Outside my bedroom window, the sun's coming up.
And staring at the graying night sky, the jagged shadow of the Everfree below, the paling spots of the stars above, I realize that this'll be the end. The real end this time, too. The final end.
Which is kind of a silly thing to say, isn't it? I mean, how can you have different degrees of ending? Either something ends or it doesn't, right? And other than a princess or two, everything ends eventually.
It's just that sometimes, what you think is the end actually isn't. It's just a shift or a setback or a moment where you have to refocus.
Like when Sunburst left. Or rather when Sunburst was taken away. He didn't want to go. I know that. We were best—
Best friends.
Except...
He never got in touch with me after he went off to school, did he? Never sent me a Hearth's Warming card or a birthday card or a cute-ceañera card.
I guess I've been failing friendship lessons my whole life. And now? After what I did today?
Or yesterday, I guess. Sun's coming up, after all. Which means those ponies who tried to be my friends, who tried to get to know me and tried to help me, they'll all be groggily coming awake with splitting headaches, sore muscles, and a general feeling of bloat and lassitude. All because of me. Because I don't know what I'm doing.
And I've never known! I mean, look at Sunburst! Yes, he didn't send me a single letter after he left, but he was the one entering a new life, moving to a new town—moving to Canterlot, for crying out loud! The capital of Equestria! Attending the most prestigious school in the entire world! Under the very tutelage of the princess herself!
Could be I know what that's like, huh? Could be I'm a little bit familiar with the pressure that wraps itself around your brain and squeezes, squeezes, squeezes till casting mind control magic on everypony around you starts to sound like a viable option.
So whose fault was it with me and Sunburst? Which of us was still in her comfortable home with her comfortable parents and her comfortable neighbors? Which of us could've taken a breath, pushed her steaming pile of self-pity to the side, picked up a quill, and written a letter to him? Which of us could've maybe given him a little solace and an ear to vent to and help him through those years when he was discovering that he wasn't our generation's next great sorcerer?
Which of us could've done that?
Yeah. Failing friendship lessons my whole life...
Because look at what I did after he left! Moaning! Wailing! Locking myself in my room! Not even telling my parents I'd gotten my cutie mark: hunger drove me downstairs two days after the stupid thing appeared, and they caught me raiding the ice box! Then the screaming, the arguing, the self-righteous ranting, the running away and never going back.
The ending, you might even say...
I should write my folks, should take a few days off to go visit, should let them know—
Let them know what? That their daughter is still insane? That she's been studying with the Princess of Friendship herself and still doesn't have one single clue what she's doing? That she's still failing at everything she tries?
Yeah, well, they already know that, don't they? I'm sure when news of what I'd done in the village reached them, they were oh so proud of their little filly.
No. Don't think about the village. Don't think about—
About what? About the clenched and fiery knot of rage and hatred you carefully and lovingly cultivated in your gut? About the libraries and museums you broke into, the knowledge you gathered and the magic you built, all to destroy the very essence of Equestria? All to salve your bruised little ego and soothe your injured little pride?
Think what you could've done with those years! Think of the positive contributions you could've made to all ponykind! You could've been the student of the princess by now!
Okay, bad example.
Still, those years came to an end, too, didn't they? The culmination of all my work, my life's goal achieved, the spell that would remove all division, knock down all the barriers, make all ponies equal.
All ponies but me, of course.
And the best part of that? The best and absolutely most typical part?
It never even occurred to me that there was anything wrong with me lying to other ponies and keeping my mark! I had to retain my powers or I wouldn't be able to help others find true freedom! I was willing to sacrifice myself, to never enter the life I'd dreamed of and planned for! I happily doomed myself, kept myself separate since I was the gate, the doorway through which my fellow Equestrians would pass on their way to a land of peace and harmony and equality!
That's what was really going on in our town! Not that I was the leader, but that I was the outsider always looking in, the secret servant of all, the pony who kept the streets swept so all the true citizens could live without having to soil their minds or hooves by interacting with the fetid, stinking morass of the old world! I was good! I was noble! I was the best friend any of those ponies would ever have!
