As the party exited the spacial realm where they had just attacked and killed the legendary summoner they all thought she was in the past, they were at a loss at what they were going to do now. How would everyone in Spira react if anyone found out that Celestia is dead, along with their "hope" of calling the Final Aeon? At least no one else will sacrifice their lives and become the next Sin, but now they had to find some other way to defeat Sin, and they don't have a clue how to do that.

Rainbow Dash was the last to leave as she began thinking, the others having already left the now darkened waiting hall for Celestia. Without her presence, the room seemed to fall into despair. As she stepped down the stairs, she noticed Rarity sitting near the bottom, almost like deja vu as it brought back the moment the pegasus's long and difficult journey began. She knew there was something the unicorn wanted to tell her that only she was supposed to hear, not knowing if it was going to be about her father or something else.

"Let me guess, Rares. You wanna tell me something in private that nopony else should know?" Rainbow asked.

"Am I really that predictable?" Rarity sighed, looking at the gem she used to form her katana. "They say revenge doesn't solve anything...I felt no satisfaction after I impaled Celestia, even though she deserved death. Nopony else will have to suffer the same fate as your father and Kindred ever again..." She held the diamond up to Rainbow Dash, holding it to her eye level. "The brightest of gems are not what they seem. To the untrained eye, you might not be able to see how tarnished it is on the inside, where you're too busy being infatuated with the outside."

"...Is this some sort of lesson?" the pegasus questioned, not understanding what Rarity meant.

"No...Take a closer look at my eyes. There was a reason why I wore those sunglasses, and it was not to shield my eyes from the sun, or hide my true emotions." Wondering what the unicorn was trying to imply, Rainbow moved closer and took a better look at Rarity's eyes.

Squinting her eyes, she tried to see what was wrong with the older unicorn's eyes. She soon found out what it was; her irises are slightly grayed, though they still retained their azure hue. As strange as it was to see Fluttershy with two differently colored eyes, it was unnerving to see someone with eyes like hers. It then clicked as she had seen similar eyes like Rarity's before. Blueblood had those same dulled eyes, the same eyes that were slightly lifeless, almost like the pony was dead.

"...Oh my gosh," Rainbow uttered as she backed away. "...You're...Celestia killed you..."

"Yes." Spirits began to fly out of the unicorn. "I'm an unsent, like Blueblood and Star Swirl..."

"...I thought you acted weird...Back in Guadosalam, you didn't enter the Farplane...You stayed far away from Fluttershy when she performed the sending. And the pyreflies..." It seemed pretty obvious after everyone saw Rarity attack Celestia ten years ago and failed, her injuries seeming fatal after she didn't move when that memory faded. "...Don't tell me you're going to turn on us because you're alive again."

"I'm not as sadistic as Blueblood, Rainbow Dash," Rarity said. "Just because I'm unsent doesn't mean I'm going to have a different personality. Besides...being dead does have a few perks. I was able to travel to your Zanarkand on Sin and watch over you, like I promised Jet Stream."

"When did he say that?" Rainbow questioned.

"It was...thankfully left out of the earlier memory in here...I'll show you what happened to me as well." Rarity pressed a hoof to her chest as the spirits around her flew out and began playing out Rarity's own memories of the events that transpired ten years ago.

Seeing everything from Rarity's point of view, tears ran down her face as she was given a final goodbye from Jet Stream, the stallion approaching Kindred. He stopped halfway across the room, looking back at her.

"Hey, Rarity? Can you do me a favor?" he asked, Rarity slowly nodding her head. "...You think you can watch over my family for me in my Zanarkand?"

"...What? How am I supposed to do that if they're already gone?" Rarity asked, finding the favor seemingly impossible.

"I managed to get here from a thousand years ago. There might be a way back if it's a one-way trip." Jet scratched his head, seemingly unsure if it was possible to travel back in time. "If you do, just don't put Dashie in any of your frilly dresses you made for little Flutters. I know she'll hate wearing those."

"...How can you keep making stupid jokes like that, and still be sane enough to continue doing this?" Reluctantly, Rarity nodded her head, despite her odds of ever seeing her. "I'll take care of them, Jet..."

"Thanks, Rares." Jet approached Kindred as the two talked, their words fallen on deaf ears as Rarity knew she couldn't keep a promise like this.

A while later, Kindred Heart came back out, looking pale as he had just had one of his friends sacrificed to be the next fayth. Time skipped forward as Rarity was now on her own in Bevelle, promising Kindred to look after Fluttershy for him once he brings the Calm. He knew she was going to break down when he confronted Sin and left her to that task, not wanting her to see him die by their loyal friend. She was already broken, just imagining what would happen to the summoner already killing her emotionally.

