Day. Blue sky. Warm morning air. The city of Canterlot.

It was not market day, but nevertheless the market plaza of Lower Canterlot was still bustling as Crimson limped his way through the noise and crowds.

He had only the one destination fixed in his mind; the alcove with the statue of Luna. Where the last letter from Prey had told him to go.

His stomach was hurting, his body weak. He hadn't eaten anything in thirty six hours. His own fault, but he hadn't been able to face it.

How could he have an appetite when Gloom and Prey were both gone and never coming back?

A regret he was suffering now, as his three good legs and one bad shook and seriously threatened to give up on him. If only his wing was working, he could have been there already.

Throngs of happy, brightly coloured ponies passed Crimson by on every side. Their words and chatter were a muted buzz, and his ears didn't swivel to follow any one of them. There was only one thing that mattered right now.

He pushed through, as fast as he could limp. When ponies turned and saw his wild mane and unkempt fur, coupled with his bandaged injuries, they swiftly left a bubble of empty space around him. He didn't spare any of them a second look.

And there it finally was, at the end of the plaza and set off to the side. The quiet alcove and hooful of steps leading up to Luna's statue.

He saw no one waiting there for him. Was he too late? Or too early? Were they instead hiding in the crowd and watching? This could be a trap.

'No. The letter was in Prey's room. Nobody hostile could have gotten in and left it there. I'll just have to wait.' Crimson grimly thought.

He ignored his stomach, ignored his aching, itching injuries, ignored the shaking in his legs, and stiffly climbed the few stairs.

It was much quieter in the alcove, most of the noise of the market cut off. The larger-than-life, rearing statue of Luna looked down on him. It was plain, polished grey stone. Crimson turned his back on her and faced the market.

There was only one way in and out of the alcove on hoof, and he could also watch the sky at the same time. He made up his mind then and there to wait for however long it took.

Crimson waited, weak and hungry, but far more than that, desperate. And waited.

And waited...

Every minute was one beset by doubts that he'd already missed his window, or that Prey's contact wasn't coming.

He kept waiting, in a sick repeated parody of yesterday. Had it really only been yesterday?

And waited some more...

Ponies passed by in the market, and pegasi overhead in the sky, but none were showing any interest in the quiet little alcove, or its one red inhabitant.

Crimson waited. He noticed in the corner of his vision that someone had added some more graffiti on the alcove wall, presumably some bored youth sneaking out at night. "Nightmares 4 Free", the scrawl read.

He became aware, he wasn't sure exactly when, only that it was after the fact, that someone else had casually walked up the steps and joined him in the alcove. And somehow, he hadn't reacted.

A vague yellow pony in a hat, that was all his eyes had been noticing. He'd known in the back of his mind she was there, just not realised.

"Crimson Trace." She addressed him, and suddenly he'd always known it was a mare, fur and razor-straight mane straw yellow, wearing a sunhat and a short travelling cloak.

She stood across the alcove, with plenty of personal space between the two of them.

She knew who he was. She'd come here specifically for him. He had no idea who she was, but she must be who Prey's last letter had meant.

Crimson was certain he'd never seen her before in his life, but she was vaguely familiar. The lingering scent of old blood. Like Prey. He was keenly aware he was unarmed, temporarily crippled, and covered in injuries.

"Are you who P-Prey mentioned in his letter?" His words came out as a dry croak, and broke on Prey's name. He cleared his throat and repeated himself.

"Yes, Crimson." The words, tone, and delivery were flat, empty. But he imagined he heard something dark swirling underneath.

He noticed her dull eyes were as flat as her words.

"Who are you?"

"My name is Lemon Pink."

"Prey, he, he never mentioned you." It came out accusatory.

"I know. He wouldn't have." Was the toneless reply.

"Why not?"

"I'm a secret. I worked in secret for Prey. With Prey. Many important secrets."

Crimson didn't know what that meant, "Are you from before? I mean, before he came to Canterlot? His home?"

"No."

Crimson waited. The unnaturally still mare didn't add anything more.

"Then who are you?" He gritted out.

"Oh. Prey made me. I was part of him, came from him. I served him. But now..." A quiver went through the mare’s jaw, "...Now I'm just me. Alone. Lemon Pink. Free."

"Free? I mean, weren't you before?"

"Yes. No. It's complicated. I am... 'free' now, and must act for myself. No guidance. I have a few last duties to perform, but then I am free to do as I think best. Those were Prey's standing orders."

"Why can you even remember-? Why can I remember?! No one else can. Why've they all forgotten? They just, they just forgot him, like he never existed, after all we did!"

His voice cracked with the weight of his intent, but he kept going, "Why can you remember? Why has everyone but us, and bloody Celestia forgotten?!"

Lemon was silent, still, a statue. Then finally, "I don't know. I don't know why they've all forgotten him. I only know why we still remember."

"Oh yeah? Then why?"

"My mind is naturally shielded by what I am. Yours too. My memories are also further protected," Her hoof rose to her throat, a flash of a silver choker under the travelling cloak, "Again, yours are too. By that feather you carry."

Her horseshoe slowly scraped across the paving stone, a gritty, drawn out squeal. Her voice wavered where her face didn't:

"I was too slow. Not fast enough. I should have been back in time. Failure. Felt the rune deactivate. And now it's too late. We worked together on many topics, researched. Dark topics. I've always been here, in the background."

Crimson watched her. He didn't understand even half of what was going on. But he was angry.

Angry at Celestia, angry at this oblivious city, angry at whomever this mare thought she was, and angry at Prey for never mentioning her. Angry that Prey had left him behind.

"Why didn't Prey tell me about you if you were so important? What are you doing here now? And why should I trust you?"

"This isn't my real appearance," Lemon Pink abruptly informed him, as if that would somehow help her case, "This appearance is an illusion. I call her Sunflower. My name is Lemon Pink, though. But if I am in disguise, please refer to me as Sunflower in the future. For the safety of both of us."

"Answer my question. Please."

Lemon Pink slowly reached under her cloak. Crimson's muscles coiled. But she only took out a blue strip of silk.

Crimson stared at Prey's ribbon, draped across her hoof.

"This will explain everything."

"Where did you get that? That's Prey's. And, Celestia said-" His voice was strangled.

"It found me." Lemon said, as if that should make everything clear. It didn't.

"What?"

"It found me. It will always find its way back. Always." She repeated that as if it was of vital importance.

"Please! Just give me a straight answer. Tell me about Prey. Did he, did he leave any message, did he say anything?" He was on the verge of begging.

"Yes. He left this." Lemon Pink held out the silken ribbon which should have been tied back behind Prey's ear, where it belonged.

It stabbed him in the gut as he realised all over again that he'd never see Prey wearing this ribbon, the lamb's defiant joke against the world, ever again,

"A message? Did he leave a message?" He pressed, desperate. This mare seemed not to be all there. Distracted. Maybe she was also grieving.

