I get to the Sparkle Enchantments building?”

“Oh, you’re right next door. Get on the train, first stop, you’re there.”

“Thanks.” She rose from where she stood. She smiled at him. “Good luck. Those burgers were great.”

Stepping out into the station, she used the last of the stallion’s stolen money to buy a train ticket going west. She waited on the platform with the others, and boarded when the train arrived. It smoothly sailed away on elevated tracks, navigating out into the water and weaving between the tall buildings.

A few minutes later, it came to a stop. “Sparkle Enchantments!” the conductor called. “All ponies off for Sparkle Enchantments!”

Sweetie bit her lip, but she didn’t move. The train doors shut, and it whisked her onward.

“Poison Joke is POISON!” proclaimed a poster to the left of Apple Bloom’s door, angry red letters slashed across the paper. The image depicted a pony’s corpse in repose, clutching a blue flower to its chest.

“She was somepony’s filly!” shouted the poster to the right. It’s image was considerably more graphic—a filly in a blue dress, vomiting blood into a bucket.

“Sanity not ALCHEMY!” read the one on the door. “JUST SAY NO!”

Sweetie Belle knocked. After a few moments, a metal slit in the middle of the cargo door slid open. A pair of orange eyes peered out at her. From the other side, she could hear Apple Bloom’s voice. “And who in the heck are you?”

“I’m…” Sweetie hesitated. “I’m looking for a mare named Swiftwing.”

“Are you now.” Apple Bloom didn’t sound convinced. “Well, she ain’t here.”

“I know, but I need to find her. I’m, ah.” Sweetie cleared her throat. “I’m a relative.”

“The heck you are.”

“No, I-I am. It’s...” Sweetie Belle cleared her throat. “Apple Bloom? I need you to listen, okay? It’s really complicated, and I know I’m not your Sweetie Belle. But I’m Sweetie Belle. It’s me! And I need help.”

Sweetie Belle cleared her throat and waved a hoof with half-felt enthusiasm. “Cutie Mark Crusaders forever!” The sound made her teenage voice crack. “Remember? I know you probably don’t believe me, but please. Give me a chance to explain?”

The orange eyes on the other side of the door narrowed. Then Apple Bloom sighed. “Cutie Mark Crusaders forever.” Her voice was suddenly weak. She sounded beaten.

She shut the eye slit, and a moment later, the door opened. “Come on in then.”

Past the door, Sweetie found herself inside a large, metal-walled storage container. Holes had been cut in the side to two of the adjacent containers, and doors roughly fitted to the frames. The space around her was some manner of gathering area, with a podium at the front and plenty of room for ponies to stand.

Apple Bloom waited for Sweetie to enter, then shut the door behind her. She didn’t look well. In this universe, she was past thirty, with tired eyes and lines on her face. She walked with a shuffling step, and her cutie mark—three stars—didn’t bear any of the imagery of the CMC.

She walked to the middle of the room, pulled a chair around, and sat. Then she gestured for Sweetie to do the same.

“A little over a year ago,” Apple Bloom said, “this mare named Swiftwing shows up at one of my meetings. She says her wife is addicted and needs help, and asks me if there’s something I can do. I say not much, but the poor thing is scared out of her mind, so I go with her. And what do I find where she leads me?”

Apple Bloom gestures. “I find you." She paused, then repeated in a slightly lower tone, "I find you.”

Sweetie sat there in silence, her face pulled down into a tight frown. She didn’t speak, and the silence grew pronounced.

Finally, Apple Bloom snorted. “I watched you die, Sweetie. I watched Rarity choke the life out of you with her own horn. A telekinetic noose around your neck, legs kicking and flailing. Until you didn’t. Until you didn’t kick no more. You hung there. Didn’t move ever again. But then here you are! Or, there you were. Curled up in Swiftwing’s bed with the sweats. You told me you were from another world, somehow. That you were a Sweetie, but you weren’t my Sweetie.”

“That’s right.” Sweetie nodded quickly. “That’s right. I’m not your Sweetie. I just woke up in this world. And I don’t remember Swiftwing at all, but there was this picture.” She held the picture up. “Is this her? Is this my…” She hesitated. “Is this my wife?”

Apple Bloom inspected the picture: “That’s Swiftwing, yeah. One of you Sweetie Belles married her.”

Sweetie’s jaw worked silently. “Rarity killed me? The me from this world?”

“Yeah.”

“Well,” Sweetie didn’t know what to say. She stammered for a few moments. There had been worlds after all where she had seen sides of her sister she never wanted to see again. A mental image of Octavia bleeding to death made its way to her mind and she grimaced, changing the topic back to her original thread. “Swiftwing wasn’t in the apartment. I got—I get. I get the feeling nopony has been around for awhile. Do you know if she’s okay? Or where I can find her?”

Apple Bloom's expression didn't change. “Why do you care? You said you don’t remember her, right? You’re just another alternate copy. You never married her.”

“Maybe. I don’t know. It’s complicated, alright?” Sweetie held a hoof to her chest. “How would you react if you woke up and found a picture of you marrying somepony you’d never met?”

Apple Bloom didn’t answer, and so Sweetie prompted her again: “I don't know if I did something to directly antagonize you, Bloom, but I promise I'm not messing around. I need to make sure she’s okay.” Sweetie looked at the picture. "This mare meant something to me. Just look at the picture."

“Well she ain’t okay. I don’t know where she is, but she ain’t okay. And she wasn’t okay a year ago. That’s cause of you.” Apple Bloom gestured around them, an expansive motion of a hoof taking in the entire room and the city beyond. “Do you know what you’re getting into? Here? This world? You know what this place is like?”

Sweetie was quiet. "Look, I'm out of my depth, Apple Bloom. I've never had to pick up after myself like this. I've never screwed up somepony else's life through, whatever it is I did." She carefully slid out the note she had written. "When I woke up, looking younger than before, I found this. I think, I'm fairly certain I wrote it when… anyway." She levitated it forward so it was within her friend's grasp. "You decide."

Apple Bloom took the letter with a hoof, her eyes scanning down the page. A grim chuckle escaped her when she finished, and she passed the letter back: “It’s good advice. You should take it.”