She did keep her promise to Kindred and watched over Fluttershy, struggling not to cry in front of her as her face kept reminding Rarity of Kindred Heart and his sacrifice. At least the other monks looked out for her when she wandered around Bevelle on her own after a week since the Calm started. The unicorn drank hard alcohol, trying to numb the pain in her heart as she had lost two friends she held dear, all while knowing the full truth behind all of their beliefs being nothing but endless death.

It had now been nearly a month after the Calm started, Rarity leaning against the balcony of one of the tallest towers in Bevelle, overlooking a majority of the Calm Lands. She was sober, but nothing would ever fill the emptiness in her heart. Fluttershy always put on a brave face whenever she showed up, knowing her father is gone, but Spira was saved thanks to him. Rarity didn't have the heart to tell her about what happened to Jet Stream and why her rainbow-haired uncle didn't come to visit.

She was about to head back downstairs when she heard something come from the Calm Lands, a low roar that made her heart stop. It was the exact same roar that came from Sin. And as she looked out to the land, she saw it had come back, lounging in the ocean where Kindred had last killed it. It came back in less than a month, her friends' sacrifices meaning nothing.

"...No...Jet...You said you would find a way to stop it..." Feeling her anger boil past its breaking point, she slammed her hooves down onto the railing, shattering it to pieces. "Celestia...You're no saint...You're a killer..."

The memory flashed in and out as Rarity ran out of Bevelle, through the Calm Lands, up Mt. Gagazet, run through the ruins of Zanarkand, and confront Celestia, slashing her way through any fiends that had gotten in her blind rage. Rainbow Dash knew what was going to happen next as Rarity lunged at Celestia to cleave her in half, only for the summoner's barrier to block her, shatter, and pierce through her body several times, sending her tumbling across the ground with fatal injuries, her katana landing inches away from her head. She slowly lifted her head, watching as the last of Celestia's flowing mane and tail disappeared down a flight of steps in the back, having failed to kill the mare who had killed so many for Spira's false hope.

Despite her wounds, she managed to find the strength she had in her to get up, leaning against her blade as a crutch to keep her standing. Rarity began making her long trek back to Bevelle, tears streaming down her face, along with blood from her scarred eye, weakly limping away. She failed to avenge her fallen friends. She failed to stop Celestia from sacrificing more possible lives for future summoners and their guardians. She failed to keep her promise to Jet Stream and Kindred Heart to watch over their daughters. She failed to be strong and lost control of her temper, and her price to pay would be her inevitable death.

She had spent an entire day, limping back home, surviving on potions to keep her alive. Rarity had run out of what she kept on her as soon as she made it through the caves of Mt. Gagazet. A terrible blizzard struck the mountain that day as the cold numbed her already tired and dying body. No fiends bothered attacking her, knowing she was already dying and waited for her to become one of them. Her vision grew blurry from the storm and her life finally, yet slowly, succumbing to her injuries. She barely reached the end of the trail as a powerful gust pushed her back, unable to fight it as she lost her footing and fell over the side of the nearby cliff.

She tumbled down the rocky cliff side until she seemed to hit solid ground, her body gone limp as she now rested on a small landing on the side of the cliff she fell. The unicorn was still alive after the fall, but her life was slowly fading as she desperately clung on to the living, scared to die out her, by herself.

As her vision began to grow dark, her ears perked up when she heard something climbing up the mountain, hearing the sound of a young boy's voice grumbling. "Stupid...Garble...Every time...he picks on me...and he thinks he's so great...Ripping off my wings like a-" He stopped talking to himself when he felt something soft compared to the rocky surface of the mountainside. As the boy climbed up, Rarity could barely see what it was, but she saw a blurry purple and green figure lifting himself on the platform she was on. He sniffed the air and moved his claws over her legs and side, feeling her clothes and fur. "Blood? Oh my gosh! Are you alive!?"

She could barely lift up her head as the boy tried to keep her awake. He pulled out a potion, gently lifted the mare's head up, and slowly poured the healing liquid into her mouth. With little strength returning to her, her vision cleared up a little as she saw a young Spike kneeling over her. Seeing this was her only chance to try to make up for her carelessness, she hoped she could keep Fluttershy safe and carry out her message to this young dragon.

"I-I'm...not going to make it," Rarity weakly said as tears welled up in her eyes.

"Don't say that. I'll climb up and get the elder. He can help." Spike tried to gently lay Rarity's head down, but the unicorn managed to muster up what strength she had left in one of her hooves, stopping the young dragon.

"I-It's too late..." Her tears rolled down her cheeks as she weakly clutched Spike's arm. "D-Don't leave me..."

