“Ponies often ask me why bad things happen to good ponies. I have found, however, that a far more interesting question is ‘Can a good pony do bad things and still be a good pony?’”

The unicorn gave a pause to let the question sink in. Purely for his own amusement, of course. He once more took the opportunity to sum them up, this class of freshpony medical students out on a field trip from one of those prestigious institutions in either Canterlot or Manehatten. (Did it matter which? No.)

Of course, they were all officially on a “research expedition,” and were supposed to be getting their hooves dirty in a real hospital.

Metaphorically dirty, of course. Dr. Fiddly Fie would never permit a speck of dust to stain the halls of his immaculately polished establishment.

He looked at their faces. Some of them seemed to register the question. A hoof-ful even seemed like they were trying to come up with an answer. (And giving themselves mental hamstrings in the process, bless them.) But, the majority of this group of twenty or so were either looking out of the windows at the nice day beyond or looking at him without actually looking at him. Clearly, they had other places they wanted to be. There was no way this group was going to be doing any work in his hospital. Aside from the fact that most of them wouldn’t want to, Dr. Fie would never permit it.

So, basically, it was a glorified field-trip.

The fifty-something doctor shook his head and gave an audible “tisk-tisk” which awoke some of the group from their day-dreams.

An earth pony spoke up, “Maybe?”

Dr. Fie shook his head again and gave her a look that highlighted the wrinkles on an otherwise still relatively youthful face. He wanted to ask her what she was even doing here. How did an earth pony expect to work in a hospital like his? Did she intend to use her mouth to bandage patients or handle equipment? How would she feed any that couldn’t feed themselves? And the thought of how she would clean patients was just too unbearable to contemplate.

But he kept his cool and said instead, in a distinctive sing-song baritone, “Maybe. Maybe? What is the younger generation coming to that they cannot even give a half-way competent answer to a simple question?”

Dr. Fie then nodded in approval at his own maturity and tact.

“I’m sorry,” said the earth pony, “but that sounded like a philosophy question. We’re all in medical school.”

“Oh, I suppose that disqualifies you from thinking, does it, dear girl? No, no, don’t answer that. I’m sure any answer you’d give would just waste my time. And my time, unlike yours, is very valuable.”

Now everypony was paying attention. They all looked somewhat frightened. Dr. Fie was even tempted to threaten them with failing whatever second-rate course they were here for. He did not actually have the power to carry out such a threat. But only he knew that. The students were ignorant of it. And ignorance, Dr. Fie reflected, is not always bliss.

But then, the group’s professor or chaperone or whatever she was came back from the cafeteria. No more fun to be had here, then.

“Well, dear children, shall we move on to the next part of this very important hospital?” His voice was quick and upbeat. There was no way the nanny over there would know what he had just been saying. And the students wouldn’t tell. It would just be their word against that of one of the premier – no, the premier – doctors in all Equestria.

The beige unicorn smiled. As he did so, his eyes narrowed and his eyebrows rose high on his head, making it look even larger than the receding maneline of wispy grey hair did. It would be hard for anypony to determine whether he was trying to be friendly or sinister.

His tone, however, remained chipper, “Come along, come along, we don’t have all day. We must hurry. Chop, chop!”

But as Dr. Fie had just begun to move, in that funny little bow-legged amble of his, an orderly stopped him.

“Doctor,” the orderly said, “they’ve just flown in a pegasus from Cloudsdale. Terrible accident. He already had broken wings when he accidentally fell from one of the clouds and….”

“I can imagine the details, dear boy,” Dr. Fie said.

“They say that there’s not much hope, but you are known to work miracles….”

“Of course, of course.” Now Dr. Fie turned toward the young stallions and mares following behind him. What he was going to say was chiefly intended for their benefit. “Any small thing I can do to ease this poor soul’s sufferings and brighten his few remaining hours before he slips off this mortal coil and joins the choir celestial, I shall do, tirelessly and without fail. And if there is any chance, however small, of saving his life, I shall not cease to pursue it. No, not even should my own health be placed into jeopardy by the attempt. I would run the risk of a thousand deaths just to save a single soul.”

