My Little Mistakes

Sweetie Belle was horrified. One second she was with her friends trying to get her cutie mark in mountain climbing, the next she's in a room filled with ponies she doesn't know, with no help in sight. The closest thing she saw to somepony she recognized was a thing that looked like Cheerilee, and after trying to get close she immediately turned tail and galloped away because that thing had no face. So here she was. Surrounded by strangers, in a place she knew nothing about, and with some monster things roaming around with the ponies. She wanted to cry, but she was too busy trying to get away from that demon to let her body do anything else. There was no spite, no hatred, only fear and loneliness in the little white filly.

Sweetie finally slowed her pace, the adrenaline in her system diminishing and her lungs demanding more air. Stopping completely, Sweetie panted, sweat dripping profusely from her chin and mane. She gained several curious looks from the other ponies nearby, but they were currently to enthralled in their own conversations to be bothered with the filly's odd behavior. Several minutes later, Sweetie Belle had gained enough strength back to move her legs, though they remained sore from her intense sprint and soaked from sweat.

Thinking it best to just look for somepony she knew, she cautiously began to scan the faces of the ponies nearby. Though many seemed familiar, something just seemed... OFF about these ponies, but she couldn't quite put her hoof on it.

Forty minutes of fruitless searching later, Sweetie began to grow desperate. She would take ANYPONY so long as she knew them. Rarity, Apple Bloom, Scootaloo, Twilight, Pinkie Pie, hey, she'd even be fine with Snips or Snails at this point! She just needed to know that she wasn't alone, that she would have somepony to talk to, somepony to help her.

Sweetie's ear twitched. She heard a voice... a familiar bratty voice. And it was-? Crying? Trying to close in on the noise, Sweetie carefully listened to the sounds around her and made her way to the figure it was coming from.

Sweetie Belle's suspicions were confirmed upon location of the voice. It had been a little, pink coated, purple and white maned filly, head buried in her front hooves and whining loudly, a diamond encrusted tiara about to fall off her head.

"Diamond... Tiara?" Sweetie asked carefully, wary of her chances of being shooed off. The pink filly before her either didn't hear her or didn't care as her sobs hadn't let up even slightly. Moving a bit closer, Sweetie tried again "Are you okay Diamond Tiara?" This time was met with more success, as the sobbing filly raised her head, revealing two eyes gone pink from watering, a trembling lip and a running nose. The two fillies eyes met before Diamond Tiara buried her head again.

"Go away. Just leave me. You and your cutie mark crazies friends are the last ponies I want to see right now." Her voice was quiet, lacking much of the authority and snobby attitude she was known for. "I just... I j-just-t... want..." was all the pink filly could manage before resuming her sobbing.

"Diamond Tiara, please tell me what's wrong."

"Like you care."

"I DO care! Please, just what is it? You need somepony to talk to and you aren't finding one just sitting there!"

"Please, just go away... I don't wanna talk to you."

"Just tell me Diamond, you need to get it off your chest." Sweetie Belle was still processing why she would ever talk to the school bully alone, but under these circumstances, she really couldn't help but feel worried for her.

"I SAID LEAVE ME ALONE YOU BLANK -" Diamond Tiara stopped, turned her head to the side, staring at her body, before falling on her face again and crying even harder than before.

Sweetie Belle began to move around Diamond Tiara's body and began looking her over, stopping at a sight that made her eyes go wide in astonishment. The image of, well, a diamond tiara was absent from the filly's flank, leaving it bare. Sweetie Belle immediately felt sorry for her, even if Scootaloo said that a cutie mark crusader would never feel bad about anything that happened to bullies like DT, this was beyond that. Sweetie Belle longed for her cutie mark to appear, she didn't want to wait, she hated being a blank flank. She couldn't imagine what it would be like to actually have her cutie mark and then lose it. A cutie mark is part of who a pony is, it reveals their place in life, and losing it would be losing that part.

Sweetie looked around to make sure Scootaloo or Apple Bloom hadn't shown up, she couldn't have them see what she was about to do. Coming closer to Diamond Tiara, Sweetie Belle pulled out the small hoofkerchief that Rarity had given to her ('A proper filly must always be prepared', she said), surprisingly dry despite being concealed in her mane during her earlier sprint.

"Take it." Sweetie said to the trembling mass before her. Diamond Tiara raised her head again, looking at the hoofkerchief and Sweetie before slowly reaching out for it. After taking hold of it, Diamond didn't know what she should think or say.