"...Ok..." Spike stayed where he was.

Though he couldn't tell what this mare looked like with the blizzard shrouding his vision, he honored her wish to not die alone. "...I-I...I failed..." she whispered. Rarity looked up at Spike feeling the last of her life fade away. "P-Please...grant me my...final wish..."

"What is it?" he asked.

"...F-Find...the daughter of S-Summoner...Kindred Heart," Rarity uttered, her vision slowly fading black. "T-Take her...somewhere safe...P-Protect her...D-Don't...let anything...happen to her..."

"...Ok. I'll fulfill your wish, ma'am." She nodded her head, thanking the dragon as she finally embraced death's door, passing away in Spike's arms.

A moment of darkness had passed, nothing going on for some time. Rarity slowly began to open her eyes, feeling alive, even though she had just died. Instead of Mt. Gagazet, where her resting place was supposed to be, she found herself in some strange realm, which looked exactly like the same place Rainbow Dash found herself in when she was sucked in by Sin in Zanarkand. She stood up, looking over herself, all of her injuries having healed themselves.

"W-What happened to me?" she questioned, thinking she would have become a fiend as she wasn't sent to the Farplane.

Appearing next to her hooves was a letter, though how it showed up out of thin air without a unicorn's magic was a mystery to her. She opened it up and read it to herself.

Hey, Rarity.

Well, I hate to say this, but you kinda died. After you kicked the bucket, I thought for sure you would have turned into a fiend, like many other ponies we saw when they got killed on our pilgrimage. Turns out your just as stubborn in death as you are in real life. At least you're not a zombie...sort of.

Anyway, I found your body on Gagazet and actually sucked you in here. And, yeah...by in here, I mean Sin. I'm the bad guy now. Whoop dee doo. Celestia wasn't joking after all...I couldn't really stop it. So, I screwed up. But that doesn't mean you're going to go back on that promise you made for me. You'll probably pass out after you wake up and read this, and you'll be seeing my Zanarkand as it was a thousand years ago. Better get used to being around machina.

But don't think this will be all for nothing. I have a plan. In the next ten years, I'll come back to get you and Dashie and bring you back to Spira. Look out for her and my wife for me when you get there. My house is located in the southern docks, the last boat down. She might not like you that much if you mention you're one of my friends. She's going to think differently with your beautiful looks. Just make sure she doesn't cry a lot.

Jet Stream

P.S.: Nice scar. Makes you look like the badflank you are with that sword of yours.

Before she could question what Jet Stream meant in this letter, she passed out, just as he had predicted. A while later, the sounds of a city reached Rarity's ears, waking her up as she rubbed out the headache she was given. The moment she realized where she was, she gasped as she was on the outskirts of Zanarkand. Jet's Zanarkand.

It was just like he had told her and Kindred while on their travels: bright lights, tall buildings, the hustle and bustle of ponies going about to shops and restaurants, dozens of colts and fillies running around wearing their favorite blitzball team logos on shirts or jackets. Rarity was really out of place with this grand city, especially when it came to her clothing looking ancient compared to this present's fashion style. Ignoring the idea of being in this machina city, taking Jet's advice to get used to living with forbidden technology.

While wandering around the many stores, she managed to catch a glimpse of herself in the reflection in the  window of a nearby sunglasses store in a shopping district. She finally got a good look at her face and saw the scar Jet mentioned over her right eye, along with her slightly dull irises.

"Oh my...I'm an unsent...I shouldn't be alive..." She didn't bother hiding the scar on her face as she made the realization. She knew why she was still alive, why she wasn't a fiend yet, why her spirit lingered to the living. Her promise she made to both Kindred and Jet Stream weighed her down, even if she deserved to die from failing them. This time, she intended to keep her promise to Jet now that she was here. She also wanted to end Sin's resurrection once and for all, believing her friend's plan will succeed, whatever it will be. "...Jet...I hope you know what you're doing..."

While she was busy reflecting on her ties to the living, she decided to buy a pair of sunglasses, paying with the Gil she had left on her. The clerk didn't seem to mind it, seeing the differently shaped currency as some form of foreign money that was worth more than the current bits they used. She put her new glasses on to hide her eyes from the rest of the population.

After asking around to find where Rainbow Dash and her mother lived, she found the docks where several boat homes sat, spotting the last one being the right home. It was clearly obvious this was Jet's family home, finding a young Rainbow Dash kicking a blitzball around on the deck of the ship. She looked almost identical to her father, unable to believe the stallion would say anything bad about a filly like her for so long since she had known him. Steeling back her nerves, she approached the deck and stopped a blitzball that rolled up to her after Rainbow smacked herself in the face with it.