"Yeah well, when I saw those medicines, I just, I didn't feel like throwing up but, I was uneasy?" She shook her head. "It doesn't matter. I'll follow that advice, but I need to know, Bloom. When I look at this picture it's just hope. And laughter. They're happy. I'm happy. What the hay happened? Where is she? How did I do this? Why did I hurt somepony I so clearly loved?"

Apple Bloom sat back in her chair and let out a long breath. “You like yourself, Sweetie?” she asked. “Are you a good mare?”

"I think so? I do try to do good where I go." Sweetie answered, sitting down herself, "I mean, I don't have much control over where I end up at, but I don't hate anything about myself, at least as far as I know."

“Oh, very confident answer there. You’re a real self-actualized mare.” Apple Bloom snorted. “Of course you hate yourself. Everypony hates themselves. Sometimes for good reasons, sometimes for bad reasons, sometimes just because you stubbed your hoof and you’re such a useless stupid klutz.”

She learned forward in her chair, forehooves pressed to the wood. “But not here! Not in the glorious city of Vision. Here, alchemy triumphs over flesh. There’s these potions, see? They’re called mantles. And when you drink one, it changes who you are. You get an extra cutie mark somewhere on your body, and the talents and disposition to go with it. If you’re a coward, we can fix that. Make you brave!” She picked up her tone and set her teeth in a parody of a gung-ho grimace.

“Or we can make you smart if you’re an idiot. Make you hot if you were ugly. Make you kind if you were cruel. It’s a golden age.” She sighed. “There were things about yourself you wanted to change. You know that?”

Sweetie gulped, suddenly not feeling so sure of herself. A world where drinking a potion could change whatever you felt was wrong with you? She bit her lower lip. Where she could… just not ever lose an argument again and no crazy Twilight fragment would torture her, or nihilistic Twilight fragment would argue her out in order to kill herself?

"I—" A world where she could abandon her desperate need to go back home? Maybe settle down? Find somepony? Maybe settle down because she had found somepony? Her lips felt dry and she could almost—almost—feel herself shaking a little. "I did, didn't I?"

“You did! A lot of ponies did. That’s how it starts. See, the thing about mantles is, you get used to them. When you start, a dose the size of a thimble will do you for a month. Then one dose a week. Then a day. Then you’re pouring them into your cereal in the morning. And your friends try to tell you to stop, but do you want to go back to being that mare? You had true love. You want to go back to wandering the cosmos as a friendless loner?”

A smile touched Apple Bloom’s face as she added: “Or whatever. So you don’t listen. Nopony ever listens. They just keep upping the dose, until it gets so high the side effects kick in. Sweats. Chills. Mutations. Erratic behavior. Explosive rage. Blindness. Lumps forming under your skin. Hair falls out! Full on bug-twisted insanity!” Her voice rose to a shout. Then, just as abruptly, it fell. She spoke softly. “And then, finally, your body can’t take no more. And you keel over dead.”

Slowly, Sweetie raised a hoof and touched her coat. Under it, she could feel her true crystal and rock body. She rubbed her foreleg, up and down, slowly, then faster and harder until it started to hurt. "I'm, I just, I lost this leg once and it grew again along with half my face. I was shot. Do you think could I have?" She looked up at Apple Bloom. "Did I really… That letter. I think I was dying, but if I had keeled over, how would I have written it?"

“Markers, is the term. For ponies who are past the brink. When the time comes, it isn’t quick. Weeks of shaking, vomiting blood and pissing themselves. Assuming they don’t go mad first. So a lot of them keep a bottle of poison somewhere around. They’d rather go out on their own terms.” She nodded. “Including you. You talked about it a lot.”

Sweetie's eyes went wide and she lifted her hoof to her mouth. "Celestia… that bottle of hydrofluoric acid I—I must have been very close as it is for it to even work on me." She had died before. Multiple times. Under controlled circumstances even; but it had never been due to despair. And the fact that she was so weak physically that even a simple poison had killed her made her wonder if that was the only thing she had done to herself. "I killed myself…" she trailed off. "Swiftwing. She saw me become that?"

“It’s why she was here. I spend a lot of time working with addicts. Spend a lot of time trying to stop ponies from becoming addicts. She thought I could help you.” Apple Bloom shrugged. “But I’m not a doctor. And even if I was, there’s no pill that stops a pony from overdosing. All I could do was give you advice you weren’t gonna take.”

Apple Bloom paused a moment. She licked her lips. “You were starting to lose your mind. Forgetting things. Showing up for work at a business that closed years ago. Explosive rage. A colt made fun of you and you nearly beat him to death right in front of his parents. She held you back. And she took care of you after. Made sure you were eating properly, took the right dose of your meds, and weren’t around ponies when she wasn’t there.”

Apple Bloom shifted uncomfortably. “She loved you.”

Sweetie closed her eyes. She could feel some tears building up, but a part of her wondered: was she crying for Swiftwing or for herself?

"I didn't deserve that," Sweetie whispered at last. "Not her love. Not if I am that kind of pony."

“Nopony is born a monster. But alchemy will make you one. It’s dark magic, Sweetie. It promises you anything you want, but in the end, all it does is take from you.” She let out a breath and firmly shook her head. “Take your own good advice. Vision is an evil place, and it’s evil ponies that live here. You should move on, before you become one of us again.”

Sweetie gulped. "Just, give me something, 'Bloom. Anything. Let me at least, I dunno, just see her from afar. Maybe say goodbye." She looked at the picture. "I've never seen myself so happy since I left home."

Apple Bloom’s eyes went to the floor. “I haven’t seen her in over six months. She stopped coming around once it got clear that there was nothing I could do to actually help you. Last I heard she was up to her eyeballs in debt to hire this absurdly expensive private alchemist. Maybe thought she could help.”

“I…” Sweetie nodded. “Who?”

“Berry Punch.”

Sweetie stared at Apple Bloom for several long seconds. "No, seriously, what's her name?"

Apple Bloom's solemn face morphed into slight annoyance. "That's her name. Berry Punch. She’s an old Ponyville hoof.”