"...Why?" she settled on, holding the scrap of well-stitched and embroidered lace before her.

"Because Rarity says to always think of others, and last time I checked, she's a pretty good source for knowing how to be generous."

Diamond Tiara waited a moment, looking down at the gift she had been given. A moment later she patted her eyes and blew her nose, making sure to keep any mucus from dripping onto her hooves. she then folded it up, covering any wet places with the hoofkerchief's own padding and returned it.

"...Thank you... Sweetie... Belle..."

Sweetie Belle made sure when she returned the hankerchief to it's hiding place that it wouldn't open and coat her head in it's contents. Upon hearing  Diamond Tiara's last comment, she nearly fumbled.

"What?"

"I said... Thank you..." Diamond was obviously struggling to get herself to say those words.

Sweetie Belle was nothing short of stunned. Diamond Tiara NEVER thanked anypony, no matter what they did for her.

"Umm... You're welco-OOF!" as Sweetie responded to Diamond Tiara the pink filly had pulled her in, holding her close.

"I'M SORRY! I'm sorry I pick on you all the time! I'm sorry I call you a blank-flank! I'm sorry I make everypony at school so miserable all the time! I'M SORRY!" Diamond Tiara had nearly broken down at this point, the tears returning to her eyes. "I'm sorry for everything! I just wanna *hic* go home! I wanna see daddy... I wanna go home... I j-just *sniff* wanna go home..."

Seeking a way to comfort her, Sweetie Belle began to stroke Diamond's mane as Rarity had done for her when she was upset. Initially Diamond had rebelled, but in a brief moment she did nothing to stop it, taking the action without complaint and holding the white filly close to her. A few minutes later and the pink filly had come to her senses once more.

"We'll be okay. We'll look for a way out together."

"...Yeah... No use whining to daddy if he isn't around..." Sweetie couldn't help but feel even worse, she wanted Diamond Tiara to get what was coming to her like her friends, but not anything as broken as this. Before long, however, Diamond had completely recovered and dried her eyes, looking expectantly at Sweetie Belle. "Let's go then."

"What now?" the white filly asked

"I thought you had a plan?"

"Nope, just running and listening."

"Seriously? Come on, you and your friends come up with insane ideas every day, you have to have something!

"I was more concerned with trying to run away than thinking of a plan."

"Away from what?"

"Trust me, you do not want to know."

"Humph. Well if you're going to invade my privacy I'm invading yours: What was it?"

"Fine. I saw Miss Cheerilee."

"Pfft, that's all? Afraid she's gonna give you homework on being foalna-"

"And she had no face." Diamond stopped, thinking about it before realizing that the white filly had been right; she really wished she didn't know. "Yeah. It was even freakier than it sounds. So... Got any ideas?

"Well... Maybe we should just try to find the other foals from school? If both of us are here the rest probably are to."

"Sounds like as good a plan as any."

"Just one more question Sweetie- What happened to your eyes?"

"Huh?"

"Eyes. You know the things in your head that let you see?" The pink one snarked.

"I know what they are, just what happened to mine?" Sweetie asked, a bit annoyed at the comeback and Diamond's returning resolve.

"Aren't your eyes supposed to be green?"

"What do you mean? They are green, aren't they?" Diamond Tiara pointed to the small pool of tears on the floor that hadn't been dried.

"Take a look for yourself." Sweetie Belle moved to the puddle slowly and looked in, unable to comprehend the figure reflected back at her. While the figure initially appeared to be her double, in place of her grassy green eyes were two of the same orange-red coloring Apple Bloom's possessed.

"...This is getting weird."

"Should we just go now then?"

"Yeah, I don't think it's a good idea to just wait for somepony else to find us here, and we aren't finding any answers just by talking to each other."

"Well then, after you." Diamond said, ushering to the crowd.

Sweetie was still a bit unnerved by Diamond Tiara's sudden attitude adjustment, but by no means was she complaining about it.

"Right. Let's go." Sweetie said with a nod.

And so the filly with odd eyes and the filly who had lost her cutie mark came together and joined in search of the others. Would they ever find them? They could only hope. With the small spark of understanding to light the fire of friendship, they stayed close and weaved together through the crowd of ponies before them, keeping their eyes out for anypony they knew, hoping, just hoping that they would be able to get home. With a small smile at her new company and the thought of her friends, Sweetie Belle began her search.