Chuckling to herself, Rainbow Dash bursted through the doors of Twilight’s castle. Turning a sharp corner, she whizzed to a stop in front of the castle’s famed Friendship Map.

“Goodness!” Fluttershy gasped. “You really do look happy today, Rainbow Dash.”

“Ya sure do,” tagged on Applejack. “What’s got ya in such a sunny mood?”

“Aw, man!” Rainbow Dash breathed, grinning ear to ear. “Pinkie and I just pulled off the most awesome prank of all time! You guys really should’ve been there; I can’t do it justice!”

There was no immediate reply as Rainbow Dash’s friends, assembled for their weekly meeting, exchanged worried glances. Finally, Twilight Sparkle spoke up. “Take a seat, Rainbow...We should really have a talk.”

Rainbow Dash groaned and rolled her eyes as she flittered over to her crystal throne. “Gross. This sounds like some lame lecture, or something.”

Rarity cleared her throat. “We’re just worried about you, darling. You seem a bit...detached from reality. And we want to make it better.”

Rainbow Dash cocked an eyebrow. “Detached, how?”

Twilight spoke again. “It’s just that… Loss can be hard to take, you know? And we want to make it clear that we’re all here for you?”

Rainbow Dash sighed and rolled her hoof in the air anxiously. “Get to the point, I don’t have all day!”

“Rainbow...Pinkie Pie has been dead for four years,” Twilight delivered calmly.

Rainbow Dash scrunched up her face. “Ha ha, guys. Hilarious. I know you guys got me good at our last sleepover with that whole, ‘clouds are illegal after 10pm’ thing, but I’m not that gullible.”

“Rainbow, I know this hurts,” Fluttershy cooed, reaching over to grasp her friend’s hoof gently. “But it’s time to let Pinkie go. She would want you to live your life to the fullest, not live in the past…”

Rainbow Dash yanked her hoof away and glowered at her little yellow friend. “This is a really weird joke, you guys. I just saw Pinkie Pie this morning!”

“Guilt-induced hallucination. Quite common in the literature, actually,” explained Twilight, a clinical polish to her voice. Upon feeling the pairs of eyes drilling into her, she punctuated her statement with an awkward grin. “Nothing to be ashamed of!”
“Consarnit, I understand how you feel, Dash,” Applejack added solemnly, taking off her hat and placing it over her barrel. “That stallion should never have gone flying while drunk. Darn it, I hated him for so long before I finally learned the beauty of forgiveness. But, the accident wasn’t your fault.”

“This is really messed up, guys,” Rainbow Dash protested, her bottom lip starting to tremble. “Stop it, seriously.”

Rarity pouted and looked into Rainbow Dash’s eyes. “We’re here for you, darling. We can work through this, together. As friends.”

“It’s like I always said, Dashie,” Pinkie Pie chimed in. “The only way to move past the crippling trauma and guilt of a flying accident is with the love and support of your friends.”

“Pinkie Pie is right, Rainbow Dash. In fact, I- PINKIE PIE!?” screeched Twilight, her widened eyes filled with terror. “Y-Y-You…”

Fluttershy immediately burst into a fit of sobs and flew across the room, latching on to Pinkie Pie and burying her face into her barrel.

“Jeez, Fluttershy. I know I forgot your brother’s half-birthday last month, but this is a little excessive, don’t you think?”

“Ah...I don’t understand! We buried you at the rock farm! I saw it with my own eyes!” Applejack protested, her mouth agape.

“Well, apparently somepony forgot to invite me,” Pinkie pouted, still patting the sobbing Fluttershy’s head. “I love burials! Especially when there’s an open bar.”

Rarity tried her best to sputter something out. “But...when I’m at Sugarcube Corner...The cakes-”

“I have a nice little condo at the edge of town, now. Don’t worry, I still visit Pound and Pumpkin Cake at night!”

Shaking in her seat, Twilight brought a hoof to her head. “So...The last four years...You’ve been alive? How come you never told us!?”

“I was always inviting you guys to come hang with Pinkie and I!” Rainbow scowled triumphantly. “But you guys never took the offer!”

“Because we thought you were having guilt-hallucinations!” Twilight’s voice shook.

“Oh, Dashie definitely has guilt-hallucinations about me,” Pinkie agreed. “Like, all the time.”

Rainbow Dash slapped the table with a hoof in a fit of clairvoyance. “Oh! So that’s why there’s two of you sometimes! It all makes sense now…”

Starlight Glimmer walked into the chamber casually. “Hey everypony,” she greeted, before walking around the table and placing a hoof on Pinkie’s shoulder. “Nice to see everypony in one place.”

Fluttershy lifted her sobbing face from Pinkie’s fur. “Y...Y..You knew!? You knew Pinkie was alive?”

Starlight’s ears perked up. “She is!?” She did a double-take at Pinkie Pie, who smiled back at her. “I thought I was just having a four-year long guilt hallucination. That was a nasty accident, after all.”

Spike then entered the room, whistling as he wheeled a tray of cookies in for his friends.

“S-Spike,” Twilight pleaded, gesturing with her head toward the other occupants of the room. “Please tell me you caught some of what just happened!?”

“Hm?” he asked, wiping his claws on a dish towel absent-mindedly. “I don’t pay much mind to things anymore. We’re all just inside of Princess Celestia’s dying fever dream, anyway.”