"The barmaid?" Sweetie mumbled. "She's the most expensive alchemist? Last time I saw her she was making Chocolate Martinis. Either she's gotten really good at those or our worlds are really different."

“She made chocolate martinis here once too. They were pretty good.” A small smile touched Apple Bloom’s face. Then it faded. “She don’t make them no more. First mantle every alchemist learns to make makes them better at being an alchemist. These days she works for Trixie. Rich ponies pay a thousand bits an hour for her to fix what’s broken inside them.”

"And wait, Trixie is rich?" Sweetie mumbled. "Is she also married to Twilight in this world? And Berry takes her own killer stuff?"

Apple Bloom laughed. “Trixie is the most wealthy pony in this city. And one of the most feared. Ponies who cross her have a tendency to turn up dead. As for Twilight…” She needed a moment. “The way this whole thing started. Vision. The city. Is when Celestia killed Twilight’s husband. There’s a bit of a story behind it. But that’s the short of it.”

“Celestia…” Sweetie frowned. “She killed Twilight’s husband?”

“Yup.” Apple Bloom lifted a hoof. “And Rarity killed you.”

"Oh." Sweetie tried to think of a comeback. Nothing really came to mind. This place was ghastly. She cleared her throat. "S-say, before I go… if you have the ingredients, I can replicate that martini."

“I don’t keep liquor around.”

Sweetie chuckled. "Of course not. How silly of me." She shook her head and slowly stood up. "I'm sorry you had to see me like that. Even if I wasn't your Sweetie, I'm sorry."

“It’s not a great world you’ve landed in. But I suppose it’s where I belong.” Apple Bloom rose as well.

“Where can I find Berry?”

“Sweetie…” Apple Bloom frowned. “You do this, you’re going to regret it.”

Tiara Tower was, Sweetie Belle was told, one of the nicest parts of the city. She believed it.

After making an appointment with Apple Bloom’s help, Sweetie arrived via a private train car. Smartly dressed pegasus guards greeted her, and made sure she had everything she needed. The hallways she walked through were made from only the most elegant white stone. The doorways were made of lacquered wood instead of steel. Statues decorated the halls. The shops had glass in the window instead of bars, and they didn’t list prices. If a pony had to ask the price, they couldn’t afford it.

The inhabitants were different too. Everypony was young, fit, and beautiful. Sweetie didn’t see a single pony over thirty. Elegantly dressed mares flirted with smart looking stallions. Young unicorn fillies doing their shopping walked around without fear, followed by obedient earth pony servants to carry their bags.

There were no mares living in boxes.

Sweetie blended in as she walked, moving in the proper courtly style—back straight and head high. Nopony looked at her twice, and soon she sat in a lavish private office. Servants offered her everything from water to tiny cakes as she waited for Berry Punch to become available. Their consultation was only ten minutes long. Her time was very valuable.

Sweetie never let the stress show on her face. In the time she’d had to wait for the train, she had grown another inch, and her voice had deepened. She was no longer a teenager, but a young mare, and the phoenix amulet’s power would soon be concluded.

“Berry Punch will see you now!” said a young pegasus mare. She was gorgeous, young and dressed in fashionable attire. She had four cutie marks.

Berry Punch had six: her natural mark, twin cups, an erlenmeyer flask, a pony biting their own tail, a cluster of heart’s desire leaves, and a poison joke bloom.

One of the marks was on her face. The poison joke bloom covered her right eye, and was only fully visible when her eyes were shut. When Sweetie Belle entered her small office, she was sitting lengthwise on a small couch. One was provided for Sweetie as well.

“Hello,” Berry said. Her voice was flat and dull, lacking any tone or inflection. Her face was much the same. She stared at Sweetie head on with a perfect neutral mask.

"Hello, Miss Punch," Sweetie said with a pleasant smile. "I don't want to waste your time, so I will go straight to the point." She levitated out the picture, letting it hover close to Berry Punch where she had a clear view of it. "I'm looking for Swiftwing. I know she came here on occasion, I was hoping you could help me find her."

“You are asking me to betray a client’s privacy.” Berry’s tone had no anger in it, not even any frustration. She simply stated a fact.

"I understand… but, ahem… generally the law allows for ponies to disclose information to next of kin if the information does not reveal the actual interactions held between client and provider, but does actually help said next of kin confirm that the pony in question is in good health. And I am worried about her health." Sweetie bowed slightly. "So please... help me find her."

“Are you her next of kin?”

"I'm her wife."

Berry stared at Sweetie for some time. Her face remained impassive, her expression blank. Sweetie shifted uncomfortably on the couch. It was like being watched by a statue.

“You are younger than the last time I saw you,” Berry said. “By what means was this achieved?”

"Regeneration amulet." Sweetie leaned forward. "If you saw me before, then you know right? You're the best there is here from what I've heard. I'm not trying to fool you. I just want to see her once."

“Why?”

"Just so I can say I'm sorry. Even if she never forgives me." Sweetie said. "Swiftwing stuck with me all this time and I just caused her pain. I have no right to ask this of her but I want to see her and..." Sweetie sighed. "I don't know, Berry. I wish I did."

“Has she left you?”

Sweetie lowered her head and nodded. "I think… I think she eventually gave up when she saw I was about to die."

“Was she unaware of your capacity to regenerate yourself?”

Sweetie chuckled. "I was unaware that was an option… after I figured out what happened, I decided to look her up."

“A rather spectacular thing to happen by accident.” Berry’s head tilted to one side as she watched Sweetie. Her eyes didn’t move—didn’t flick from side to side like ponies’ eyes do. They were glassy and stared straight on. Sweetie would have thought she was blind, if her head didn’t follow Sweetie’s movements.

Before Sweetie could reply, Berry went on: “You refer to the amulet embedded within your chest. A fascinating piece of magic. But its practical applications are limited.”

"Well, yes," Sweetie shifted, looking down at herself. She couldn't see the damn thing. Was that what Twilight from Blackjack's Universe had done? "If I need to die for it to work, it does have a particular caveat I'm not entirely fond of. However, it being inside my chest, it's not an optional function."