Another failed friendship lesson, in other words...
We were all failures there was the thing. All of us who came to that village, broken and bleeding inside, we'd all come out the wrong side of a friendship lesson or two. I listened to their stories, sought some of them out after hearing gossip about relationships that had crashed and burned in spectacular ways. Sometimes it had been the pony's own fault and sometimes the fault of the other pony, but either way, while the wounds were still jagged and raw, I would step in with the answer.
The easy answer. The perfect answer. The no muss, no fuss answer. Don't make the effort to mend your broken friendship and reconcile. Don't make the effort to mend your broken heart and move on. The whole world is broken, friend, and the only answer is to find a new world.
Let me lead you there, I would murmur. Let me be your guide. Let me show you the way to a place where differences can't hurt you any longer because there are no differences.
And I believed it. Oh, how I believed it. I had to. My whole life would've been a lie otherwise.
It brought me to another ending, too. A happy ending this time, I was completely and firmly convinced. I would take the pain away from all ponies everywhere at the cost of clinging to my own pain, would add their unhappiness to the spiky ball already jabbing away inside my chest and would deliver them to peace and happiness.
Would kill them, in short. Freeze them in place, turn them to stone, paint a smile on their unmoving faces and announce their friendship lesson successfully learned. While I skipped among the corpses wishing I had the courage to join them.
Okay, that's a little melodramatic. But looking back on it now, it's all I can see. If Twilight and the others hadn't come—
Oh, now, let's really not think about that.
Because I could've salvaged it even then! Could've turned to Twilight Sparkle there in the street and proclaimed that I would teach her my spell, would show her how to remove a pony's cutie mark and lock it away, if she promised to use the spell on me. I could've stood with my friends and neighbors, could've taken that final step, could've seized the ending and made it my own.
Except, well, turns out I didn't believe what I'd been telling those ponies while recruiting them. Turns out my whole life had indeed been a lie. And then the screaming, the arguing, the self-righteous ranting, the running away and—
Well, at least this time I've gone back.
But it's the one friendship lesson I think I might actually have learned. Friendship can't grow when pain and hatred take up all the space. Even the drab and dreary life in that village was still a life, and as the ponies I'd brought there slowly let go of their pain and hatred, they started to form friendships.
Despite me, that is, not because of me. I was convinced I couldn't join them, after all, and was so intent on holding tight to my pain and the pain of all the others, I wouldn't've known real friendship if it'd come marching up the main street on four purple hooves with a horn and wings attached. I wasn't friends with anypony there, and my only thought when that information came squirming out into the open was to cut and run.
And to plot my revenge, of course.
Please, please, please can we not think about that? Can we just stand here and watch the sun rise and think about how there aren't words in any known language to tell the ponies I treated so horribly yesterday that I'm sorry? To tell them that this will never happen again because I plan on cleaning up the mess I made of Twilight's castle, then packing up my suitcase and leaving? To tell them that I'm—
Running away? Yet again? But that it's worse this time since you're running away in fear and shame instead of anger and hatred? Because as bad as anger and hatred are—
And they are bad. Nasty, grasping, needle-clawed little vermin that dig whispering into every corner of your mind, body, and spirit, never letting go, never letting up, never letting you rest. All they let you see is the purple pony princess who destroyed your life, and all they let you focus on is the plan you'll need to destroy her life. And if there's one thing I'm good at, it's focusing single-mindedly on a plan.
It was brilliant, too. Just like my earlier plan. This time, though, I wrapped myself up in it: no more being on the outside looking in for me! I would show Twilight Sparkle that I did believe my own doctrine, that I hadn't betrayed every principle I'd thought I stood for when I'd run from the village, that my life wasn't a lie!
I cast the spell, and all the parameters functioned perfectly. We were bound, the both of us—and Spike, too, though I didn't know him then—and any time she used the spell to return to that Cloudsdale race course, I would be drawn back as well. She couldn't escape me and she couldn't defeat me and I—
And I destroyed the world.
