"Thanks for your help, Twilight. I'm sure this is all nothing, but I just wanted to make sure. Like I said, you're the one who knows about friendship problems. She won't open up to me about it."
I shot Derpy a cracked smile. "Oh... yeah, it's no problem at all." I choose to walk in silence for a few moments while I think of something to say. "Uh... so when you say that Dinky won't open up, do you mean that she's... I dunno, gotten angry and violent with you?"
Derpy looked at me like I'd lost my mind. "Dinky? You're asking me if Dinky has gotten violent with me."
I weakly chuckled and forced a smile on my face. "Just covering my bases. I want to be one hundred percent sure of what I'm dealing with before I go in there."
"Why?" Derpy frowned at me. "She's having a problem with another filly at school. She's not even being bullied, I don't think. Why would she be getting violent?"
"Like I said: just covering my bases here," I replied. "I want to fully understand the situation." I paused for another few moments. "So, how is she, aside from being a little anti-social?"
"She's doing fine, I guess," Derpy said with a shrug of her wings. "She's not as happy or bubbly as usual, but she has been getting more homework now that the school year is almost over. She can get a little tired when she's working on that."
"Makes sense, I guess."
Derpy and I walked in silence, with me doing everything that I could to not freak out in front of her. In my mind I was already making up several drafts of letters to Princess Celestia. One of them even said "Ha! I knew Chindii were real, but you didn't listen to me!" I'd never actually send Princess Celestia a letter like that, of course, but I was starting to wonder how she would react to the news that Jackie had come back around and latched onto another one of her subjects.
Or not. Maybe this was all nothing! Maybe Dinky merely heard Sweetie Belle talking about Jackie on the playground and, not understanding the situation, made her own imaginary friend named Jackie. It was possible, and I wasn't going to do anything rash until that possibility had been eliminated. Even if it wasn't the case, there were still a dozen explanations for Dinky's behavior.
Then again, maybe I was fooling myself to keep my emotions in check. I'd never let Rarity or Sweetie Belle know this, but, if I'm being honest, dealing with Jackie the last time drained me a little. I mean, not as much as the two of them, obviously, but it does hurt a little bit to see one of your best friends and her younger sister be so powerless, and the best thing that you can do is be the shoulder to cry on. I'd never compare my feelings on the matter to those of Sweetie Belle and Rarity, but I also couldn't deny the fact that it wasn't easy for me either.
We reached Derpy's home, and I waited while she unlocked the door. Strange. Ponies in Ponyville don't lock their doors. Not unless something is going on.
"Expecting somepony?" I asked as we walked into Derpy's humble, but sturdy home. "I've never known you to lock your doors."
Derpy grimaced and flattened her ears. "It's kinda silly, really. I just have a feeling that something's wrong, or is gonna go wrong. It's just a feeling, though. Nothing's actually happened." Derpy forced a smile back on her face as she shut the door behind us. "But I'd rather be safe than have something hurt Dinky or Sparkler, right?"
"Right," I said. "Makes sense to me. Definitely don't want anything to go wrong."
We entered Derpy's home and she locked the door behind us. That got me a little more freaked out, to be honest. The part of my mind that always goes nuts when something is about to go wrong started yelling at me to get out of there. Maybe go get Princess Celestia so that she could perform an exorcism on Dinky. It wouldn't be the first time in her life that she had to do that. Princess Celestia didn't believe in Chindii, though. Or maybe she did and she just wanted me to handle it. Like Nightmare Moon.
No, that was silly. She had a set plan laid out for Nightmare Moon, and it involved me getting the Elements. I can't imagine that she has a similar plan for something that few ponies even know about, and fewer still believe in. I mean, that was also true about Nightmare Moon, but... that's not the point! Luna was her sister and she had to redeem her.
No, no, I didn't have time to go on mental tangents. Pretty much everypony who's interacted with me even a little bit says that I get this faraway look when I do. Like my brain is somewhere else entirely. Not the best time for that.
"So, is Dinky in her room right now, then?" I asked, trying to recover before Derpy notices that I blanked out for a few seconds.
"She should be," Derpy replied. "I think she said something about Jackie being with her right now, though I haven't seen her. She says that Jackie is really shy and hides whenever I come into the room."
"Interesting," I said, trying to keep the panic out of my voice. "So I guess I'll just go up and talk to her about Jackie. See what's wrong. And fix it. Yes, I'll fix it."
Derpy looks at me with uncertainty, I think she can guess that I'm a bit strained by all of this, even if she doesn't know why, but she nodded anyway.
"Okay, then, Twilight. Whatever you think is best. I'm going to get some dinner ready. You're welcome to stay for dinner if you'd like. If you'd like to bring Spike over, that's okay too."
"Sounds good," I said, forcing a somewhat genuine smile on my face. "I think I'll take you up on that, depending on how it goes with Dinky."
Derpy excused herself to get started on dinner, while I made my way up the stairs to Dinky's room. My mind kept flashing back to the short time ago when I was doing something similar for Rarity and Sweetie Belle. Maybe I needed to be a little more aggressive this time around. I mean, if Jackie kept coming back to torment the foals of Ponyville, I figured it might be time to put a stop to Jackie once and for all, as opposed to just freeing whatever filly she happened to latch onto and letting her go so that she could do it again.