She cleared her throat. "Not to mention that… well, the magic that would go into such a thing is… distasteful." She couldn't help herself. Having been around very rich ponies with Blueblood, she automatically changed some words to better fit. "In any case, this… amulet, might have brought me back to life, and now all that remains is what I'll do with it. I'd like to start by apologizing to a pony that loved me."

“You are mistaken.”

Berry’s word hung in the air. Seconds passed as Sweetie waited for her to elaborate. Without knowing why, Sweetie bit her lip, and her tail tucked in tight under her legs. “Mistaken how?” she finally asked.

“The amulet in your chest does not restore a dead pony to life. At present, there is no known means to revive the dead. It creates a new pony from the spiritual essence of the old one. While the new pony is a nearly perfect copy, it would not be strictly accurate to say it regenerated you. Rather, I would say you were born from the remains of another.”

After a moment, Berry added: “Like a phoenix.”

Sweetie stared for a moment in awkward awe. "Berry, that was borderline poetic."

“Is it?”

Sweetie chuckled a bit self-consciously. "Yeah. You have this... really intense look, but yeah. I understand what you're saying." Even if she disagreed. She had died and come back before. What Berry was suggesting was not something she was going to think about right now. Souls and essence were eternal. The body could be remade. "And it implies also that I wouldn't bear responsibility for my, uh… other Sweetie's previous actions... oh. I see. So you're stating I'm no longer her wife." Sweetie's eyes narrowed. "Can you tell me at least then why I started taking those drugs?"

“You cheated on her.” After a moment, Berry added. “And you were unhappy.”

“Oh.” Sweetie laughed. She bit her lip again. “Well, I…”

“Alchemists who specialize in love do not use ‘love’ as a technical term. It covers too many distinct forms of emotion, ranging from lust to sibling obligation. I believe it would be accurate to say that you two cared about each other, but I do not believe you cared about each other in the same way. You were what she wanted. She was a thing you wanted. You also wanted a stallion you both knew.”

With a methodical, dull cadence, Berry went on. She sounded like a lecturer, speaking on a dry and academic topic. “When you first came to my office, you wanted a potion that would diminish your sex drive, but that would not have resolved the underlying problem. You wished to roam. To seek new horizons. But there are no horizons here. The sun does not shine in Vision. Your body rejected this city. It made you sick. And you sought to medicate yourself however you could.”

After a moment she added: “It did alleviate your symptoms.”

Sweetie gazed down at the picture she had. "I'm not looking at her like an object," she said weakly. "I was probably… scratch that, by all accounts I definitely was a horrible marefriend and wife… and you might not use the word love anymore, Berry but if I wanted to fix those things, doesn't it mean that she meant more to me than a passing thing? Even if I ended up worse?"

“Ponies desire to change themselves for many reasons. Love is one, but shame is another. Or guilt. Or obligation. Or because they can’t admit they made a mistake.”

Sweetie really wanted to argue that, but all she said was: "Yeah." She sounded defeated, even to herself. "You're right, and I'm not going to argue with you on the validity of those reasons. I do feel obligated to at least talk to her. Apologize. Hay, I don't know what I'd do after that."

Berry looked at Sweetie Belle. She didn’t say a word.

“Fine.” Sweetie turned up her head. “You’ve made your point. But the problem remains that I need to deal with all of this regardless." She leveled her eyes at the Alchemist. "Berry, I need you to tell me where I can find Swiftwing. Even after this discussion you know there's no reason to not tell me.”

“It would be betraying a client’s privacy.”

Before she knew what she was doing, Sweetie was on her hooves, glaring at Berry. Sure. She was responsible for hurting Swiftwing. And sure, for whatever stupid reason, she had apparently cheated on her. And become a drug addict. And dangerous to be around. And she would not stay in this stupid city any longer than needed, but she'd be damned by Celestia if she was going to just let paperwork get in the way.

"Listen, you," she hissed, "I've taken down beasts that can rip a pony to shreds. I've been through dungeons that suck the soul of the very planet and contain things that will sizzle their way through your body at the first chance. I've dealt with Queens and Princesses, I've gone through a death maze, and stared down into the abyss." She raised a hoof and placed it down on top of the table, eyes narrowing and magic pouring out of every porous surface of her rocky body. "I've had my body defiled and my mind tortured… and your questionable drugs might have pushed me to suicide in the end, but you know what I'm not going to put up with? Using half-baked philosophy and "client privacy" BS as an excuse to stop me. So tell me, where she is!"

Berry lifted a hoof and reached out to Sweetie, placing it on Sweetie’s shoulders as though to reassure her. After a moment, she placed her hoof on Sweetie’s shoulders again, a little closer to her neck. A pause hung in the air.

“Did…” Sweetie paused. “Did you just try to use the zebra neck pinch on me?”

“Your nerve clusters are not where they should be.”

“Darn right they’re not! I’m made of solid crystal and rock!” Sweetie knocked Berry’s hoof aside. “And that sound? That was my patience with your bullhockey running out! So why don’t you take a nap!” Sweetie’s hoof lanced out, striking Berry at a key point in the chest.

Another pause hung in the air. “Um…” Sweetie poked Berry again. “You’re supposed to have a chakra like, right here? This is awkward.”

“The essence flows of markers are significantly different from those of normal ponies. For instance.” She held up her hoof as though to demonstrate something, but just as the base of her hoof rose to the air, she let out a sharp breath. Fine white dust from the bottom of her hoof billowed out, blowing directly into Sweetie’s face.

Sweetie paused. She licked her lips. “It this poison? This tastes like really expensive poison.” She licked her lips a little further out. “How do you not poison yourself having that on your hooves all day?”

“Earth pony magic.”

"Right." Sweetie smiled. "I always liked this trick!" She said, slamming down on the side of the table. It didn't budge, since Berry had simply pressed down on the other side. A moment of silence passed again. "Well. You're no fun. You were, ideally, supposed to backflip out of that one."

Berry pulled back her hoof. “You first.”

The blow connected with the force of an oncoming train. Sweetie flew backwards, through the air, through the plaster wall behind her, through the wooden wall behind that, and finally into the steel wall that marked the edge of the office suite. Metal rang with her impact, and her ears rang as well. She left a dent in the metal, and tumbled to the floor in a pile of twisted limbs.