The whole entire world. Every pony, every animal, every tree, every flower, all of it. Me. I did that. Ended it all.
What does that say about a pony? That the only thing capable of making her stop and look around and think about her life is the complete and utter destruction of every life form on the planet? How does a pony become that pony?
I don't know. I mean, I am that pony, and I still don't know! All the post-midnights I've stood like this, staring out the window and waiting, wanting, hoping that the sun will come up, my ears straining for the first yawning chirp of some early-rising bird to tell me that the heart of the world still beats, that the awful, sour dryness I breathed in as I stood beside Twilight Sparkle in that desolation, that it's not real, not anymore.
And then?
And then?
Then I do what I did yesterday.
It's like I've learned nothing! Like I'm not physically able to absorb the truth that my actions have consequences greater than most ponies! I've demonstrated multiple times that I have the desire and the ability to ruin other ponies' lives and crush the world to a slowly spinning cinder! And what do I do? What do I do?
I'm like Discord! No, I'm worse than Discord! Discord at least formed one bond strong enough to force him to practice restraint! He may be a legendary spirit of Chaos sprung directly from ancient myth, but he's not a monster! No, there's only one monster left wandering Equestria now that Tirek's back in Tartaros and Chrysalis has retreated to her own domain!
Wandering. Maybe that'd be best. I'll go out there this morning, apologize to the five of them, tell them I don't expect they can ever forgive me, and then surrender to the inevitable. Be on my way before I do any more damage. End it here, hit the road with Trixie till I find myself a quiet cave somewhere, and—
And I can just imagine what Trixie would have to say about that. Because look what she did after fear and shame drove her to use powerful magic and take over a whole town. She apologized. She brushed herself off. She put that ridiculous hat back on and returned to that same town with a new act. She didn't let fear and shame win. Abject fear—they can never forgive me—and despicable shame—I can never forgive me...
Because I can't learn that lesson. I've tried. My mistakes destroy worlds, and I don't want to be that pony anymore.
Don't want to be this pony anymore...
But the sun's coming up. A dog barks. A rooster gives about half a crow before apparently deciding to go back to bed. Another day begins. And I'm still me.
Just like always.
I turn from the window and head for the door. Apology, then cleaning, then another ending.
Or—
Maybe don't plan for once, huh? I mean, the whole planning thing's worked out so well for you so far, hasn't it? All your plans to make friends when you came here, they all failed, didn't they? It wasn't till you stopped planning that you met Trixie, and a better, more understanding friend you couldn't've asked for.
So maybe just apology, then cleaning, then—
Then whatever happens, happens.
Stop trying to be perfect because you're not. Stop trying to be in control because you're not. Stop trying to be some pony other than you because you're not.
You're a mess, but you're working on it. You're a failure, but you're working on it. You're a monster, but you're working on it.
I'm working on. Which means no running away this time. If Twilight sends me away, sure, I'll go—
But she would've done that last night if she was going to, wouldn't she? Unless the other princesses are gathering downstairs right now so they can focus all their power on restraining me.
Seems unlikely. But I don't know.
There's so much I don't know. And so much I'd like to know. How Applejack can laugh after bucking a million trees with five million more trees standing ahead of her. How Pinkie can smile at everypony she meets and mean it. How Rainbow Dash can go from asleep to Sonic Rainboom in the twitch of an ear. How Fluttershy can apologize to the weeds in her garden as she pulls them and mean it. How Rarity can create elegance just by stepping through a doorway. How Spike can fold his arms, roll his eyes, grouse and grumble and then do his job anyway. How Trixie can go out into a world that absolutely hums with magic and create awe and wonder with just a line of patter and a few pyrotechnics. How Twilight can—
How Twilight can keep giving me chance after chance when I would've cut me loose long before all this.
So much to know. And really, no place I'd rather be than here.
Which makes me pretty sure of one thing.
Whatever this is today, it isn't the ending.
I activate my horn, push the door open, and step through.