"Yes. I said, he left this."

He looked at her hoof, "The ribbon. How is...?"

"If you take it, you'll see and know. A memory packet. There's a message left behind in it."

Crimson didn't know what that was supposed to mean. Did it matter though? It was something weird, probably dangerous, but Prey had left it behind for him. He limped forwards, crossing the intervening space between them.

But Lemon Pink, or Sunflower as she wanted to be called, pulled back the ribbon slightly, "I am obligated to warn you first. This will hurt. Nor is it completely safe. You can choose not to take it, and I will still perform my last orders and help you. You are, were, you were precious to Prey."

Her dull, emotionless eyes bore into him, "So very precious. We, he, latched onto you hard. He recognised that. But still it happened. And I will help you too, even though I am my own person. So listen to my warning; this ribbon is not safe. At all. In a way you can't understand. It is a connection."

"A connection to where?" He asked, hot and cold running through his veins. The slack silk ribbon looked so harmless, and yet... knowing Prey as he did, he couldn't help but think of a venomous blue viper, the bright colour a warning.

"A place. Non-real. It is important to remember that place isn't real on Equus or the moon or elsewhere, even if it does exist. You must not forget to keep that separation clear in your mind if you take this ribbon."

He listened to her, but to Crimson, there was only one choice despite the mare's flat warnings. He held out his hoof, turned face up.

For a brief second, Lemon almost looked reluctant, or perhaps jealous, "Then from now on, and always, it is yours." She intoned, and the ribbon smoothly slipped off her hoof with a life of its own and dropped onto his.

First the silk was cool. Then it was cold. Then it bit him.

Roaring black in his ears, grey ash filled his eyes and mouth-

Crimson was not Crimson, he was something else. Jarring, shuddering pain.

He felt like he was being crushed, splintering under an unimaginable weight. It was terrible, blinding in pressure.

Then it went away, lifting to as light as a feather. The relief that filled him, or whatever he was, was indescribable. In that moment, he didn't think anything could be worse than the crushing pressure he'd barely been delivered from. He was wrong. For in the next moment, came a touch.

Rusty barbs. Hooks in his brain. Thorns growing through his eyes. Screaming as glass poured into-

He tried to fight back, tried to defend himself, reaching for the mental self-discipline which had helped him so many times.

It meant nothing. In that moment, his all willpower meant nothing.

It wasn't him, wasn't Crimson who took all the pain away. It wasn't anything to do with any strength of his own.

It just... ended, as the memory packet finished settling into his head and opened.

He shook; hurt, afraid, not mentally there, but very distantly aware of the paving stone under his hooves in the real world.

And then there was the memory. Not his own, he'd never had these thoughts before, but he was remembering them as if they'd always been his.

No sound, no image, no tone of voice or accent, because how could a thought have any of those? Just a thought, but one as close as anything could ever be in his heart, because it was now Crimson's very own thought.

'Hello Crimson. I am thinking this to myself, but if you absorb this in the future, then yes. It's me, Prey.'

'If you are hearing this, then I'm sorry. I don't know how it happened, but I'm sorry. I don't know what your circumstances will be, but I'm sorry. And if you've taken my ribbon, then I'm sorry.'

'There are things I must tell you, for your own safety. About changelings, about the Deeper Green, about blood magic and many more things. I have secrets. So many secrets. Ones I could not tell you if I was alive. I just can't. Couldn't.'

'I won't tell you everything, but instead nearly everything, and I'll explain why I skip bits of the story in those places, because some things are physically unsafe to know. They can mentally kill you. But even if I don't explain the how, I will explain the why.'

'Once upon a time...'

There were very, very few images to accompany Prey's packet of memories, only brief, still-life recollections where it was important for Crimson to have a visual understanding of something. Like what the raw, unprocessed ingredients of Bone Rot looked like. But otherwise, it was all Prey's own self-reflection.

'And that's important, believe me. You aren't me. I am not you. And in experiencing my life, even secondhoof, the memories would start to bleed over and blend together, and you would begin to become me.'

So instead of true memories, rather in words with the very occasional frozen, still-life picture, Prey simply told Crimson his story.

Crimson heard about a small, forgotten farm on the border, where there had once lived an ewe, and her two young sons.

'All we wanted was to be left alone.'

He was briefly told of a hard upbringing with an absent and then dead father, while struggling against both the land itself and the earth pony landlords to survive.

'Now, I would give anything to go back to those simple times.'

Of an uprising, of rebels who called themselves The Resistance, and how it all began to creep into everything else.

'They were the worst of the worst. Murderers. Thieves. Torturers. They were monsters. I was one of them.'

About a new Border Guard Captain called Fire Strike, and a fire.

'I only regret it was far too late by the time I killed him.'

About how Gossamer died, and Prey was born. About Breaker, about Snake, and about failure.

'It was there in the silence after the battle. It was there in the cold mud. It was there in me.'

About fifty-seven years of never-ending, insanity-inducing isolation, and the grinding nothing of an inactive volcano prison and fortress called Dreverton.

'I counted every single day there. Every. Single. One.'

And then, about a chance appearing out of nowhere, presented by an arrogant, ignorant Solar Guard Captain named Valour.

'I killed him. Quite recently, in fact. I don't really regret it, I play around with the notion, but no. And I know now that I didn't really have a good reason for it, when I could have just left him alone and ignorant.'

About who Lemon Pink really was, and what she had come from. Who she had come from. And how it was her who had later kidnapped the foal Rocky Bed.

'Lemon is a person as real as you and me. She's just different. Trust her.'

Luna. A dream. An offer. A job. And a new team. Of his first time meeting two new ponies he didn't like or trust. Crimson, and Gloom.

'We came so far since then, huh?'

Their first mission. Distrust. Hatred of Canterlot and its ponies. And then their second mission. The cellar. Garrow. The Lumber Yard.

'There are only two things I won't do for you. I made a promise that day. I meant it with all my heart.'

Scenic and Lilly Blossom coming onto the scene.

'I don't hate them now. I did then. I realised though, after Discord, when I chose to return, that I would kind of miss them if they were gone.'

The misery of Mayflower, and the horror of the kindersnatches, scarecrow, and Reaper King.

'It was me. Me and Lemon Pink, I mean. We were the ones who really executed the warlock Hard Baked in the end. He didn't commit suicide.'

Then had come the Wolfing Wood. And Prey had told him this was one of those things it was not safe to know.

'Just know this. There is always a hunt. And therefore, there must always be prey. Think on that, and run far away.'

It was then in his retelling, that Prey had informed him of the long, sordid conflict in the shadows that he'd sparked with a race of shapeshifters called the changelings.

'I don't regret what happened to them. I don't. At least, that's what I keep telling myself. But I'll get to what happened with them soon enough.'