“Ahhh.” She struggled to rise to her feet. When she coughed, she coughed up rubies. “Pretty good. Pretty—”

Something moved to her left. There was a blur of motion, and a metal bar connected with her underside. She screamed and crumpled into a ball, twisted up around her undercarriage. There was a stallion standing over her—an earth pony guard in black, holding a practical looking nightstick in his teeth.

“Is that all you got!?” Sweetie shouted. A kick of her hind legs hit him in the front hooves, and he went down to the floor with her. She slammed her hoof on his jaw, breaking some teeth around the nightstick and pulled herself up, grimacing all the way. “That’s what I thought you—”

Then another guard hit her from behind. A steel club cracked her over the back of her head between her ears. She staggered, but still managed to turn in time to dodge the next one and turn his club away. She was in some kind of office. A secretary screamed and fled the room as Sweetie fell into one of her patterns and danced around the officer, making him more and more angry until she stopped right on his face and used a flash of light to blind him.

The guard cried out in surprise, and Sweetie took advantage of that to knock the air out of him, letting him crumble to the floor. "The hell?!” she wheezed around the pain in her ribs. “You ponies should ask questions before you attack somepony!"

As the guards caught their breath, and Sweetie had a moment to catch hers, she gradually became aware of things she’d missed. An alarm was going off—a shrieking whistle and a naval bell. To her left was the hole she’d left in the wall on her way through. She could still see the waiting room on the other side. Berry was gone of course.

“Fine…” The two guards were getting back to their hooves, and Sweetie didn’t particularly feel like fighting them again. Guessing where Berry might have gone, she headed out the nearest door, weaving between frightened staff as she marched through the halls. To her left was another office, to her right was a lab, then another set of doors, then a room full of bubbling tanks. But she didn’t see any sign of Berry.

The double doors ahead of her parted before she could reach them, pushed open by a pony made of steel. Sweetie didn’t know if it was a golem, a robot, or whatever, but it didn’t look like a shambling pushover. It rushed towards her, breaking into a gallop. Sweetie took the first left.

There were another two guards in the hallway in front of her, both in their sharp uniforms. One was another earth pony with a steel club, while the other was a unicorn, some nasty spell arcing off of their horn. The door to her side opened, and the two earth pony guards from before appeared. Behind her, the metal thing caught up, blocking the hallway and her only route of escape.

“You think you can take me!?” She shouted. “Bring—”

The unicorn’s horn discharged, and a bolt of lightning struck her across the face. She staggered, and the steel pony, the robot, the golem, stepped up behind her and grabbed her in a chokehold. It was stronger than any earth pony, throttling her so tight she felt her neck might snap. Gears and motors whined inside its frame. Her forelegs left the ground. The thing pulled her back, exposing her underbelly.

Then the guards raced forward and applied their clubs. They hit her belly, her ribs, her neck, her legs, swinging like a baseball player. Eventually, when she stopped struggling, the metal pony dropped her. She hit the floor with a meaty thump.

When the guards approached her still body, she opened an eye and smirked. Yeah. Being a young filly had sucked. She had been beaten and bloodied by some grunt. But now she didn't have to put up with it. "It's my turn."

The place went pitch black just as the fact that she was not only alive and still able to fight, but also smiling at them started to register with the guards. Sweetie rolled on the floor, her training sinking in again.

No sound. That was her advantage. No sound and no light. The guards gasped and shouted warnings at each other, but Sweetie was already on them. She weaved around them, barely a breeze, before slamming her hind hooves in an Apple-family style buck—just not quite as effective—on the robot pony, then blasted it with a powerful lightning spell.

The guards predictably turned to face her, and she simply hoofed one on the face from the location of the other guard, then quickly rolled away, watching in amusement as the pair started attacking each other with their clubs. That left two more.

The unicorn guard was preparing another spell, and that wouldn't do. She dashed forth, using her momentum to land a solid kick on the unicorn's skull, smashing it against the wall with a dull crack. It wasn't enough to kill him, but he wouldn't do magic for a few months.

The last guard with the steel club was wide eyed and looking around in complete bafflement and fright. He swung his club around, attacking the darkness more than anything. Completely futile. Any sympathy for these ponies from her was gone. They had done nothing but attack her relentlessly, and if violence was the only thing they understood, then that's what they would get.

But first. Psychological warfare. Using a simple projection spell, just like so many years ago, she whispered onto the guard's ear, as if she was just behind him. "Celestia sends her regards."

The moment the guard turned to attack her voice, Sweetie jumped forth, her front leg hooking the pony's head and introducing his face to the wall. Then, when she figured he hadn't gotten to know his new lover well enough, she introduced him again. And again. Until he stopped struggling. And then she let him crumble to the floor, turning her attention once more to the last of her opponents.

Unfortunately, the golem pony was better designed than to be taken completely out with a simple electric spell; as effective as hers was in apparently shutting it down, it hadn't completely destroyed it, which meant she had to improvise. If she could have summoned Akela, she would have just blasted through the damn thing with her magical diamond, but since she still couldn't summon her diary she looked around, then levitated the heaviest desk she could find and dropped it on the robot pony.

She then levitated desk and pony together and threw them both across the hallway. She glanced at the pair of guards, who were twitching on the floor, having beat the snot of each other, and nodded, dispersing her spell.

"Okay, now, where the hay is that stupid alchemist?" she growled, turning around towards Berry's office. As she moved forward, a bottle of something came whirling out of the office door and smashed onto her face, drenching her. Sweetie sputtered and shook her head. "I told you that doesn—"

Sweetie staggered. Her limbs suddenly felt heavy.

“Ah…” Spots appeared in her vision. “Horseapples.”

The world around her went dark and she hit the floor one last time.

“Good morning, Ms. Belle.”

Sweetie’s head lolled like she was a doll with a loose string. It was too heavy to hold. She wanted to sleep. She wanted to sleep more than anything, but somehow she couldn’t. All she could do was lie there, slumped against the hard stone.

“Now, now. There’s no need to play hard to get. I know you’re in there.” Something brushed Sweetie’s left ear. It was a gentle touch, soft and close. She felt warm air flowing over the side of her head. It was a pony’s muzzle.