Another pause, for effect. They were eating it up!

“But, of course, it means that I cannot possibly continue supervising our little foray into the world of medicine.”

The chaperone nodded solemnly. “We understand, doctor. Go to your patient.”

“But I’m sure my friend here will be happy to conduct matters in my probably-long-absence.” Dr. Fie gestured to the hapless orderly, who suddenly looked like he had been placed before a firing squad.

Dr. Fie did not wait for the orderly to stutter out a response. He let out a little laugh as he ambled down one of the narrow side-corridors. Salvation! How wonderful it felt to be free of that onerous task.

“I really must thank this dear boy for the impeccable timing of his fatal accident!” he said to himself.

There was just one more thing he needed before he could go to his newest patient. Dr. Fie’s happiness soon turned to frustration as he glanced around at the various doors along the corridor. There were several and he had no idea where to look.

But he knew he saw her go down this corridor. She had to be behind one of these doors. Where in Tartarus is that blasted girl?

Darkness. Faces in the darkness. Terrifying, twisted faces. All groaning. Groaning and reaching out from the darkness. Reaching for her. The groaning stopped, replaced by voices. Voices of sorrow. Then voices of anger.

“Help us, Hope!”

“Help us! You have to save us!”

“You did this to us!”

“Why did it have to be us, Hope? Why?”

Radiant Hope opened her eyes. She let out a deep breath. The first thing her blue crystalline eyes fell upon was an old mirror across from her. Probably taken out when they were remodeling the bathrooms and then just left here, in this closet.

Whatever condition Dr. Fie kept the public areas of his hospital in, he put no effort at all into the places that no pony other than the janitors should ever see.

Hope thought for a moment that, had she really wanted to hide the Crystal Heart, she should have thrown it in one of Seaddle Specialist Hospital’s many janitorial closets. No pony could ever have found it in one of these.

She laughed. The first laugh in a long time. It felt good. But it also felt wrong.

Hope caught sight of herself in the mirror as she laughed. For a moment, she looked like her old self. Even with all the dust covering the mirror, she could see the crystal that made up her body light up. The lavender on her face and the sky-blue in her mane seemed to become more vibrant. Her crystal-blue eyes seemed to sparkle. And then it was gone.

Or maybe she had just imagined it all. After all, none of the other orderlies and nurses seemed to notice any loss of tincture, despite Hope’s often dower mood. But then, Seaddle Specialist never seemed to get any crystal ponies as patients or workers, so how would they know?

Another deep breath. Hope felt unnerved. It was strange to feel this way. She had thought she was used to the faces that appeared whenever she closed her eyes. Some days, she barely even noticed them. But today, they terrified her all over again. They reminded her of another day, not too long ago. The day she had lost Sombra. The day she had lost everything.

And yet, why did she lose him? Hadn’t she set up everything for him to do the right thing? She thought she had saved him. Why couldn’t he just return the Crystal Heart to its pedestal like she had expected he would? Like she had hoped he would? Had she been wrong about him, all this time?

Did I ever really know Sombra at all?

Hope shook her head. She could not let herself think that. Not today. She had often had that thought in the days and months since the end of the Siege, and she would probably have it many times over in the days and months to come. But not today. Today was trying enough.

But then, how could things not get to her today? She had a lot of stress to deal with. Dr. Fie had asked her to help conduct the tour of students from a far-away university. She had been so afraid that one or two of them would be a crystal pony. None of them were, but Hope had done her best to keep out of their direct line of sight anyway. Luckily, Dr. Fie had been in one his more theatrical moods (and that was saying something), so there was no room for a co-presenter. Hope could just stand at the back of the group and pretend to be invisible.

But then, after remarking on a particular case where a barn had collapsed on a charity hoe-down and sent several prominent philanthropists to him, Dr. Fie had posed the old question about why bad things happen to good ponies. It was a question Hope had pondered many times.

But it was what he said next that really unnerved her.