“Oh, come on, Spikey-poo. Now that’s truly ridiculous,” Rarity scolded.

“Indeed. Truly ridiculous,” Princess Luna’s voice echoed from everywhere at once.

Twilight’s muzzle scrunched up. “...Princess Luna?”

“...Yes?”

“Are we in Princess Celestia’s dying fever dream right now?”

“...No. As I said...That would be ridiculous...”

“Okay, but what ab-”

“No further questions!”

Fluttershy had somewhat recovered by this point, and wiped her tears away with a hoof. “I guess the real question is...what is reality?”

“Well, philosophically speaking, the basis of reality would have to be a being of pure act with no potency,” Starlight answered.

“I think that’s a very shallow reading of Equinas, actually,” Twilight tacked on. “You see, Starlight-”

“Hey, eggheads! Let’s talk clearly for once, huh?” Rainbow Dash demanded.

“You’re the one with the hallucinations, Dashie,” Pinkie Pie teased, ending with a chortle.

From then on, the whole group laughed together.

Trixie closed the ringed document forcefully. “So, Starlight, tell me what you think of my pilot?”

Starlight grimaced and inhaled through her teeth. “Trixie...That was really terrible.”

Trixie scowled at her friend. “What do you mean!?”

“Do you really think anypony would act like that? How did Pinkie survive? Not to mention, what was all that garbage with it all being in Princess Celestia’s head!?”

Trixie snorted and turned up her muzzle at Starlight. “Well, Starlight, it’s clear that you don’t have the IQ points to understand the subtlety inherent in all of The Great and Powerful Trixie’s literary works!”

Starlight pursed her lips together and almost said something snarky back, but stopped herself. “Sure, Trixie...whatever you say.”

“That’s right. Whatever I say. And since Trixie’s best friend hates her magnum opus, that means it’s sure to be a hit with the board of directors at the PONY Network!” Her thoughts concluded, Trixie lifted the script in her magic and marched out of her caravan trailer into town.

Starlight was left sitting alone, and sighed.

You chuckled as you finish recounting the story. “And so, with another one of Trixie’s get-rich-quick schemes coming down the pipeline, My Little Pony: Friendship is magic came to an end.” You smiled, wiping a tear from your eye. “Truly, one of the most revolutionary final episodes in all of television. I wish you could have seen it for yourself…”

“Great-grandpa, I saw it yesterday on the HoloNet,” your great-granddaughter answered from her bed. “It wasn’t anything like what you said. I’m really not sure where you got any of that.”

“Are you questioning my memory?” you glared down at her. “I fought in the war, you know! I didn’t watch my platoon get torn to shreds by Cameroonian robot commandos just to secure you the freedom to get smart with me,” you pointed at her threateningly.

“That’s great, Pop-Pop,” she answered. “I’m going to ascend to the astral sphere now. Make sure you turn off the lights, okay?” she half-asked, half-commanded as she placed her quantum VR goggles on her head.

As your descendant’s conscious being transformed into digital code for virtualization, you crossed your arms and leaned back in your rocking chair. “You kids...You know, in my day, we didn’t even elect our President. Instead, beating George Bush Senior in a boxing match secured you the office. It became a problem after he died, since it’s difficult to lose to a corpse in boxing. Still possible, of course...but difficult…”

“I’m telling you, Joe, I’ve seen this research first-hand,” Alex Jones declared, pounding the table with his fist. “They took me into a lab under the University of Washington where they’re conducting all this research on interdimensional aliens, okay? And they pumped me up with drugs, and I saw all sorts of stuff.”

“That’s crazy, man,” Joe Rogan replied, nodding slightly.

“You’re telling me! First I saw all these colorful creatures, running around, doing some sort of ritual for a pink death cult, or something. And then there was this dragon, trying to feed them baked goods made of pure psychic energy.”

“Okay, now the psychic dragon absolutely sounds like something you'd see on DMT,” Joe Rogan butted in, shaking his finger in excitement. “I got this buddy who…Hold on, Jamie, look up ‘DMT dragon cookies’.”

“Okay but while he’s doing that, I gotta keep going,” Alex Jones continued with manic urgency. “Then they started debating the attributes of God. But it gets weirder, because one of them tried to make a demonic pact with a media company. And see, Joe, this is how I know that CNN, MSNBC, they’re all in bed with the interdimensional beings. And then there was this old man reading to his granddaughter, and...and..” He bit his lip as he fought back tears.

“Jamie, how long have we been going? Seven hours? Should we stop?”

“No no,” Alex Jones cut back. “I’ve got way more.”

“Gummy? ...Guuuummmyyy? GUMMY!?”

Pinkie Pie’s pet alligator slowly focused his eyes on his owner, who was standing muzzle to muzzle with him.

“What were you daydreaming about, my little philoso-gator? Huh?” she asked him, her blue eyes sparkling with curiosity.

Gummy slowly blinked one eye, then the other.

“Well, anyway, Rainbow Dash is going to take me on a piggy-back ride through the most dangerous flying route in Equestria! They say that on any given day, more than 40% of fliers are drunk and dangerous! You wanna come with?”

Gummy stood silent and unmoving, an Ozymandian monolith on Pinkie’s baking counter.

“Okay, have it your way! I’ll see you tonight!” Pinkie Pie beamed a smile at him and turned tail to leave. “Lalalala…”

Slowly, Gummy licked one of his eyeballs.