Fluttershy opened the door to Sweetie Belle's house and gently led the still sobbing filly inside. It hurt her heart, seeing Sweetie Belle this way, although not as much as it hurt knowing why. In hindsight, she shouldn't have gotten so mad that she had destroyed the reporter's camera, but another part of her wished that she had gone farther.

She led Sweetie Belle up to her room and quickly left for a brief moment to go get a wet washcloth, which she used to wipe the tears from Sweetie Belle's face. It was a technique she had picked up a few years ago, and it did wonders for Sweetie Belle now. At the very least, she had stopped sobbing.

"Shh, it's okay, they're gone now," said Fluttershy soothingly. "They're not gonna hurt you anymore."

"W-w-w-hy did th-th-they d-d-do that in th-th-the first place?" stuttered Sweetie Belle.

Fluttershy looked sorrowfully at Sweetie Belle. "They don't understand what you are going through and they want to exploit it. It is very, very, very wrong of them and I hope that it doesn't happen to you again."

"D-d-do you th-th-think it w-w-will?" Sweetie Belle sniffled.

Fluttershy sighed before she slowly nodded. "Yes, but I hope it doesn't."

Sweetie Belle whimpered and buried her head in Fluttershy's chest once more. She didn't begin sobbing again, but tears streamed down her face all the same.

At that moment, Fluttershy heard the door to the house open and the voices of two ponies coming from downstairs. She recognized them as the voices of Sweetie Belle's parents. "Isn't it amazing?" her father said. "He gave us a job, right on the spot!"

"I know!" said her mother. "I know that it doesn't pay too much but between the two of us I think that we can make it work."
Fluttershy and Sweetie Belle heard her parents coming up the stairs, chattering excitedly about their new jobs. Fluttershy saw Sweetie Belle's father walk past the door and glance inside Sweetie Belle's room. He stopped dead in his tracks when he saw his daughter crying and in the embrace of the yellow Pegasus. "Sweetie Belle!" he said in a shocked voice. "What's wrong? Why are you home from school?"

Sweetie Belle removed her face from Fluttershy's chest and wiped her eyes. "I... I got in a fight with Diamond Tiara," she said sadly. "We both got suspended for a week."

Sweetie Belle's parents walked into her room. Fluttershy noted that Sweetie Belle's father seemed to have an expression somewhere between anger and sorrow on his face. "Why did you get in a fight?"

"She told me that she was glad that Rarity is dead and that if I had any sense, I would be too," said Sweetie Belle.

The jaws of Sweetie Belle's parents simultaneously hit the floor and even Fluttershy looked more than a little shocked. "Did she really say that?" asked her father. Sweetie Belle sadly nodded. Her father gave a frustrated sigh. "I suppose it's just as well that we're moving then."

Sweetie Belle's eyes widened. "WHAT?!"

"We're moving to Hoofington. We both just got jobs there and we have to move there if we want to keep them."

"No!" said Sweetie Belle. "I don't want to leave Ponyville!"

"But Sweetie Belle--"

"No! My whole life is here! My friends are here, my house is here, all of my memories are here! I can't just leave that!"

"But Sweetie Belle, pain and suffering are here as well!" said her mother. "They'll just keep doing what they're doing!"

"But won't we get that in Hoofington? Rarity killed there too!" Sweetie Belle's mother flinched at that.

"But we need that job!" said her father. "We can't just ignore the offer, we need the money!"

"What'll you do when I can have Rarity's money in a few years?" asked Sweetie Belle.

Her parents looked at each other. "Well... it's your money really. We can't touch it ourselves," said her father. Sweetie Belle wiped her eyes once more, hoping that she wouldn't begin crying once more.

"Can I...can I just go live in my house instead of moving to Hoofington with you?"

"Sweetie Belle, you're ten years old!" said her mother. "You have no money and you don't know how to care for yourself!"

"But I don't want to move to Hoofington!" said Sweetie Belle angrily. "That's a long ways away from here!"

"Sweetie Belle, we're moving to Hoofington and that's final," said her father crossly. Sweetie Belle's eyes filled with tears and she once again buried her head in Fluttershy's chest.

Fluttershy looked up at Sweetie Belle's parents with sad eyes. "What will you be doing there?" she asked.

"We'll be ditch diggers," said her father. "It isn't much, but it's something."

"Will you be able to support the three of you?" she asked worriedly looking at Sweetie Belle.

Sweetie Belle's father sighed but nodded all the same. "I have to admit that it'll be pretty tough, but I think we can make it work."

"How tough?" asked Fluttershy. "Will you be able to afford food and a place to stay?"

Sweetie Belle's mother bit her lip and scratched the back of her neck. "Uh... probably."

Fluttershy looked at the sad filly in her forelegs and sighed. "Listen... I know that she's just under eleven years old, but maybe she could stay here."

"No!" said Sweetie Belle's mother. "I can't leave my only child! Not after what just happened!"

"But you need this job, and I can't let her go with you if I'm not sure that she'll have a good life. Here, me and the others can help her! She doesn't need to live in poverty."