“Can a good pony do bad things and still be a good pony?”

Immediately upon hearing the question, she had begun to feel incredibly queasy. She bolted, running down the nearest corridor to the nearest unoccupied room.

Not to be sick, but just to be alone. Just to avoid being subjected to speculations from Dr. Fie or from the group. Just to avoid more pain.

Hope suddenly realized that her muzzle felt wet. Her tongue tasted little drops of salty water. She wiped her hoof against her eyes and saw that the fur had become moist. She had been crying without knowing it.

It was shaping up to be one Tartarus of a day….

And then the door flung open. Hope knew she should jump to her hooves, that she should avoid letting any of her co-workers see her like this. But she didn’t. She didn’t have the strength. Besides, it would only be one of the janitors, and they wouldn’t tell anypony. They never fraternized with the orderlies here.

But it wasn’t the janitor. Hope looked up through tear-filled eyes to see the good doctor himself standing there. There was his clean-shaven, somewhat wrinkled face, with grey-blue eyes narrowed and brows high on the head, and a disapproving little frown. He was immaculately dressed as usual, with a white dress-shirt and a sweater of deepest burgundy beneath a large grey tweed suit jacket that terminated just ahead of his cutie mark – a hammer striking an anvil. He was standing in that bow-legged fashion with his head drooping down and one hoof held against his chest as though he were a high-society mare who had just witnessed something that challenged her delicate sensibilities.

He never did look very much like how a doctor should, Hope thought. Maybe a lab-coat would help. But he always refused to wear one of those, even in areas where it was mandatory.

“Hope, dear girl, what are you doing in here?” he said, his rather deep voice dripping with disapproval. “I don’t employ you to lounge around in–”

Dr. Fie shivered a little as he looked at some of the cobwebs in the corners of the room.

“–such dubious surroundings.”

Hope rose to her hooves. “Yes, doctor,” she said mechanically.

“Have you been crying?” he asked, not without concern.

“It’s nothing,” Hope said. “I’ll be fine.”

“What caused you to dash off like that?”

Hope stepped out of the closet and soon the two were walking side-by-side, though she had no idea where their destination was.

“I’m so sorry, doctor.”

“As well you should be.” Back to disapproval. “I take you in when you appear on my doorstep from who-knows-where, let you take a job here, no questions asked, and put incredible faith and trust in you to handle this hospital’s most important duties. This is no way to repay such kindness.”

“No, doctor, it’s not. It won’t happen again.”

“See that it doesn’t.”

Hope had hung her head while the doctor administered his tongue-lashing. Probably more out of habit than anything; she hung her head quite a bit these days. She was, after all, too used to his tongue-lashings to feel any genuine shame at them anymore. And they were always less-severe than those he gave to the other orderlies.

When he paused, Hope raised her head and looked at him from the corner of her eyes. She found his expression changed. Now it was kind, almost fatherly. A smile had soothed out many of the wrinkles and the doctor’s eyes had grown a bit wider. Even his brows had lowered considerable, bending downward somewhat as to suggest pity.

“But it’s not like you, dear girl,” he said, his tone now soft and gentle. “Something must have set you off. Something I said, perhaps?”

A little smile appeared on Hope’s face. “Well, you were the only one talking.”

Pride filled the doctor’s features. “Ah, yes, well, when you have my gift for perfect speech and unmatched eloquence, it really would be a crime not to use it at every opportunity. I only speak so much as a public service. I open my mouth, and the world is benefitted in untold ways. I say words, and ponies feel better. Their days are brighter for knowing that there exists a pony of such verbal acuity and power.”

There were times when Hope couldn’t be sure whether Dr. Fie actually believed the things he said or not.

But turning the conversation back to him was always a sure-fire way of keeping the doctor from inquiring too much about her. And that was how Hope wanted things.

“Ah, but we don’t have time to socialize,” Dr. Fie announced (that is really the only word for how he said it). “There is a new arrival who is in mortal jeopardy, his very life hanging by a thread. It’s up to me, with some small assistance on your part, to save the life of a beleaguered pegasus. I have not been able to think of anything else but his tragic story since I was informed of it not too long ago.”