Of where his first gift to Crimson, the jade necklace, had truly come from and where it had gone afterwards.

'I really didn't mean for any of the trouble that followed to touch you. Sorry for that.'

He'd had no clue. Crimson had absolutely no clue at the time about the struggle Prey had been in with a group of unicorn vigilantes calling themselves the Brotherhoof of Sol.

'I can't be sure I got them all, so be careful about them. The diamond dogs though, they were innocent. I still killed them.'

Then Prey had tentatively admitted what he'd done while the rest of them went undercover for their secret mission in Griffonia. That his visit back home had only been a half-lie.

'I know you said you wanted to meet my mother one day. I wish you could have met her, too.'

Discord. A real, accurate picture of the unpredictable and lethal nature of Discord's madness, and not the Harmony-altered, rose-tinted version ponies now remembered.

'I'm trying to construct an array that will kill him if he ever returns for a third time. He is mad, Crimson. And madness is catching.'

It was here that there was a pause, a silence in the darkness. But Prey still recounted without offering any excuse or justification about what had happened to the changeling war swarm, an invading army Prey had exterminated about which nobody in Canterlot ever learnt a single thing. An image of a single cave tunnel packed to the ceiling with black corpses. Just the one. Prey didn't say anything further, left Crimson to judge him, and moved on.

An army of twisted monsters, being grown or perhaps sewn together down in the sewers, from what Prey called a 'wickerwatch'. One which Prey freely admitted to basing off of the Reaper King.

'I don't have any plans for what to do with them yet. If you have need of them, and they're still there, then you are free to use this mage-killer army as you see fit. Just ask Lemon.'

And with that Prey came to the end of recounting his history to Crimson. At no point did Prey offer any excuse, or attempt to justify anything he did. He gave his reasons, but nothing else. There it ended, before the disastrous trip to Haven Hay. Crimson realised that Prey must have created this memory packet before they had ever gotten on the train.

He would never know if there was anything else Prey had wanted to say to him following Gloom's death, something that hadn't already been said. He had to believe that this was enough for closure. That this could be enough.

But the memories did not end there. This last message from Prey, one that he clung to every word of, it didn't finish with Prey simply recounting his life's story.

Prey spoke directly to Crimson, then. It was a memory, Prey wasn't really speaking directly into his mind, but it was so close that Crimson could not differentiate between it in the moment.

'There are three last things I need to leave you with, if you're hearing this. Personally, I'm hoping you'll never hear this message, but just like you have your sworn duty to Luna, I have my own duty to you. So I have for you a warning, a memory, and a truth.'

'First, the warning. I am sorry for this, but you need to know the danger. I have not implanted any of the emotions I hold into this memory packet so far, for your own safety. I am a mind leech, so take it from me; it would have overwhelmed you and brainwashed you into being someone else.'

'Please believe me when I say that you are not mentally weak Crimson. I can't tell you how many times I've wished I could hear your thoughts, but you also don't know the dangers of mind magic. It's more delicate and dangerous than balancing on any knife’s edge. So I haven't been imprinting any emotions up until this point, but just for this warning, I will. It's about this ribbon. About where it connects to. It's touching somewhere else, one side here, the other there. It's a... passive danger. But here is the truth of it.'

Intent obliterated everything, yet it was only a sliver broken off of the whole, true, real effect. The only fraction Prey knew he could withstand.

'People say that before there was light, before there was even dark, there was nothing. They're wrong. Before creation, there was HunGEr.'

Crimson was a speck, he was nothing in the face of the yawning depths. An endless hunger. A mouth swallowing the sky, filled with more mouths upon mouths upon mouths. He was not Crimson. He was only hungry.

Just as suddenly as the world had opened to eat him whole, it slammed back shut, and the intent was gone.

Crimson quailed and shivered as he found himself able to think again. The fading feeling was now a memory, not something he could truly experience again, only a memory of the clanging of alarm bells deep under the sea.

'I'm sorry for that, I really, really am. But you need to understand, my ribbon... I made it as a weapon. Now, it’s something else. Something more, less, and worse. You don't need to worry about it suddenly eating you, you are safe from that. Because I will keep the things connected on the other side at bay, even if I'm dead I've seen to it. But anyone else...?'

'I guess what I'm saying is, think of my ribbon as a veropede that is utterly loyal to you, but only to you. Also, think of it like you would those cursed magic items in old stories. It belongs to you, and will always find its way back to you. But hey, if you ever meet Nexus Fate again in your life, and you have him at your mercy without feeling very merciful, throw this ribbon in his face.' Prey's words spiked with malicious glee for a moment, and then it was gone, back to being only the recollection of previous thoughts.

'Second, is the memory. You don't know this, although you shortly will, but I have used mind magic on you once before. But only because you asked me to, I swear. There was a conversation we shared, which went so far south that I revealed my ability to alter memories, and offered to remove the conversation from both of our heads by mutual agreement. You will see why, as I now return this memory to you. After I finish crafting this memory packet, I will again repress the exact contents of the memory from myself. But if it's come to this point, and you have my ribbon, then it's too late for any secrecy. So here your memory is.'

Crimson barely had time for heart-thudding apprehension to flood him before the memory hit him.

Memory. Actual memory, not just Prey's lone thoughts, but solid memory.

His own. This was his. From his own perspective, seeing the world from his own height once again, not Prey's. There was even the impression of feeling, the folded warmth of his own wings at his sides, and the weight of his Night Guard armour.

And he experienced his own emotions.

Fear, and an old shame so deep he'd prefer to die than to keep stand there.

It was him and Prey. They were standing in Crimson's flat. He was shaking. His eyes were hot and stinging as if he were pulled under seawater. He couldn't look at the little white lamb standing before him, who had just accidentally stumbled across his secret, because he'd been too careless and called out "Come in" when Prey had knocked, without thinking.

'It's all over. It's over it's over it's all over. It's over now.'

The Crimson of now didn't care about the distress of the Crimson in the past, even if he could feel the same raging shame. He strained to make his old self turn his eyes to look at Prey, desperate to see the lamb again even if he knew this was only a memory.

But it was only a memory. He couldn't influence it, only re-experience it as it had originally happened.
And the shame, the trembling, the familiar self-loathing, it sunk its cold fangs into his flesh just as surely as it had back then. Because this was him, and it was happening, had happened, to him.

Prey was sitting back on his haunches, forehooves held up defensively, golden tracer bands glinting on his thin ankles, "Stop, just wait. Don't overreact, Crimson." He was pleading.

Crimson's eyes darted to the window, looking to see if he could dive through it and flee.

"Wait, wait! Crimson, just wait. See? I'm not overreacting, so please don't overreact either."

Prey's words twisted in his chest, eliciting both elated hope and the bitterest of self-loathing. He'd always despised this secret about himself, something he'd been born with and had no control over, but hearing Prey say those words instead of being disgusted like he should've been-

"Crimson!" Prey squeak-shouted, then coughed, "J-just hang on one moment, let me explain."