Her head shot up. Adrenaline flooded through her. There were so many spots in her vision that the world was nothing but spots—patches of dark and light that shifted around her as her heart pounded inside her chest. She gasped for breath, the chains around her ankles going taut as she tried to move.

Somepony was laughing. A stallion. And when Sweetie’s heart finally slowed and her senses cleared, she could see him sitting across from her. She could smell tobacco smoke, and alcohol.

“See, there? I knew you wouldn’t go down so easy.” He was a soldier. An older pegasus stallion, certainly past forty, dressed in a sharp black uniform with silver pins and fittings. His wings were decorated with wingblades, his shoulders with red epaulets, his hooves with brass horseshoes, and his head with a square military cap. His snow-white coat stood in sharp contrast to his immaculate uniform. Once, his mane and tail were sky blue, but lines of silver showed his age.

A thin line of smoke curled up from the cigarette between his teeth. “You’re a survivor, Ms. Belle. Aren’t you?”

Sweetie needed a moment to get her bearings. They were in some kind of prison cell, or perhaps an interrogation room. She was sitting on a couch with a steel frame, and while the pillows under her were soft, all four of her legs were shackled to the couch with short and unforgiving chains. The stallion sat across from her on a small metal chair, and the only way out of the room was an armored door behind him.

Well. She was in deep now. Better make the most of it. "I'm sorry officer, you seem to know me, but you don't look familiar. Have I threatened you before?"

“Oh, you have lost your memory.” He tsked. “That’s a pity. You really don’t remember me at all? The name ‘Echo’ doesn’t ring any bells in that lovely head of yours?”

"Hm. Nope." Sweetie sighed. "Look, I get it, I roughened up a couple of your guys after they came in and started smacking me around without even asking or checking if I was responsible for anything. But, it's very clear it was self defense." She coughed. "Um. initially anyway. And had they just asked…"

“Aaaah.” A broad grin split his face. “Oh, Ms. Belle. It’s really all gone, isn’t it? You’re back to being that sweet young thing you were a decade ago. The mare from a distant world who arrived in our city in a flash of light.”

After another brief chuckle, he shook his head. “Well, no reason to be unfriendly. I can’t do anything about the chains, but, drink? Smoke?” He patted himself down until he found a flask in his saddlebags. It was one of several. “Here. This one should actually do something for you. All the way from the Crystal Empire.”

Sweetie raised an eyebrow. "I'll pass, thank you." She glanced at the bottle. "The Crystal Empire, huh? I never thought about that one. But they're not the same as I. And you seem to know me well enough, uh, Echo. So why don't we just get on with it? You know I wouldn't have done anything to your officers if they hadn't attacked first. So why don't we call it even? If it had been a normal pony they greeted with their questionable professionalism, they'd be dead."

Echo kept smiling that bright smile all the while she was talking. “Well,” he said when she was done, “suit yourself.” He unscrewed the top of the flask, shifted his cigarette to the side to make room, and took a long pull.

"Enjoy. Now, can you let me go? I have things to do and ponies to see, and while it might surprise some, I'd rather do it on the right side of the law. You let me go, ergo, I'm on that side. We're all happy, you do your good deed for the day, you can go home, get on your favorite sofa and finish that bottle with the deep knowledge of having done the right thing even if the others didn't."

“Ms. Belle, you don’t seem to fully understand your situation. You attacked a…” He gestured vaguely in the air. “A pony of interest.”

"Wait…" Sweetie blinked. "You mean Berry? She attempted the Zebra Seven Point Nerve Strike on me! And all I did was ask her a question! How is that my fault?"

“It’s not against the law for her to hit you, Ms. Belle. It’s against the law for you to hit her back.” His grin reappeared. “You’ve already plead guilty, you understand.”

"Aha! If that is the case then you can verify with her that I did not, in fact, actually hit her at any point in time." Sweetie countered. "And I did not plead guilty for anything other than self-defense, officer. Echo."

“Contradicting an officer of the law. That’s obstruction of justice. Oh. Um. Oh! Or maybe it’s…” He rolled the words around for a moment. “Unlawful trafficking in dark magic. You do have that amulet. Or maybe you do terrible things to little fillies. I haven’t finished filling out the paperwork yet.”

He shrugged. “Do you have a request?”

"Hm." She glared at him. "So basically, you'll just forge whatever information to fit your case rather than actually do some work." She nodded. "Typical bureaucrat with a power high. I wonder how you actually sleep at night. How did I ever meet you, in the first place? You don't look or sound like anypony I’d care to know."

“We met several times. Once, when you first arrived in the city. You were the subject of some curiosity, and I was asked to make sure you weren’t a threat. After that we parted ways for several years. But I met you once again in a bar in the uptown. That would have been…” He mulled it over. “Eight years ago, now. You were drinking heavily, and asked me why ponies can’t just say what it is they want.”

His eyes slowly traveled down her flanks, resting around her tail. “I told you I wanted to put your hooves up on that bar, spread your legs, lift your tail, and ride those beautiful flanks into the sunset.” He waved a hoof as he spoke, his voice fond. “The bartender had some objections of course, but we made do.”

Sweetie tried to bring her hooves to her face, but the chains prevented it, so she simply gagged. "Go me." She really was a horrible pony. "Well, hey, at least the body you touched burst into flames eventually." She glared at the stallion. At least he wasn't that bad looking. No. Bad Sweetie. "Look, uh, Echo. In all seriousness, what's the point of all of this?"

“It’s known in the logistics department that I’m rather fond of you. When your name came up, they asked if I’d like to have a word with you.” He spread his forehooves. “You’re scheduled to be executed tomorrow.”

After a moment of silence between them, he corrected himself: “Well, not executed, exactly. That amulet of yours! That’s a tricky one. Technically you’re scheduled to be sealed in a block of liquid steel and then dumped into the ocean trench. So…” He glanced back up, his eyes meeting hers. “Not to worry.”

"Huh." Sweetie leaned back as much as she could. "Steel?" she shrugged. "Okay. I mean. Oh. No. Please save me, oh valiant hero. Or something." She glared at him. "Sorry, not going to be scared of that one."