“Oh, dear,” Hope said. “This is the third one this week. Where’d she come from? What happened?”

They reached the elevators and Dr. Fie’s horn lit up purple as the buttons pressed themselves. “He’s from Ponyville or Cloudsdale or thereabouts. Hit his head or something.”

Catching Hope’s knowing look as they stepped into the elevator, the good doctor said, “The minor details don’t matter. What matters is that there is a life in the balance and only we two can save it.”

It was solemn inside the examination room. Though none of the pegasus paramedics knew the blue and purple pegasus laying in the bed — Cloudsdale was a big city, after all — they all could not help but feel a certain kinship to him. Everypony had had a broken wing at some time or another; it was just part of pegasus life. And it was an open secret that safety regulations in some areas of Cloudsdale were not what they should be. In short, every one of the paramedics could see herself in the patient. And, as he slipped deeper into unconsciousness, none of them could bear to leave.

And then the door flung open. The doctor came trotting in, a clipboard and a number of concoctions in small bottles floating behind him. Radiant Hope followed.

“You’ll forgive us for being late. My assistant here forgot to ask the room number when they brought you in. She’s a little dense, you see. But I believe it takes all types to make a hospital run ship-shape.”

Hope turned her head away so that nopony would see her rolling her eyes.

“So, what seems to be the trouble?” the doctor said cheerfully as he scanned his clipboard.

The assembled pegasi just looked at him in shock.

“Tisk-tisk. There’s one fatal accident and suddenly humor is to be banished from Equestria. Well, if you’re going to be that unfriendly, I might as well get down to the examination.”

“Please do,” one of the pegasi said. “I don’t think he has very long left.”

The doctor put down his clipboard and the various bottles and lifted up a small flashlight. “I’ll be the judge of that,” he said as he opened the patient's eyes one after the other. “After all, I’m a doctor so I know about these things.”

Dr. Fie returned the light and took up a small stick. After positioning himself a little farther away, he proceeded to prod the stick into the pegasus’ wings and skull. He then put the stick down and picked up a magnifying glass. Dr. Fie paced around the patient, occasionally leaning in and giving his head or wings a look-at through his glass.

Hope began to move toward the far corner of the room. She grimaced slightly. The pegasus’ condition did look bad, and Hope couldn’t help thinking that the paramedics were right to suggest he did not have long left.

“Come on, doctor, hurry,” Hope said under her breath. “Please don’t be too late….”

Finally, Dr. Fie set down his glass. “It is just as I feared,” he said. “Oh, this poor child clearly has suffered a terrible fall. I dare say he’s on death’s doorstep as we speak. He can probably already hear the trumpets sounding.”

“So… there’s nothing you can do?” one of the paramedics asked, caught between confusion and gloom.

“Ha, tut!” said the doctor with a magnificently theatrical wave of his hoof. “There is always something I can do. I just cannot promise that it will make any difference.”

“But if you can do it, doctor, then do it!” said another paramedic.

“Quite.” Dr. Fie turned once more to the bottles. They floated up into the air as their caps unscrewed themselves. A plastic cup floated up to meet them. Soon, the various strange-colored liquids were pouring into the cup at seemingly random intervals.

“This is an experimental treatment I’ve been developing,” said the doctor. “A new kind of medicine, if you will. It should heal broken bones if all goes well.”

“So, it’s a new type of potion!” said the confused paramedic, proud to have finally picked up on something.

“Please, dear girl, do not call it a ‘potion,’” said the doctor. “We are a highly scientific establishment. We do not use such outdated terminology here. Did we not leave all such superstition behind us after Princess Luna returned, when we brought to a happy conclusion that long twilight struggle with magic and found ourselves at long last in a universe of rational ponies and rational laws?”

Hope could tell by the looks on the paramedics’ faces that they had no idea what the doctor was talking about. Neither did she, truth be told.

Then, without glancing away from his potions, Dr. Fie said, “Hope, dear girl, can you get me my stirring stick?”