Then again, how was I supposed to catch and stop something that I knew next to nothing about?
I reached Dinky's room and put my ear up next to the door. If Derpy was right and Dinky was playing with Jackie, she'd probably be talking to her like Sweetie Belle did.
I rather disliked what I heard.
"Miss Twilight's here, Jackie?" Dinky's voice said from the other side of the door. "How do you know Miss Twilight?" Dinky went quiet for a few moments, presumably to listen to Jackie's reply. "Oh. Well that doesn't sound very nice. I'm sure she just didn't know about you. If she did, she'd know that you're a good friend! Miss Twilight knows all about friendship and stuff." Another pause. "Hey, maybe she could help you get together with your last friend! I know you said she got boring and stuff, but I'm sure Miss Twilight would love to help you become friends again."
Over my dead body and the ashes of Ponyville.
Hopefully not, though.
"That would be really neat!" Dinky continued. "You 'n me 'n your old friend could all hang out and have a blast together! You could... Oh, you don't wanna hang out with your old friend again? Why not? She sounded really nice. Who was your old friend anyway?"
I'd heard enough. There were enough similarities between this conversation and the one I'd overheard with Sweetie Belle. This time I wouldn't knock. I grasped the door handle with my magic and burst into the room, looking around wildly for any sign of Jackie. If I could surprise Jackie, maybe she wouldn't have time to hide before I came in!
However, all I got was Dinky sitting on the floor in front of her bed, flinching away from me like she thought I'd hurt her, or something.
"What are you doing, Miss Twilight?" Dinky whispered, her ears flat and tears brimming in her eyes. Oh geez, I'd really scared her. "Did I do something wrong? Is that why you're here?"
"No, I'm here about Jackie," I said, my gaze flicking over to her closet. "Where is she?"
"Jackie? What do you want with her? She didn't do anything bad, did she?"
I closed the door behind me with one of my hind legs before walking over to the closet and opening it up. Nothing except one or two outfits and some toys. "I'm afraid she did, Dinky. She hurt Sweetie Belle a lot. Sweetie was the old friend that Jackie was talking about." I moved over to Dinky's bed and looked under it. I found some dust and a couple more toys, but no Jackie. "You know how Sweetie Belle was in the hospital a little while back? Jackie did that."
Dinky whimpered and curled up into a ball on the floor. I hated to scare her like that, but I couldn't have her believe that Jackie cared about her at all. I saw where that particular road lead, and had no intention of going down it again.
"LIAR!"
I jumped in shock when Dinky yelled at me like that. I've known Dinky for a few years now, long enough to know that she didn't yell about anything. Not in anger, anyway. I didn't need to think long to figure out that Jackie was the cause.
Okay, so maybe barging in and confronting Jackie directly wouldn't work any more than letting things play out. I needed to find some kind of middle ground. First I needed to calm Dinky down.
"Get out, Twilight!" Dinky screeched. "Jackie doesn't want you here! I just told Jackie that you would help her, and then you say lies to try to trick me into not being Jackie's friend anymore!"
"I'm... I'm sorry, Dinky," I said, backing away in the direction of the door. "I didn't mean to scare you."
"Go away and leave Jackie alone, Twilight!" Dinky growled, sparks shooting out of her horn. That unnerved me. Dinky's magic hadn't really come in yet, but under enough duress, a unicorn could have a magical surge at any age, and we still hadn't figured out Dinky's power level. This could get ugly fast if she didn't calm down.
"Dinky, I'm leaving," I said gently. "I'm sorry to you and Jackie. It was wrong of me to come in here and accuse her of bad things." I lit my horn and opened the door. "I'm leaving."
"Don't you ever come back, Twilight!" Dinky crossed her forelegs and turned her back to me. "Jackie says I should hate you. I think I do."
Even knowing that Dinky would never say something like that if she weren't under the influence of a nasty entity, that hurt, and not just because everypony in Ponyville knew that Dinky was incapable of hatred. I tried to help and all I'd done was exacerbate the problem. Now I'd be doing damage control against something I didn't really understand completely.
I left Dinky's room and shut the door behind me. I went downstairs and ran into Derpy, who was coming up the stairs. No doubt she heard Dinky's shouting.
"What's wrong? What happened up there?"
"Derpy, I think we have a problem. Dinky is going to be fine, but for right now, I have to go contact Princess Celestia. She's--"
A piercing shriek echoed throughout the house, causing Derpy and I to flatten our ears to block out the noise. It only lasted a few seconds before it cut off like somepony had cast a silence spell over Dinky's room. Derpy flew over me and bolted in the direction of Dinky's room. I followed and reached Dinky's room just in time to hear Derpy let out a scream of her own. I nudged my way into the room and gasped when I saw the problem.
Dinky lay on the floor, completely unconscious. She was bleeding from a cut that ran from her flank all the way to her jawline. I rushed forward and began casting healing magic on her to stop the bleeding. The cut didn't look deep enough for her to bleed out, but she might need stitches. I noticed the bleeding slowing down considerably, so I continued weaving my magic into the cut. As I did, one of Dinky's eyes opened and she looked at me like she'd seen Tartarus.
"I don't wanna see Princess Celestia," she whimpered before her eye rolled back and she went unconscious again.
Oh dear.