“I suppose Ms. Sparkle—your Ms. Sparkle—will probably save you.” He made a grasping gesture with a hoof. “Pull you from the depths.”

"Who the hay knows. Besides, I'm saving her. Or I was before I decided to waste my time here." Sweetie was starting to get annoyed at his smug look of superiority. "I don't get you, Echo, you're here, telling me that I'm going to be executed because you’re "fond of me", but you're willing to manipulate whatever you can get your hooves on to make me guilty, regardless of whether I am or not." She tilted her head. "What's your take? What do you actually get out of lording this over me?"

“You misjudge me, Ms. Belle. I actually have very little influence over the matter of your guilt or innocence. The paperwork is filled out post-fact.” He paused for a moment, taking another draw off his cigarette and blowing out a cloud of smoke. “I suppose I was curious if I was one of your regrets.”

He gestured with a brass-shod hoof: “If we were one of you regrets, that is.”

Sweetie sighed, shoulders drooping down. "Yes. At least from what I've learned about what happened. I was married and I cheated on my wife. I don't know what my circumstances were, but she deserved better."

“Did she?” Echo flexed his wingblades, pausing a moment to inspect the edge of one for tarnish. “There is, of course, something special about two ponies who choose each other alone. Ponies don’t often think of me as a romantic, but I assure you it is so. Love is a powerful force in our world, Ms. Belle. I wouldn’t be much of a soldier if I didn’t respect it.”

He rose from his chair, pausing to spit out his cigarette onto the stone floor. With his teeth, he pulled another from his uniform front pocket. A spark off the tips of his wings lit the end. “Do you think your dearest Princess Cadence would command two ponies to stay together against their will? That love is a chain that binds us together whether we would wish it or not?”

He stepped up to her, standing beside her couch. So close, she could smell the smoke and alcohol on his breath, and see the sparkle off every little pin on his uniform.

"Probably not," Sweetie said, turning away from him and wrinkling her nose. "But there are things you do to a pony and things you don't, regardless of the situation. From my perspective, whoever I became here, was wrong to act as she did… and to take drugs to try and fix herself."

“Should have suffered in silence, mmm?” One of his wings left his side. With a single feather, he brushed her flank. Her skin crawled, and she pulled away. “Well. Maybe it’s for the best then. We’ll send you on your way, back to your distant worlds, and you’ll never have to bother with us again.”

"Not suffer in silence, but at least stop before doing something that would just be hurtful." Sweetie muttered. "Ponies get divorced. Separated. They figure things out if things are not working, right?" She looked up. "I don't know why I did what I did with you. But it seems like a mistake.”

“Saying something you shouldn’t is a mistake. Getting angry is a mistake. Getting drunk is a mistake. But too much planning goes into an affair for it to happen by accident. Sneaking around, finding…” His hoof brushed her neck. “Time alone. That’s a decision, Ms. Belle.”

He paused for a moment. “I’d hoped—” Then there was a loud pounding on the metal door behind him.

“What!?” he snapped, as the door slid open a crack. There were a number of other soldiers there in the same black uniform. “You had better have a good reason for interrupting.”

“I’m sorry, sir!” A young mare snapped, raising her hoof to her forehead in salute. “But the prisoner is being transferred.”

“Transferred where? She’s being executed tomorrow.”

“New orders, sir.” The mare said. “Princess Sparkle has requested her presence. She is to be moved immediately.”

"Mistakes and accidents are different things, Echo, I never said a mistake couldn't be done without intent behind it. That doesn't mean it's right." Sweetie said as two other officers walked into the room and pulled her up. She shrugged. "Maybe some food for thought while you have some time to yourself?"

“Her Highness will see you now.” The guards removed the chains from Sweetie’s ankles, and opened the door in front of her. Without another look at them, she stepped inside.

Twilight’s office was on the highest level of the tallest tower in the city. It was the Sparkle Enchantments building, just like the letter had said. At first, Sweetie thought she was walking into an unfinished room. The room was huge, easily the size of Celestia’s hall in Canterlot, but it was bare. Bare white walls, bare white floors, a bare white ceiling run through with harsh white lights. And at the end, where Celestia’s throne would have been, there was only a single massive window.

But when Sweetie’s eyes adjusted to the glare, she saw the mare standing in front of the window. This world’s Twilight was tall and rail-thin, like Princess Cadence, but with a more aristocratic build. She sat with her back to the door, looking out at her city.

Next to her, on a pedestal, floated a Twilight shard.

“Um… hello!” Sweetie called, but this Twilight did not answer. Hesitantly, Sweetie lifted a hoof to walk across the gap, but when she put it to the stone floor, her hootbeat rang out in the silence.The sound echoed off the stone walls, and she instinctively froze to the spot.

That was impossible. Her hoofsteps were supposed to be inaudible. She had survived the Maestro's castle due to her ability to not make a single noise. It took a moment to work up her nerve and to ignore the unfamiliar noise. She crossed the gap, ignoring the sounds of her own hooves and her own breathing.

“Hello, Sweetie Belle,” said the Twilight beside her. “You are looking better than when I last saw you.”

Outside the window, the city sprawled before them. From so high a vantage, the towers that had once loomed over Sweetie now spread out before her. There were so many they blurred together, like she was looking at a forest from above. The individual ponies seemed no more than insects, part of teeming millions.

"Um… hi, Twilight." Sweetie said, glancing at the mare. "If you saw me when I was… you know." She grimaced "At my worst. I'm sorry about that."

“Are you a fatalist?” Twilight didn’t look at her, continuing to stare out the window. “Do you believe, put in her circumstances, you would make the same mistakes?”

"Maybe? Maybe not? Depends on what I know." Sweetie said. She didn't know this Twilight, but it was Twilight. "Knowing what I know now? I think I'd act differently. I'm not in the same position as before."

“We think that we make our decisions, but it is our decisions that make us. If you are not the mare who so debased herself, then you have nothing to apologize for. If you are that mare, then your apologies mean nothing. You aren’t sorry enough.”