Hope nodded and turned toward the pile of instruments on the counter at her end of the room. She spotted a forceps already balanced precariously on the edge. She put her hoof on the counter and pushed it off.

It made an audible clang.

“Hope, what are you doing?” Dr. Fie said. “Don’t you know that a patient’s very life depends on not only the swiftness, but the carefulness, of our actions?”

“Sorry, doctor.”

Hope bent her head down as though to retrieve the forceps. But she didn’t.

“My apologies,” Dr. Fie said to the paramedics. “She is incredibly thick sometimes. I swear, if not for the goodness of my own heart, she wouldn’t keep a job here.”

Hope knew it was wrong, but she couldn’t keep herself from rolling her eyes again. Then, swiftly, as the doctor finished pouring Celestia-knows-what into that plastic cup, Hope turned her head stealthily toward the wounded pegasus. Her horn began to glow blue.

It proved not to be as difficult as she thought. Despite the pegasus’ highly injured condition, Hope felt barely any energy draining from her crystalline body. It was a surprisingly easy fix.

“The stirring stick, child, the stirring stick!” Dr. Fie snapped. “Don’t you realize the seriousness of the situation?”

Hope jerked her head up and levitated the stirring stick from the counter. With a meek little “Yes, doctor,” she rushed it over to Dr. Fie.

“Insufferable girl,” Fie said as he took the stick and began to stir rapidly enough that at least a quarter of the “medicine” onto the ground.

Meanwhile, the pegasus on the bed began to stir. Dr. Fie quickly put himself in between the patient and the nearest paramedic.

“I’ll just slide this down his throat,” he announced to the paramedics. To the pegasus himself, he whispered. “Here, drink this. You’ve been in an accident and I’m a doctor. This will take care of it.”

The pegasus, still too groggy to protest, did as he was told. Dr. Fie tossed the cup into the trash and backed away from him. He blinked a little and then opened his eyes more fully.

“What… what happened?” he said. “I was trying to cross a street, but there was a pothole… or was it a cloud-hole? Then I was falling….”

“You’ve had an accident. We brought you to the hospital,” one of the paramedics said.

“I would thank you to remember that you are not the presiding physician here,” Dr. Fie said to him. Then to the newly-recovered pony, he said. “There was an accident, dear boy. You were badly injured. But, due chiefly to my heroic perseverance and quick command of the situation, you’ll leave here without so much as a scratch.”

The pegasus quickly found the words to thank his savior. “Why are you calling me ‘dear boy’? I’m thirty-seven.”

Dr. Fie let out a squeak of indignation. Hope could see that some wicked retort was already forming itself in his mind.

She rushed forward just as he opened his mouth. “Please, don’t strain yourself too much,” she said to the patient, “You may be healed, but you still need to rest.”

“Hey, who made you the expert?” snapped one of the paramedics, the continually-flustered one. “The way you acted, he could have been dead by now. And he would’ve been, if not for the doc here.”

Hope bit her lip. These sorts of reactions were the price she had to pay, after all. And, wrong though the paramedic may be in this particular instance, Hope felt she deserved to be the object of her anger.

“Doc? Hmph!” said Dr. Fie. “I would kindly request you, dear girl, to refrain from speaking to my assistant in such a disrespectful tone.”

Hope reflected that the doctor’s response was neither a request nor particularly kind.

“Well, I think our work here is done,” said Dr. Fie, in the same tone. “I’ll have one of the nurses by later to look after him and continue with the treatment. You may all return to the regular duties you should have been performing this whole time. Good day, one and all. Come along, Hope.”

Hope quickly made for the door. But before the doctor himself could take more than a step, one of the pegasi offered him a hoof.

“Thank you, doctor, thank you,” she said. “It’s true what they say about you. You are a miracle worker.”

Dr. Fie smiled. “Well, one does what one can.”

Hope and Dr. Fie walked in silence down the hallway. That is, until Hope spoke.

“Incredibly thick?”