What was there to explain? Why should Prey be explaining anything? It was him that should be explaining.

But of course, Prey was still here instead of calling for the Guard. Of course he wouldn't run away. He was Prey, they were both as broken as each other. Crimson now knew he'd only been scratching the surface before, but the Crimson back then still recognised that Prey understood.

That hurt. 'Prey shouldn't be understanding. He shouldn't have to understand and accept any of this.'

It was wrong that Prey so obviously didn't care about the right and wrong in this situation. Right dictated he should be turning Crimson in to Nighthawk straight away.

"W-why?" He managed to choke out, eyes still anywhere but on Prey. The lamb was seated in front of the door, so he couldn't flee.

'He sat down there on purpose, didn't he?'

"Why?" Prey cocked his head too far to the left, ear dangling, "Why? I thought that would be obvious. It's because there are only two things I won't do for you, of course."

"That shouldn't-" The rest of the sentence died in his throat. 'That promise shouldn't cover this.'

But... why shouldn't it cover this? Even after everything, he couldn't admit that he'd still been afraid Prey would loathe him for this. He couldn't go on to insult Prey by voicing his ridiculous fear out loud.

Hope made his shaking legs feel like water, but years of shame and fear of discovery couldn't be dispelled so easily. It wasn't rational. But what emotions ever were? Fear made fools out of everyone.

"Hey. It's okay, okay? It's okay." Prey said. It sounded more like a suggestion than a fact.

Crimson was ashamed that his shame still made him too ashamed to look at Prey, which only made it compound all the worse.

"It's okay, really it is. Seriously. I already knew about all this for ages," Prey snapped his mouth shut, "I shouldn't have said that. Ah... oops?"

A jolt shot up his spine. Was Prey trying to make light-? No, Prey wouldn't do that for something so serious. So it was genuine. 'Genuinely light? He genuinely doesn't see what the big deal is, does he?'

The ridiculousness helped. Slightly. "You knew? How? When?"

He didn't want to know. He needed to know.

"There were clues, like when you were reading that city signpost, or not quite agreeing when Gloom brought up blood drinking. But I knew for certain when you got arrested. Remember when Lord Vanish tried to frame you? Yes, of course you do. Well, I came to check your flat, to make sure nobody had tried to plant false evidence. So I searched your flat myself, and, well..." Prey's sky-blue eyes moved past him for a moment, to the cool-box, "... Sorry about that. But I put some 'insurance' in place. You know, just in case anyone else came in and searched your flat too."

"You, you've been trying to cover up for me?!" He jerked, "Please, don't. This is my problem, if I get caught I don't want you also getting dragged down with me."

Then, a horrible suspicion, one he'd known the answer to deep inside returned. His heart plummeted. He could barely form the words. His past self looked at Prey. His present self was at once relieved, elated, and horrified.

"In Griffonia, when, when I was sick... you knew. That medicine you sent, was it ground down...?"

"Yes." Prey answered without hesitating.

"H-h-how? I mean, where did you get...?"

"Same place as you. Just, more carefully. You need to cover your tracks better. Or let me cover them for you."

Crimson couldn't get any words out. It wasn't out of gratitude, although that was there, but rather fear.

Fear of the both of them being exposed, from himself already having been exposed... he'd never wanted this.

"I didn't, I didn't want to be... I wanted to be a thestral. Not, not this." He half spread his own feathered wings in disgust.

"Is it why your clan-?"

"-They are not my clan."

"-I'm sorry. Why clan Myrrdon rejected you for being a genetic throwback, right? You said it'd happened a few times in the past already. And I'm guessing that for those few times, the unfortunate pegasus was less than circumspect about their dietary needs..." Prey cleared his throat and delicately skirted around saying the actual words. For his sake.

He'd been there in the cellar, he'd seen Prey prodding a pool of congealing blood without hesitation. Prey was being polite for his sake alone.

"..." His throat worked around the lump blocking it, but he couldn't face admitting it was the truth.

Not that he needed to. Prey had obviously worked it all out already. He was so very clever like that.

"And thestrals don't need to start drinking blood until shortly after their special talent manifests, which explains why none of them starve to death as babies, so I'm guessing your additional 'unique' dietary needs only came into effect about the same time." Prey continued.

'Stop it. Just leave it there.' Crimson tried to say. But he still couldn't get the lump down enough to actually form words.

"And I'm guessing your father was the only one who accepted it unconditionally. And when it began, that was the start of the proper split between you and them, far more than the previous extreme ostracisation. Everything else just drove this wedge deeper and deeper until-"

"Stop it! Stop. Please just stop." Crimson blurt out.

Prey instantly shut his mouth.

He stood there, shaking and trying to think of what to do next. Prey waited, face solemn, eyes rapidly flicking over him.

He... didn't know what to do. What was he supposed to do?

Did anything have to change?

'This is too much. Things can't go back to the way they were before. I now know that Prey knows. And he knows that I know that he knows.'

Stinging in his cheeks prompted him to bring a wing up to his eye. He was horrified and shocked to see the tear he wiped away.

Not as horrified as Prey looked.

"Zoma'Grika Crimson, listen, I really am sorry. I didn't know keeping this to yourself was so important. I, I know what that's like. I have things that I, that I can't tell anyone about either. I just can't. I'm sorry, if I'd known I would've kept pretending, would've stayed silent..."

"Please don't, Prey. It's okay. It's not your fault you saw, and it's too late now that you know." Crimson admitted with a huge effort of will, "Just, just let me think."

Prey swallowed, and blinked rapidly, "What if..." He bit his lip. He looked afraid. He still opened his mouth again.

"...what if things could go back to the way they were before? What would you say?"

The memory, his own memory now returned to him, abruptly cut off there. The sensations, emotions, and perspective vanished. That was okay, Crimson didn't need to see the rest to know what had happened next.

Prey had made the offer to remove both of their memories of the evening, and selfishly, in a moment of weakness, he'd accepted the offer.

Now, he felt so incredibly shallow for being ashamed back then. Or rather, of being ashamed in front of Prey, who'd never cared in the first place. He would give anything to feel that again if it meant being ashamed in front of a still living Prey.

Prey was not a doll, or some stolen soul of a murdered child, or a golem, no matter what the liar Celestia had said.

Prey was Prey. Always had been. Gloom had always been Gloom. And he would always be Crimson.

And just like that, the knife of grief stabbed him in the lungs all over again. Whenever he forgot for even a moment, it only hurt all the worse a second later.

But Prey's memory packet wasn't done. He didn't leave Crimson there, his last message wasn't finished yet.

'You've had the warning already. That was the memory, now returned to you. Do what you will with it, but it's yours and you had a right to remember it. And last, I have a truth for you.'