She looked back to get the ball, noticing the strange mare standing in her home. "...Can I help you?"

"Is...this Jet Stream's house?" Rarity asked, receiving a sneer from the filly.

"Oh. You must be one of those mares...Dad's disappeared, and we don't know where he is," Rainbow coldly explained, Rarity definitely seeing the disdain toward her father.

"N-No no! I'm actually an old friend of his from school!" the unicorn lied, hoping it was believable. The pegasus filly crossed her forelegs together, giving her a look of disbelief. "...I know you don't believe me, but I really am a friend of his. I know of his...uhh-"

"Sleeping with other mares? Flirting with them?" The unicorn was appalled to hear Rainbow bluntly saying what infidelities the stallion had committed, nodding her head as she was also one of those mares he tried to hit on. "You expecting some sort of fun night with him?"

"Absolutely not! He's a pig!" Rarity shouted, quickly covering her mouth before the other neighbors heard her badmouth the popular blitzball celebrity gone missing.

"Hmmm...So, you hate him too, huh?" Rainbow pondered after hearing Rarity's outburst against her father. "...You two didn't do anything together, right?"

"Y-Yes," Rarity replied, clearing her throat as she calmed herself down. "He was more of a perverted nuisance where I wanted to just kick him where the sun doesn't shine."

".........Alright. You're cool." As quick as it was for Rainbow Dash to like her over Jet Stream's stupid antics and adultery with other mares, at least she liked Rarity. "I'm Rainbow Dash."

"Nice to meet you, Rainbow Dash. My name is Rarity." Rarity's memory faded out, both mares knowing what happened next as the past decade went by.

After the last of the memories Rarity wanted to show Rainbow Dash ended, the spirits flew back inside the unicorn. The two mares stood in silence as the pegasus processed everything that had happened to Rarity before the two met each other in Zanarkand.

"That's why I'm still here," Rarity finally spoke after some time. "I kept my promise to Jet Stream, and I'm still going to keep you safe for as long as I can. And once Sin is finally beaten, once and for all, I'll be able to rest peacefully."

While going through what she had just seen, she realized something in the unicorn's memory when she was about to die. "...That dragon who found you was Spike...Back in Djose, when he finally spoke to me, he told me about why he became Fluttershy's guardian; to fulfill your promise."

"...It seems so. I barely recognized him when I saw him back in Luca." Rarity chuckled as she straightened out her clothing. "He thinks I don't notice, but he's trying to flirt with me...I don't think he even knew I was that same mare who died in his arms as he kept his word to fulfill my dying wish. I wouldn't blame him for not being able to tell with that blizzard that day."

"...Gross." Rarity laughed a little harder at the disgust on the pegasus's face, just imagining the two in a romantic situation.

"I'm sure you know the deal, learning all this?" Rarity asked.

"Yeah, yeah...Keep my mouth shut or else everypony's gonna flip." The two mares left the room, glad to be leaving this place as they caught up with the others outside.

As the rest of the party waited for them outside of the stadium, the sun was beginning to rise on the horizon. What they didn't realize was that Sin was practically a quarter mile away from them, staring at the crumbled ruins of the stadium where the Final Aeon rested. Where they expected a fight, Sin didn't do a thing, just staring at them.

Rainbow Dash knew why it showed up; Jet Stream felt Spira's "hope" was finally gone. It was as if Sin knew its never-ending revival was finally coming to an end. She could feel its eyes looking at her, despite not knowing exactly where its eyes were on the massive face of the fiend.

"Just a little more time, dad," the pegasus whispered. "The Final Summoning's gone, but I'll think of something to help you."

As if it heard her hushed voice, Sin slowly nodded its head and began to turn around, either to cause more chaos or rest somewhere. From the sunrise, the party saw the large airship approaching Zanarkand, practically brushing past Sin like they were brushing shoulders as they went in opposite directions. Sin didn't even pay it any attention as it left, leaving the airship alone and intact, definitely not how the dangerous fiend was supposed to react.

"...Wow. That had to be the dumbest idea dad had as they drove the airship next to Sin," Pinkie said. "I wonder if everypony inside panicked?"

Inside the airship's cockpit, Cid, his daughters, excluding Maud, and Cheese all had shocked and scared expressions on their faces, having just brushed past Sin and survived. "...That...was not the smartest thing to do..."

Cheese, sitting behind the wheel, passed out in fear after he had parked the airship next to the stadium to pick up the group. Maud looked over at Cid, her face as neutral as it always is.

"Next time, I'm driving," she said. Next Chapter: Chapter 45: Exploring Spira: Baaj Temple Estimated time remaining: 3 Hours, 8 Minutes