"But she's only a filly! If she was a teenager than maybe we would be more open to this, but she's too young to be out on her own," said Sweetie Belle's father.

"But she has a house and ponies here that will be able to take care of her. She knows the ponies around here, and for the most part they want to help her! If she moves to a totally new town then I don't know how she'll cope! She wouldn't know anypony around there, and she certainly wouldn't have ponies like us to help her through the dark times."

"But she'll be hated and despised if she stays!"

"She'll be hated and despised in Hoofington too."

"But she's only ten!" said her mother.

Fluttershy sighed. "I know that, and I know that you don't want to leave her, but you can't support her with the jobs you have right now. She's going through a tough enough time without having to live in poverty on top of it. If it's just the two of you, then you can live a semi-comfortable life. With Sweetie Belle in the mix, you can't." Sweetie Belle's parents looked at each other. Her mother seemed to be crying. "We can help her," said Fluttershy.

"In a few years I can take care of myself anyway," said Sweetie Belle.

Fluttershy nodded. "Look, it truly is your choice; I'm just saying that she had strong relationships here. In Hoofington she doesn't. She can build up trust much faster and even those who hate her will eventually grow to understand. In Hoofington, it would take far longer for that to happen."

Sweetie Belle's father sighed. "We'll think about it," he said.

In the coming weeks, a memorial for Rarity's victims had been constructed to honor those that had died in Rarity's reign as the deadliest serial killer in Equestrian history. It was a large statue of an alicorn pony, meant to represent the races of all who had died, with large plaque with all of the names of the victims on it. However, a lot of ponies who had lost family members to Rarity had come from all over and they had brought photos and notes of the victims with them to place on the memorial. Twilight had shown up to the unveiling and had used her magic to put permanent protection spells on the photos so that they would always be a part of the memorial.

Sweetie Belle slowly walked down the street to the memorial ceremony. All around her, ponies dressed in black walked silently towards the statue as well, some of them occasionally shooting her dirty glances, as if blaming her for what had happened. However, some of the ponies shot her sympathetic glances. It was those that encouraged Sweetie Belle to keep moving forward.

Once the crowd had reached the statue, the Mayor stood up on a podium in front of it and began a long speech. Sweetie Belle tuned it out for the most part. She knew that a portion of it would vilify Rarity, and that was something that she couldn't bear to hear right now. Or ever, for that matter. Still, portions of the speech did make it through. "Never forget... tragic... honor them by... life ended... together we can move on..."

The usual stuff.

Sweetie Belle was really only there to do one thing and she hoped that it would be coming soon. She couldn't bear to listen to any more of the Mayor's pretentious speech. She had not lost any family in Rarity's basement, so Sweetie Belle wondered how much of her sorrow was genuine. The stereotypical speech left little doubt in Sweetie Belle's mind that this was just the Mayor doing her job and not actually feeling too sad. Surely she was shocked by the reveal, just as the rest of the town was, but Sweetie Belle heard the phoniness in her sorrow.

"And now, I would like to open up the podium to anypony who wishes to say a few words during this tragic time," said the Mayor. Sweetie Belle began pushing forward in the crowd, hoping to get a good spot in line so that she could say what was on her mind as soon as possible. However, she didn't expect a warm reaction when she did but she still hoped that they would at least be polite and listen.

The first ponies up were three fillies, slightly older than Sweetie Belle herself, who were flanked by a sorrowful couple. The oldest of the three was given a box to stand on, and she stood on her hind legs and used the podium for balance when she spoke. "Uh... hi," she said nervously. "I'm here today because Rarity killed our mommy, daddy, and older sister. Because of Rarity, we had to wake up one day to discover that our mommy had k-killed herself. We didn't know somepoy had actually come into our house to kill her. Our daddy had already disappeared, so we had nopony to take care of us. Our sister Trixie was on the road performing, but nopony could find her so that she could take care of us." The filly began crying now. "We don't know what our parents and sister did to deserve what happened to them, but we know that they're in a better place right now.

"I also think that I speak for all of my sisters and our adoptive parents that we don't blame Rarity's parents or sister for what happened. Even if her sister lived with her, we don't think that there was any reason for her to know about what her sister was doing. We don't give them any blame and we hope that you don't either."

Trixie's sister jumped off the podium and walked over to the statue. She took a photo of a filly Trixie surrounded by her parents from her adoptive father and stuck it on the memorial. Twilight, who was standing next to the statue, attached it to the memorial permanently.

The next pony up was a gray earth pony mare. She had to take a few moments to compose herself before she began. "I would like to begin by thanking all of you for coming out. I know your mayor did that already, but I just want you to know how much it means to me that kind and good-hearted ponies like you have come out to support the families of the victims, even if you didn't know any of them or lose any family to that butcher." The crowd murmured in agreement but Sweetie Belle flinched at the term. "I had a sister who worked at the Ponyville Post Office as a clerk. Her name was Janice, and she simply disappeared one day. My parents and I came to Ponyville looking for her, but we couldn't find her. Nopony knew where she was, so it was assumed that she had just moved away. Murder was hardly the first thing anypony thought of because nopony had murdered another for hundreds of years! Well, when we heard about this, we feared the worst but we continued searching for my sister, hoping that she wasn't another victim of Rarity's rampage. However, we got the visit from the royal guard a few days later."