'It's that these last few months have contained the most happiness I’ve had of my life as Prey. With you, and with Gloom. Some awful times too, but some of the best. And while I most certainly would change things if I had a second chance, I want you to never doubt that I was happy with you two. I haven't been happy in fifty-nine years. Two fighting and murdering in The Resistance, and fifty-seven plotting the murder of everyone I hated, rotting inside a cell in Dreverton. But now, I've been happy.'

'I love you Crimson. You are my brother. Gossamer had Fleece. And now I have you. You are all that is left of my family, and I love you.'

Crimson's thoughts were empty. He held utterly still, both body and soul, and just listened.

'I want you to understand how much you mean to me. Or meant, if you are listening to this. But I want you to understand how much you meant, because it is important you comprehend how much more valuable you are than anyone else. I say this, because if I'm gone, I don't want you to do something stupid or give up. You're far, far too valuable to stop. Never doubt you meant more and are worth more than any other person in this disgusting golden city. I mean Canterlot, if you're not inside of Canterlot at the time you're hearing this.'

There was the impression of a laugh, or a chuckle in memory, a feeling that Crimson couldn't have described fully.

'I chose to come back to this city I hate, to this nation, to the ponies I hate so much, because of you. So don't undervalue yourself. The ponies of this racist, disgusting city indirectly owe you their lives, even. If it wasn't for you, I'd probably have tried to burn the whole city to poisonous ash at least once. That's not a joke, I mean that in dead seriousness. I. Hate. Canterlot. But I came back because you are more important than the rest of them put together.'

A kaleidoscope of images flashed before his mind's eye. A hundred of them in a second, too fast to properly identify, only giving the impression and outline of what each had been.

Getting milkshakes. Hearth’s Warming at Scenic's. Wry jokes shared. Passing across the blood fern. A shared table in the mess hall. Constructing bed frames. Stacking shelves. Sorting boxes of files. In the courtyard after the Nightmare Night party. Tiredly climbing the apartment block’s stairs. Those, and so many more. Just flashes of captured time, mundane everyday activities done alongside each other. None of them meant anything important alone, but together, they combined to show their lives.

'This is my last message, the truth that I want to leave you with. You are my brother, you are my friend, my best friend. Whatever happened to me, I'm certain it wasn't your fault, and that you would've done everything in your power to stop it if you could. It wasn't your fault, and I won't have blamed you, even if I was alone and scared at the end. Whatever that end may have been.'

'I am scared of dying, I won't lie. However it was that I went, that I will have gone, I doubt it was with much dignity or composure. I am eternally sorry if you were there to witness it. I don't know if there is anything after this life, I don't believe in the Eternal Summer as some ponies do, nor the Endless Savannah like zebrakind do, nor even the Ancestor’s Halls like a few griffons do. But I do know that souls are real.'

'After all I've done, I can't hope for any paradise beyond. If it's a hell though, well, it will hold no surprises for me. But if there's nothing so organised as heavens or hells, then I'll be waiting for you on the other side. I hope I'm waiting a long, long time. Don't worry, I'm very patient.'

'On a more practical note, I don't know what your material circumstances will be at the time of hearing this, but I want to tell you to do whatever you want. Whatever it is, go for it. Feel free to tell anybody you want any of these secrets, or none of them. After all, if I'm gone, it won't matter to me one way or another. I'd just ask you to please consider Lemon Pink's safety before you do reveal anything. She is her own person, and she deserves a better master than me. Lastly, I will say it again.'

'Nothing was your fault. You are my friend, and I am yours. Goodbye, Crimson.'

The too-bright light of midday stabbed Crimson's eyes. Intense disorientation made him so dizzy that his body sat itself down heavily on the alcove’s steps without any say-so on his behalf.

Over his still-extended hoof, the cool silk of the blue ribbon rested. It had remained cool all along, despite the sun and his body heat. Faintly, oh so faintly in the back of his head while looking at Prey's ribbon, Crimson felt the far-off grinding of ceaseless hunger. But he was safe, separated from them, just like Prey had said he would be. He didn't understand how it worked, he just knew that was how it was.

And Lemon Pink was still standing there, in the sunhat that he now knew was inscribed with a notice-me-not runic array, and that a sharp, slightly curved horn lay hidden underneath. She was standing guard over him, he realised that now, having watched him for signs of danger while he was experiencing the memory packet, and made sure no random civilian approached.

Again, a moment of intense disorientation made his head spin. Lemon Pink was a complete stranger to him, but also wasn't. She had known Prey longer than he had, and yet he hadn't known she even existed until today. And now he knew that and so much more.

"Are you well, Crimson?" She asked, in that same flat tone Prey had referred to in memory, saying that's just how she was.

"I, yes." He managed to get out.

"No you aren't." She observed.

"No, I'm not," Crimson agreed, "But I'm better."

The statue of Luna stood watch over them in their moment of silence.

He swallowed thickly, "Prey, he, he said something about an army. What...?"

"Gone. Sent to the Isle of Dove. Revenge."

Crimson squeezed his eyes shut. So that is how, what Prey had meant when he'd said Myrrdon were gone. That he'd taken revenge for Crimson. He'd asked Prey to, he'd begged, and yet, and yet-

-And yet all of Clan Myrrdon. Down to the last child. He hated them. Had hated them. Did still hate them. And now they were all gone. Forever. It was so... suddenly final. The abrupt end. His heart roiled, and he didn't know what feeling was vying for dominance.

But he'd trade every single one of their lives all over again if it meant bringing back Prey or Gloom. But he couldn't. It was out of his hooves, over and done.

Crimson shoved it all down. Later. He could examine it in excruciating, agonizing detail later. He reopened his watering eyes to the too-bright day. The cool blue ribbon still lay across his hoof, infinitely patient.

"Thank you. For, for all you did. And have done Le-, Sunflower." He managed.

"Yes, Crimson."

"What will you do? Now, I mean." He asked, looking up from the ribbon.

Lemon thought for a long, long minute. "There are a last few duties I must complete, last orders. But afterwards, I, I will live. A normal life. If I am able. I want to try it for myself. I have a… coltfriend, that I want to spend more time with. I want to read…"

That was right, Lemon Pink had originally been from Prey, mostly. Kind of. That meant she, like him, had never known what it meant to live freely. She'd never had that opportunity.

Now she finally did. Now she was free. That felt right to Crimson.

What private, previously unconsidered goals might she have? What unrealised ambitions might she cherish? She had her whole life ahead of her, an unwritten story. She was a person. She deserved the right to choose what she wanted for herself.

Lemon jerked, as she seemed to come out of deep thought about her unknown future, and squared her shoulders, "Don't worry. Now you know that Prey and I were aware, I will take over acquiring the sustenance you require. It will be discreetly wrapped and delivered to Prey's apartment. Prey's old apartment. Also, I strongly believe you should move in there. He would have wanted that. You will sleep safe every night in there."