"Berry seems to think I'm a different pony," Sweetie said, "But even-even if that's true, how can I ignore what I… who I used to be? Why can't I just see Swiftwing and figure it out?"

“Why, you can, of course.”

"Nopony so far has been able to tell me where she is." Sweetie sighed. "I suppose you'd know, Twilight. Why did I do what I did to her?"

“Because you were unhappy. Because you were angry. Because you were drunk. Because you were depressed. Because it was an act of self-harm. Because Echo reminded you of your distant adventures. Because he was good in bed, and got you off in a way Swiftwing never could. Because he had superb taste in alcohol, and could find the stuff that actually got you drunk.”

Twilight turned to look at Sweetie Belle head on: “And because you’re weak.”

Sweetie looked down. She couldn't really argue with that one. "I don't want to be weak. Not at my own expense or others’."

“If wishes were horses.”

"Then I won't be weak again!" Sweetie snapped. "I hate that I… I- became something like that! I hate it! I can barely look at you in the eye without feeling shame." She took a deep breath. "That's why I wanted to apologize to Swiftwing. Not so she could forgive me, but because…" She hesitated, shaking her head. "Somepony with some pride and strength would own up to their mistakes."

“No.” Twilight’s voice was soft, and she gave the gentlest shake of her head. “A pony with pride and strength would make it right.”

She lifted her hoof, and floating above it was an electric blue bottle of medication. “Rainbow Brand Athletic Tonic!” the label read in aggressively friendly script, “For that flying body you’ve always wanted!” The label showed a dumpy, fat, ugly pegasus being transformed into a sporty flyer.

Sweetie Belle stared at the bottle for a long few seconds. “Nopony…” She hesitated. “Why would Swiftwing take those drugs too?”

“If I told you, would it make a difference?”

Sweetie had a nagging feeling. "Because of me, isn't it?”

“Because of you, because of society, because of her parents or her sister or her health, what does it matter?” Twilight’s voice hardened. “Your wife is dying. She is being consumed from the inside out by the same cancer that consumed you. You betrayed her, and she repaid your treachery with kindness. She cared for you every day. She cared for you long after she stopped loving you, because if she didn’t, who would?”

Twilight’s eyes flicked over Sweetie, and her lip curled back. “And now you have the opportunity to go and repay her in kind. To take care of her every day. Now is when she needs you. She has no phoenix amulet. When the final madness takes her, she won’t return.”

Twilight gestured with her hoof. At some point, the bottle had vanished. Sweetie wasn’t sure if it was ever real. “Or you could take that Twilight shard, and your time in Vision will be over. This place holds nothing for the new you. You, effectively, didn't exist until a day ago.”

“I can…” Sweetie swallowed. “I-I shouldn't even be thinking about this! I'll help her… and make up for everything I didn't do. I’ll go back for her. I'll stay until… until the end. The shard can wait for me.”

“Will you go back for Tip Toe?” Twilight asked. When Sweetie looked lost, she explained, “That’s the mare in the box. The one who was starving to death. You never asked her name.”

“I...”

“Just like you never asked why that waiter had crippled wings. Just like you never bothered to hug the friend who hasn’t stopped grieving over you. Just like you never wondered why law enforcement in this city acts like a pack of thugs, except so far as it inconvenienced you.”

She turned away from Sweetie and began the long walk across the room, leaving Sweetie with the Twilight shard. “You could go back, Sweetie. To the ponies that miss you or whom you hurt. Any of them. You could save the world. But you won’t. It’s not in your character. Hear my words and know them to be true: whichever option you pick is final. You don’t have what it takes to turn around.”

Twilight paused when she reached the doorway. She looked back over her shoulder. “I’ll tell the guards to give you directions to Swiftwing if you ask for them.” Then she slipped out, and the doors shut behind her.

Sweetie wasn’t sure how long she stood there in silence. She was alone, with herself.

In a flash of light, Sweetie appeared inside a ruined building of some sort. It looked like an abandoned shack, with several metal barrels pushed into a corner, where they rusted away, forgotten.

Cracks ran through the parts of the walls that were concrete, left by a staggering force of some sort. The rest of the building was basically little more than several mismatched pieces of metal and wood, held together by tape, rope, wire, and sheer luck.

Trying not to think much about how and why she was here, instead of inside a vast, white room, she looked around, trying to find clues as to her location.

A fading poster on the wall advertised Sunset Sarsaparilla. She instantly knew where she was, more or less. There was only one world where the drink was produced. Perhaps she was in Blackjack’s and Puppy Smile's world again. She felt different too. More powerful. Normal.

Looking down, her body seemed to be the correct age again, and closing her eyes, she stretched her senses to the magical ether, reaching for that familiar connection.

Her horn glowed a faint green, and with a loud pop, her diary appeared next to her, floating a few feet above the ground, with Twilight's shards orbiting it in perpetual cycles. The newest one was there as well, and she wished she could talk to her Twilight.

She stared at the diary and fragments morosely for a few seconds, her hoof hesitating on the cover. Did she have the energy or will to open it now?

She shook her head. She felt tired. She felt stupid and angry and disappointed in herself like never before. She wanted to rationalize her choice. Why hurt somepony more? Why stay in a city that was nothing more than a prison for everypony that lived there? Whatever.

She levitated the diary and prepared to send it away. Before she could, a picture fell out, gliding gracefully to rest, face down, on the floor. There was writing on the back of it.

"Distant Shores, 15th day of Fall, 12 AF."

It was her hoofwriting. She stared at it in the dust with a growing sense of dread before she swept it off the floor and brought it up so she could look at it. It took her several seconds to understand what she was looking at.

It felt like her body and mind were unable to fully comprehend what was happening in the picture. It was her, lying in a hospital bed. She was cradling a newborn foal, all wrapped up in bright blue cloth. Swiftwing was there beside her. They were both smiling.

They looked so happy.

Next: Fallout: Equestria

Author's Notes:

Yes, the original. This part was planned from the beginning, and I even got Kkat a long, long time ago to let me do this. Fear not... it's really the last visit there.

As you might remember, I talked about a re-imagining of where TSC was going, and taking things into account for this six year old story.

There's a blog related to this chapter, just in case you're curious.