The crowd gave sympathetic murmurs and the mare had to regain her composure once more.

"Like the filly before me said, I know that she's in a better place right now. I know that she's in a place where monsters like the one who killed her can't touch her ever again. I know I'll see her again but I hope that everypony here who has lost family and friends will have their wounds healed by time. I myself just want to remember the good times we had. I hope you all do the same. The sooner we stop focusing on the murderer, the sooner she holds no power over us, even in death."

Sweetie Belle whimpered at that statement. She understood what they were all going through, but she still wished that they wouldn't talk about her sister like that. However, she knew that she simply had to endure it until her time to talk had come.
One by one, the ponies in line talked about their loved ones and the fond memories they had of them. A lot of the time the ponies would include hateful words about Rarity and what she had done to them, but Sweetie Belle tried her best to look past that. She silently waited her turn to speak.

Her turn came after about half an hour of speeches. She didn't have a photo of Rarity to put on the memorial, although she knew it would be a bad idea to include one at any rate.

She stepped up on the stage and glanced at Twilight, who looked sadly at the filly. Sweetie Belle turned her head towards the audience, who were murmuring among themselves. Some of them looked extremely angry that she was up there, but she knew that she had to do this if she was going to begin a healing process of her own.

She stepped up on the box that had been put out for any foals that wanted to say something, stood up on her hind legs, and, using the podium for balance, cleared her throat. "Uh... I just want to say a few--"

"Get off the stage you psycho!" yelled a random pony in the crowd to a few murmurs of agreement.

Sweetie Belle flinched back and flattened her ears. "I... uh..."

All of the words she had so carefully chosen slipped away from her at that very moment.

"How do you get the nerve to be around civilized ponies when your sister is the reason we're all here?!"

"But I didn't do anything!" said Sweetie Belle pathetically.

"Yeah, right," srarled another pony. "If you had just paid better attention, my son would probably be alive right now!"

"No, please don't--"

"Face it; you're just as guilty as your psycho sister!"

Sweetie Belle began crying now and she tried to figure out something to do, something to say that would make them accept her again. Nothing came to mind. She got off of the podium and began walking towards the edge, away from all of the nasty ponies who hated her. Maybe she should move away with her parents.

However, to the surprise of many of them, a lone voice rang out in the crowd. "Leave her alone! She didn't do anything wrong!"

The crowd began confusedly talking amongst themselves. Sweetie Belle looked towards the source of the noise to see a pony trying to push her way through the crowd. After a few seconds, the pony was revealed to be a filly about Sweetie Belle's age. She jumped up on the stage and stood in front of Sweetie Belle.

"Why are you treating her like this?!" asked the filly angrily. "She didn't do anything bad! She didn't know; how was she supposed to know?" Somehow, the filly's words stung just as much as the hateful ones. She actually had known what her sister was up to, at least in part. An angry mare walked up to the stage as well.

"June Star you get off the stage this instant and stop this nonsense right now!"

"No mommy!" said June Star. "I don't want them to hurt her!"

"Her sister killed Scarlet Tomato!" said the mare angrily.

"But she didn't!" said June Star. "She wasn't the one who killed my sister, she wasn't down in the basement when my sister died, and she didn't even know that there was such a place. Why does she have to suffer for her sister's bad actions?"

The tears began flowing faster from Sweetie Belle's eyes. She had been in the basement when her sister had killed Scarlet Tomato; she had seen her sister slice open her femoral artery, bleeding her out in seconds.

The mare walked up to the stage with the intent of dragging her daughter away from Sweetie Belle, but she found herself blocked by another protective mare. Upon closer inspection, Sweetie Belle saw that it was Derpy Hooves. Her wings were flared out, blocking Sweetie Belle from the mare's vision.

"Don't you hurt her!" growled Derpy.

Sweetie Belle was shocked to see Derpy so irate. Normally she was very good-natured. However, these were not normal times.

June Star walked closer to Sweetie Belle, gently placed a hoof on her shoulder, and gave her a small smile.

"You're a victim in this too," she said. "It's wrong for us to blame you." Sweetie Belle did her best to return the smile but she didn't know how. Not to this pony.

All of a sudden, ponies from inside the crowd began walking up to the stage and putting their hooves on Sweetie Belle too.
"We don't blame you," said a mare sympathetically.

"You didn't do anything wrong."

"We're here to help you."

"We don't want to hurt you."

"It's going to be okay."

Sweetie Belle looked around to see that dozens upon dozens of ponies had come up on the stage to comfort her in this time of need. When there was no more room around her, the ponies paced their hooves on the shoulder of the pony next to them.

Sweetie Belle looked around at all of the ponies who were standing around her, giving her comforting smiles. She looked back at June Star, who widened her smile ever so slightly.

"You're not alone."