"It's not your problem to solve, it's mine-"

"-I want to." Lemon interrupted with what Crimson now knew was startling vehemence for her. "You were Prey's friend, so I want to help."

She tilted her head for a moment in consideration, sunhat and fake yellow mane dipping on that side. Then she nodded firmly, "Yes. I will live a life to the best of my abilities. That is my goal, not to survive, but to live."

Then, she looked at him from under the shadow of her sunhat, blank lilac eyes somehow still piercing him to the core, "And what will you do, Crimson?"

'What will I do?'

His father was gone. His clan was gone. Gloom was gone. Prey was gone. From here on out, the only one left who could lift him up was himself. He could never forget the words Prey had left to him. He had been despairing, still was, but now, now there was also a spark.

Hope really was the cruellest. Yet he was going to hope anyways.

Prey's last message had given him the tiniest sliver of hope, something only fractionally outpacing the despair. But still, that's what hope was.

Nothing was better, nothing was fixed, Celestia was still a murderer, his friends were still both gone forever, but, Prey had not wanted him to give up and wither away.

He'd said he quit to spite Celestia, but, well, he didn't serve Celestia, did he? The Night Guard served Luna. For now, at least until he could work everything out, perhaps he could continue with that? He could always properly quit if the orders came down to go caving.

Crimson didn't know what was going to happen, but he knew his limits, now more than ever. He was Crimson, the last warrior of clan Myrrdon. What little he knew of Equestria, he'd learnt while in the Night Guard. It was there that the thestrals, the only others who might understand him, worked and served.

"For now, just for a bit, I think I'll stay in the Night Guard." Crimson said softly.

"Are you certain? Money is no object. Prey was... I am comparatively rich. Prey never cared about gold."

"No, he didn't did he? And also no thank you. I'm certain. For now, I will stay in the Night Guard. Until I've had enough time to think."

It was a choice, a declaration that he would face the future. Making a decision filled him with a sudden buoyancy he had not expected. The world was abruptly no longer so terribly dark, just mostly.

Before he could regress or hesitate, Crimson pulled back his mane in one motion and swiftly tied it with Prey's ribbon. That distant grinding of endless mouths settled into the back of his mind. He raised his head, looking up. With his mane out of his eyes, he could see properly.

The endless sky was bright, blue, and wonderfully free.

He rose and stood with conviction. It hurt, it hurt so much.

But he would not take back those good times that now made it hurt.

Nothing was fixed, and the burden grief was unreduced. But look, do you see that?

Can you feel it?

An injured, forgotten red pegasus limped back home. Tired, broken, and half-dead, still he rose up yet again.

One story among hundreds. One among thousands. A single thread in the great tapestry of life. The world does not stop and bend down to listen to the lament of a single ant.

Crimson didn't need it to. The unfair world does not care. So what? He did care. One person could care, and one person would remember.

In the end he wasn't alone, was he? The unworthy hag Celestia had spoken one truth, because even a broken clock is right at least twice a day. The truth that without friends, the years are not worth living.

So when the grief overwhelmed him again and his conviction waned, they were already waiting for him. Scenic. And Lilly. And Carton. And Saffron.

They did not remember Prey. They physically couldn't. The strange, dark effects of the witch Selenia Celestia had spoken about had left holes in their memories where a little white lamb should have resided.

Slowly, over the course of that first long and miserable, sleepless night, Crimson haltingly told them a story.

No details. Not about Prey's secrets. Just of a person, who he couldn't name, who had been a part of their group. About a person who'd served with Gloom and him. And how because of dark magic, they couldn't remember this person they'd lost. And who had been to each of them, a friend.

They witnessed the conviction in his face and the emotion in his voice and believed him, and all of them cried and mourned together for Gloom, and a lost friend they couldn't remember.

"Bittersweet is the memory of loss, when it is shared together."

Lemon Pink stood at the foot of a bed, a tiny figurine watching on from a nearby table. Unfinished business from a life and a lifetime ago. There had never been enough time before when Prey were alive, this task not as urgent or pressing as others. Neither still a latent order, Lemon was doing this for herself.

Big Fields, son of May Fields, daughter of Green Fields, the earth pony landlord of Rushweed and the surrounding areas lay before her, deeply asleep.

She knew logically that the grievances were neither hers nor present, but she held enough claim to her memories and heritage that she felt she had a right to them, a right to satisfy her own feelings and unsettled scores. Can a child be guilty for the crimes of their parents? Their grandparents? Would she gain anything from going through with this, as the stallion at whom this justice should be aimed for many years had no longer been alive to receive it?

She sat, and thought.

An unknown measure of time later, she picked up the lure totem and left.

Strange Happenstance finished rinsing off his plate under the tap and gave it a perfunctory wipe with the cloth, before dropping it into the drying rack.

He hadn't stood from his cramped apartment's tiny table at any point during that. As long as he was looking, he could telekinetically do everything without leaving his chair.

Takeout again. Veggie stir fry, with extra cashews. He got takeout too often, but it was so much easier to do so when living alone. He often had no time to get ingredients, let alone cook. Takeout wasn't healthy, but who cared? His job was going to kill him long before his diet did.

This apartment was simply one in a long chain. He always rented for a few months paying cash, before moving somewhere else.

Strange rolled his head back on the chair. His neck hurt from hunching over papers too long, and his hooves ached from walking the beat all day. Pinned maps and file clippings covered the walls and every available flat surface. His cases. His work. His calling. It would be easier for a bird to deny its' own wings than for him to not follow his cutie mark’s promptings.

Despite it all, Strange would not have traded his job for anything, regardless of the long hours, exhausting work, frustration, and the horrible secrets he unearthed. Somepony had to do it, somepony had to make sure justice won. It was of vital importance to everything that made up Equestria.

It was a very simple equation. It had arrived in his head as a young teenager like a bolt of lightning kicked from a cloud.

'One pony needs to step up, so a hundred more don't have to.' As simple as that.

Two weeks later, in confirmation of his epiphany, Harmony had blessed him with his mark for doing that very thing; stepping up when he saw something strange that nopony else was doing anything about.

Strange rested at the messy table, eyes now shut, for another ten minutes, just letting the long day slowly slip from his withers. It was already dark outside, and the streetlamps' light shone in through his second story window.

When he eventually got up, he dropped the blinds with a magical pull of their cord and slumped off to bed.

He dropped his coat and hat on the cluttered floor and flopped into his unmade bed with a deep sigh of weary contentment.

His unhappy stomach woke him. He rolled over and tried to get back to sleep. That was a mistake.

His guts made a very unhappy and worrying noise at the motion. Then the very pressing need for the bathroom made itself known.

He only just made it to the toilet in time before his bowels let themselves go.

Strange sat on the cold porcelain, hunched over his stomach, head foggy from sleep, and cursed himself for buying takeout.