“Oh, you’re not upset about that now, are you?” said the doctor. “It’s just part of the act, you know.”

“I could take it when I was a bit dense,” said Hope. “But incredibly thick is too much.”

“Oh, don’t be that way, dear child. You’re a crystal pony. You have thicker skin than that.”

“Incredibly thick skin, apparently.”

“I have to say things like that so that nopony suspects anything. Since you’ve arrived, I’ve become the only doctor in Equestria with a near-100% recovery rate. Ponies are starting to talk.”

Hope nodded. “I know, doctor.”

“Our agreement has always been that I let you stay here and in return you use that magic of yours to heal my patients.”

“And you in turn get the credit for it. I know.”

“Oh, Hope, don’t make it sound so mercenary! I do my part, too. Those drinks I always give them are high in many essential vitamins and nutrients. Do you know how much suffering is caused in this country by a deficiency in vitamins C through E?”

“No.”

“Neither do I, but it must be astronomical, what with the sorts of things ponies stuff into their mouths and call ‘food’ these days.”

Hope smiled a little, though she was partially forcing it. “Okay, doctor.”

“By the way, about that near-100% recovery rate. Do you think that maybe we could get it up to 100%? If they call me a miracle doctor now, just imagine what they say if we can start saving the DOAs.”

Hope shook her head slightly. “Nope. Can’t raise the dead.”

“But, Hope–”

“Can’t raise the dead.”

Dr. Fie stiffened up, his lips curling into a pouty frown, like they always did when he was disappointed. “Oh, well, can you at least try to work on that? For me? There’s a good girl.”

“I’m not a piece of equipment that can be programmed to do whatever you need, doctor.”

“No, Hope, you are my friend. And never let it be said that Fiddly Fie does not come through for his friends. That is why, even if my words seem a little more cutting than usual, I can assure you that it is entirely with your best interests in heart. I will not spare anything to help you, Hope. You should not be afraid on that account.”

Hope sighed. This was one battle she was not going to win. Then again, you did not win wars of words against Dr. Fie. Everypony gave up from attrition eventually.

Dr. Fie used the moment of silence to stretch himself and look at the clock. “Oh, dear me, how being a miracle-worker does take it out of one. And this bad back of mine is acting up again. To think, I still have the new arrival in the incurables' ward to finish processing. Oh, how these perpetual labors would destroy a pony that lacked my Herculean resolve and determination.”

There was probably more, but Hope tuned him out at this point. That is, until he looked at her and said, “Oh, dear girl, would you be so kind as to do the processing for me?”

“Doctor, you know I’m not really comfortable down there–”

“Nonsense! I’ve already done most of the preliminary work. You just have to ask a few questions of her and record them. You’ll be out of there before you even know you’ve gone in.”

Hope let out another sigh. It had turned out to be one Tartarus of a day.

Dr. Fie took her non-responsiveness for acquiescence and passed over his clipboard to her. The purple glow around it turned to blue as it came to hover over Hope’s shoulder.

“Oh, thank you, dear girl!” Dr. Fie said. “You’ll find all you need to know on those pages there. The new patient’s name is Aurora Gleam and she just checked herself into the ward not too long ago.”

“She checked herself in?” Hope asked. That was unusual. The psychiatric ward was known to all the staff and doctors as the “incurables’ ward” for a reason.

“Yes, yes,” Dr. Fie said. “It does one’s heart good, doesn’t it, to see a mare left with enough sense in her addled little brain to seek help. Now, just fill out what’s left and come drop it off by my study when you’re done. Now, if you don’t mind, I think I’ll go off and get a head-start on some paperwork. A doctor’s work truly is never done.”

He ambled off without waiting for Hope to answer. Hope watched him go and, when she was sure he was too far to catch her, she let out a little blue flare from her horn, straight toward his back.

Nothing. Hope got absolutely no feeling at all. No matter how many times she tried it, it was always the same. The good doctor did not have a bad back, and apparently never had.

Hope shook her head. “You’re wrong, doctor,” she said. “I don’t have any friends. Not anymore.”