Half an hour later though, he was still there on the toilet. The squirming pain in his lower gut was still demanding an escape, and the runs just weren't stopping.

An hour later, in the middle of the night, Strange finally started to get scared. He was not getting better.

But what was he supposed to do? He hunched lower and gritted his teeth, determined to wait it out.

It was the point at which he had to shuffle off the toilet, bow-legged, and stagger to the tap to gulp down water because of dehydration that he really started to panic.

But he couldn't do anything. Fear and humiliation warred inside him. He couldn't leave the toilet, he could barely make it back before the runs hit him again.

Please, just let it end. Let the morning come soon.

He was panting, utterly exhausted, but it just wouldn't stop. His stomach just kept squishing and churning. No matter how much water he drank from the tap, it wasn't helping. His lower half was numb with pins and needles from sitting on the hard porcelain.

He stank. The whole room stank. He was considering opening the bathroom window and hoarsely screaming for help out into the middle of the night when he felt something.

Slowly, he turned and looked down into the bowl. Watery filth, blood, and a pile of squirming, bristled worms waited for him.

Three days later, when they broke down the apartment door, that was how they found Strange Happenstance. The would-be rescuers screamed, vomited, and ran. Strange Happenstance wasn't alive to care any longer.

His withered, stinking corpse lay slumped on the blood-encrusted floor. Strings of the now-dead worms still trailed from out of the toilet bowl to Strange Happenstance, mixed with the shredded coils of his own intestines.

They evacuated and burnt the whole block of four flats to the ground, by governmental order.

Lemon Pink stopped by on her way back from the post office while safely in disguise to watch the merry burning from behind the Royal Guard barricade.

Two days later, a parcel arrived in one of House Fell's postal distribution warehouses. Somehow, the parcel ended up bound for the main office.

The office staff couldn't find a return address, but again, it somehow ended up labelled as an internal private order, and got sent along higher up the chain.

A day after that, cleared because of having arrived from their own internal sources, the package ended up in the mail room of Triton Fell's main summer retreat mansion. And then it was summarily forgotten by the servants who were supposed to double-check and sort the hundreds of letters and parcels the Lord received every day.

A couple of days later, for reasons that no maid could quite remember because it obviously wasn't important, a small golden statue of Princess Celestia was placed on the desk in Triton Fell's very own study. Moreover, it wasn't immediately removed by the head maid when she double-checked the room was as spotless as the sun that was just peeking above the horizon.

And then, and then-

And then it was overlooked, glossed over, and forgotten by everyone as simply a patriotic desk ornament. Including Triton Fell, who was very particular and rigorously exacting about his quarters.

So there the golden lure totem sat, and waited, and slowly attuned itself to Triton Fell's very own siphoned-off magic.

And then, and then...

And then one morning Triton Fell was found dead in his grand four poster bed.

Uproar, instant massive market instability, linked nobles trying to rally, and private investments threatening to go up in smoke was the knee-jerk response.

Everything pointed to Lord Triton Fell having simply slipped away for unknown reasons in his sleep. And that was an opinion reached by no less than four independent investigators, backed up by the greatest pony medical professionals in Equestria.

None of the mansion's ancestral wards had been triggered. None of the most cutting-edge alarm enchantments had sounded. Every inch of the vast mansion was examined, all servants rigorously questioned, deduction and scanning spells cast, and hideously expensive experiments tried.

But nopony could find anything which pointed to any kind of foul play. As unexpected and unwelcome as it had been, Triton Fell's untimely death had been completely natural.

Oh, markets still crashed, the Fells' merchant fleet still ended up grounded, and panicking investors still tried to pull out their gold. But that was normal. As normal as Triton Fell's death, anyway.

Within the year though, the Fell House was forecast be back up to full profitability without issue. These things happened. The Fell House would survive, and a new Lord would be appointed and recognised by the Princess.

However, none of that would change one, all-important fact at the end of the day; Triton Fell was still dead.

That was all that mattered to Lemon Pink, as she turned her back on the Fell estates. In the wake of Prey’s death, she’d dug into the trial Crimson had informed her of and who financed it. Paper trails still existed, even if everybody involved now believed the documents read as a trial involving someone else. It was still a cleaner death than the arrogant lord had deserved, but it had to seem completely natural in cause.

No trace left behind meant no trail to lead to her. Even if the investigators had scanning spells sensitive enough, and had scanned the room before the ambient magic of the world dissipated it, the only magical signature which would've been found in the bedroom was Triton Fell's own.

Still, half a country away, a lone white mare wondered. And feared.

And no one would ever consider that Triton Fell's own magic had been used to kill him. Even so, Lemon could have dragged it out for all the long hours of the night if she'd chosen to. But again, no trace was more important. Revenge brought hollow satisfaction at best.

Prey might never have tortured for the sake of torture, but she wasn't Prey. She was Lemon Pink. She was free to choose for herself, for better or worse. Strange Happenstance found that out the hard way.

'Regrettable. But dead is still dead. I will have to be satisfied with that.'

It still didn't feel like enough. The retribution felt like simply going through the necessary motions to fulfil an obligation. Her appointed revenge didn't mend anything.

Bittersweet is still bitter.

There is a 'lie' in believe. An 'if' in life. And an 'end' in friend.

The cavern air was freezing cold. Despite it, Lemon Pink's tricolour mane still hung slick with sweat.

The upper portion of a pony's skull lay before her in a runic circle. It was utterly inert. The smell of spilt blood was hours old, great swatches of the maroon liquid crusting in daubed patterns inside the circle.

The ritual had failed. Her legs were shaking with a hollowed-out, magical exhaustion. A migraine so strong it was streaking pained tears down her cheeks had been the only thing Lemon had managed to achieve.

She wasn't Prey, she didn't have his expertise, his skill, all that she had over him was a subtler mental touch. She hadn't had fifty-seven years of honing herself on the edge of madness. No matter her memories of it, it was no substitute for experience and trained skill. Or maybe it was because she now knew Prey had never truly been flesh and blood, while she was. Did the why really matter though? She wasn't Prey. And she couldn't do what he had been able to.

This was her fifth attempt to bring back Gloom for her new friend, Crimson. It hadn't worked.

She turned away, her aching head bowed. The skull would sit here, protected and preserved, but inert. Frozen in time.

It wasn't working. She wasn't Prey. It would probably take her years to even develop something that had a slight chance of working.

She had so much work to do. Years and years of it. The long list stretched out in her minds' eye. It was only her now left to see to her own future, a guiding hoof no longer there. Brick by brick, she would have to build every plan with her own hoof. That was what the future was. You were always building the foundations in the now. Prey had been constantly building, always vying to have enough tools at his disposal to live. It had worked, until it hadn’t. At the very least, she had an ever-closer earth pony coltfriend to live that busy future with.

Those who didn't prepare? They died far sooner.

History. It is written by the victors.

Sometimes all victory meant was being able to limp away afterwards, because in war there are no winners, only survivors.

Thus is history made, and thus that same history is recorded.

Except when it isn't, because an event is secret, and those few victors in the know don't want records kept.

It is like this that the wider population is kept ignorant of an event, and in a few years’ time it will be nothing but something which happened in the past without any fuss, and therefore mustn't have been important in the first place.

So out of fear, shame, concern, or just plain bad habit, Equestria, or rather Celestia, chose to not record the life of one Prey, the last false-child sewn together by the evil witch Selenia. He had already been forgotten, so let him remain as such.

The great nation of Equestria went on, Canterlot still stood, the Elements still shone brightly. Was that not what was most important? After all, the carefully cultivated buds of their all-important Bearers were beginning to blossom into the sweetest roses of Harmony!

The false lamb's grim work and thankless accomplishments in the ISND were quietly shuffled into the shadows and forgotten. Much like nearly all of the work carried out by the Night Guard, in essence. For their dedication, for their loyalty, and for their unflinching work ethic, the last two clans of thestrals were sidelined, placed out of sight and out of mind.

Ponykind knew in the back of their heads that the night now possessed Night Guards, but despite all the efforts made on integration and approachability, that was where the Night Guard was going to stay in nearly everypony's heads. In the night.

It's amazing how much, and yet how little can change in a thousand years.

A physically forgotten lamb from a purposefully forgotten Night Guard. Yet that did not mean the lamb's actions didn't affect the course of history in the years to come. Just that nobody that wasn’t in the know realised it, or instead wrote it off as a consequence of something else.

Like the changelings. The first and second purges. The tragic story of their race, only revealed after a reformation as their whole species teetered on the brink of extinction.

Changelings as a people lost so, so much because of one, forgotten runt lamb. Scars that were so deep they would never heal.

But ponies didn't see this underneath, they only saw the big, famous events of the changelings. Yet even then, in their ignorance, they didn't stop to ask why, or if they did, they were satisfied with the trite answers written in the annals of history.

Such as why Queen Chrysalis, the last queen of the pre-reformation changelings, was so desperate as to commit to complete exposure in an all-or-nothing gamble at the Royal Wedding.

Or why Princess Celestia, mightiest of the alicorns and embodiment of the sun, was somehow already so weakened that she lost to Queen Chrysalis.

Or even why Chrysalis had slowly been going insane even before the failed invasion, followed afterwards by her rapid spiral into black madness. Grief, monumental loss, a shattered hive-mind, and despair.

Or why after throwing the recently revealed Princess of Love, Cadence, into the tunnels under Canterlot, Chrysalis seemed to expect the alicorn to either die or never escape, and thus didn't sacrifice any of her drones to guard the pink princess.

Nor why, in private after the invasion, Princess Celestia was so deeply relieved by both her beloved student and Cadence's safe escape from said caves. Although in this case, there were a number of surviving and mentally scarred Royal Guards who had more of a clue, even if Twilight and Cadence themselves were never told how close they'd come to death. But that is another story entirely.

Neither the why of Princess Luna being absent from Canterlot at the time, although where would have been the better question. She was in Griffonia, convening with both the High and Low Kingdoms' governments, trying and failing to finally re-establish friendly diplomatic relations. More relevantly, the why for these hostilities in the first place. But whatever it was, ponykind was sure it was the griffons' fault, because Equestria loved peace. But that too was another story.

Thus was history written, and thus were parts of history also not written.

Equestria moved on none the wiser, eagerly heading towards an era of friendship and peace. That was much more important.

After all, the happiness and stability of hundreds of thousands of individual pony lives was of far greater weight on the scales. Later, this would be recorded as the beginning of the Era of Friendship, and the rise of Princess Twilight Sparkle!

And that is how it would be written by the victors.

If you're alive, and the other person is dead, then you are the victor. That is what survival looks like in the Deeper Green.

And finally, last and perhaps least, is another history that never was.

A disagreement, an argument, and a decision that would only be known to two ponies. Two sisters, specifically.

The victors write history, and in this case, said history was solely confined to the writings of twin diaries, one gold and one blue.

Because it was a history that never became, a decision at a crossroads of choice, an alternative path never taken, it was unimportant.

Nobody keeps records of all the events which don't happen, only those that do. Such as all the nights where a meteor doesn't fall to Equus, only the exceptional nights where one does. Nobody can know what might have been, only what is.

That decision between Celestia and Luna?

Due to her weakened, injured state, Princess Celestia decided to attempt a reformation of the mad chaos spirit Discord while there were still living Element Bearers to contain him. Rather than sit in hope that this time, the petrification would last forever, she had to be proactive against the risk that it wouldn't.

Luna argued against. Celestia argued in favour.

Before, Celestia had believed that with Luna by her side once again, they possessed the strength to stop him. But now? Weakened, shaken, and hurt? Now she was afraid. And the sight of that fear is what convinced her sister to aid Celestia in her plan in the end. Because under the illusion and regalia, she carried the constant, aching reminder that she may not now be strong enough, reawakening that ancient fear from previously battling Discord, even if it was now long past.

It really was as simple as that. A path taken, a grain of rice tipping the scales, and another history that now never was. Either for good or ill.

Besides which, it benefitted Celestia's ultimate goal of guiding her dear student up to the dream of alicornhood. It was a beautiful, wonderful goal, one which would bless the whole of Equestria! A pony so obviously beloved by Harmony only came once in a century at most, and of those few, only one before had ever managed to achieve that final step in their destiny.

Princess Twilight Sparkle might have come from a relatively humble noble line, but it was her destiny to rise above everypony! In many years’ time, Princess Celestia would look back on this era, and manage to smile past the pain of the unhealing, ever-burning with driving cold, and withered wounds torn into her chest. Wounds which looked more and more every day like they would never truly heal.

She wouldn't think about what might've happened by keeping Discord petrified though, because why would she? He had been reformed. Harmony had softened his heart and turned him into a force for good.

You don't remember what doesn't happen, only what does. Rarely do you trace back to those who tipped the scales, just enough, for it to happen.

A runt lamb who didn't live. A red pegasus exile who did.

In the end, time grinds all down to dust in the wind.

It wasn't important what happened to the red pegasus after that, nor his last few friends or the life he lived. Whether he found peace, love, revenge, forgiveness, had a foal or adopted or never did any of that, it wasn't important. The vast world didn't care.

Life went on. Equestria was a riotous tangle of so very many other colourful threads to follow, such that if you became distracted for even a moment, you'd never again find the one you'd started with. Even the immortals who had cause to meet and interact with this lone red pegasus, all would no doubt replace his memory with that of a new pony in fifty or five hundred years' time.

Who cared?

Who cared.
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.
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Wait! WaitWaitWait- Before you lynch me, can I interest you in the 'Next➡' button? To the Epilogue.