After Sunset

I stare down at the steaming cup of coffee in front of me and take a tentative sniff.

Yeah, it’s definitely burnt.

Then again, this is Millie’s coffee we’re talking about here, so if it weren't brewed about a hundred degrees over the recommended amount then it probably wouldn’t taste right. There’s something about burnt coffee at ten at night that tastes nostalgic to me now, but I’m not really sure I can account for why.

The really funny thing is that Millie drinks the stuff too. I’ve seen her do it. That’s the weird part about the coffee here at Salt’N’Pepper. Millie makes it this way on purpose.

My phone chimes but I ignore it as I tug my hoodie tighter around myself.

I know who it is. I know she doesn’t like that I’m doing this. She thinks it’s reckless, and that I’m going to get taken away. Fluttershy has always been a nervous sort of a person though. I’m not going anywhere. I’m not leaving Fluttershy behind again the way I did when I shut off after Sunset was trapped, and I’m certainly not going anywhere with my mother.

As if she could make me.

“You’ve got a lot of balls, Rainbow.”

In spite of my new power. In spite of the knowledge that the thing in the dark, the Entity, ‘father’, made me better than human; faster, stronger, and tougher, the sound of Winnow Wind’s voice still sends a shiver down my spine.

Unlike every other time, though, this time I find it in myself to ignore it and take a sip of my coffee as I look up at her.

Winnow is a woman to whom change doesn’t come quickly if it even does.

She’s just the way I remember her from the farm, and even then she was exactly how I remembered her from the last time I saw her.

Neither tall nor particularly short, and not light nor exceptionally heavy either. She’s still wearing her professional black-and-white blazer which sits comfortably on her compact form, those short, arrow-straight locks of iron-gray streaked with red still fall around and frame a face that hasn’t shown pity in better than two decades.

“Hey, Mom,” I say quietly. “Pull up a booth, the coffee is shit.”

To my surprise, the edge of her mouth quirks up just slightly as she turns and gestures to someone behind her, probably one of her goons waiting at the door, and then tugs on the lapels of her blazer to straighten it, which is kind of pointless because it’s already starched and pressed as far as I can tell, and then sits down.

“This place is filthy,” Mom says flatly.

“Tell me about it,” I reply, taking another sip of my coffee before looking up at Millie, “Hey, Mill! She says this place is filthy!”

“So maybe go fuck off about it!” Millie snaps back without looking up from her phone.

My mother side-eyes Millie who doesn’t react despite the withering look. Then she shrugs, turns back to me, and says: “I like her.”

“Me too,” I agree.

“You’re coming back to Manehattan with me.”

“No, I’m not.”

I think if it were possible for an expression to cause a snap freeze, my coffee would be sub-zero, and I’d be dead.

To put it lightly, my mom isn’t what you’d call a big fan of hearing the word ‘no’, especially coming from me. Especially since I don’t think I’ve ever actually said it to her before. Not out loud and, I don’t think, even in my own head.

Maybe because a tiny, childish part of me was sure she would hear me think it.

My mother’s finger’s move to steeple, then twine together, and her eyes that are like a mirror of mine narrow into that heart-stopping, gut-wrenching glare that haunted my nightmares for so long. The difference is that this time, things are different. This time it’s not those flecks of cerise ice boring into my soul that are hovering at the edges of my mind.

It’s a pair of burning cerulean embers.

“Try again,” Mom says softly in a voice like an oiled blade from leather.

I swallow, lean forward on my elbows, and stare into those mirror-dark eyes of hers.

“No,” I say quietly. “I’m not.”

The stare-off lasts for a long moment and neither of us blinks. Mom could be the staring contest champion of the world if she wanted to. She’s got the ‘look’, the stamina, and the sheer, goddamn stubbornness. The funny thing is, Fluttershy is kind of similar, and that’s something I’ve never let myself admit before.

There are times when Fluttershy will get really heated, or really intense, and then she’ll give you this look like…

Well, like mom.

“You will,” Mom replies after a quiet moment. “Here’s your problem Rainbow, is that you’ve got nothing you’ll go all the way for and you never have, while I do, and I will.”

She squares her shoulders and straightens, putting her slightly greater height a hair over my head in a way that makes her feel a foot and change taller.

“You have friends,” She says softly. “You care… and I can take them apart, piece by piece, and I will, and it will be your fault,” then she leans in, her expression stormy, “and I’ll keep on doing it until you stop acting like a child, grow up, and take some responsibility for your life.”

My fists clench beneath the table, and in my right hand I can feel the twisted shaft of the cane lurking just behind the Fog. It’s ready for me, ready to take my rage, my anger, and all of my guilt, and give it form. I can feel it egging me on, maybe it’s my new instincts, maybe it’s the thing in the dark, maybe it’s just years of fucking repression finally starting to buckle.

“Touch them,” I say just as softly, “and I’ll take you apart, piece by piece.”

For a painfully brief moment, I see it.

A crack.

It’s the faintest widening of her eyes. The barest shiver of her glare that takes it from the solid, unyielding expression of judgment I remember from my childhood and turns it into something far more human. Something mortal.

Something weak.

It only lasts for a second, but it’s definitely there, and when the crack vanishes I watch rage take its place in real time.

“Pathetic,” Mom says. “But very like you, Rainbow… you don’t get your way, so you bully and browbeat because you’ve got nothing else to work with.

“You know, I tried— I tried to give you motivation, give you principles, and give the chance to be successful, but you are just dead set on being an absolute failure aren’t you? Just settling for second best, then third best, then fourth, and now you’re what? A dropout, a runaway, and a bum. Well, I’m very impressed, Rainbow, because if nothing else at least you’re consistent.”

“God damn you love hearing yourself talk,” I snap. Mom starts to open her mouth again but I slam my fist into the booth table, cutting her off and leaving a sizable crack.

“Hey!” Millie looks up, glaring, but I turn before she can say anything more and meet her eyes.

I don’t know what Millie sees in my face but whatever it is, drains the colour from her features, drops her jaw silently, and strangles her protest into a weak and brittle wheeze.

“Fuck off,” I snarl, and the words come out with a wet, viscous undercurrent.

Millie doesn’t hesitate, she doesn’t even nod. She just takes one step back, then two, and turns and scrambles out the back. I hear a clatter of pots and pans and a vicious stream of swearing follow her out, and I think I hear her dragging the cook with her.

When I turn back to Mom, I see something that’s very much like uncertainty on her face for the first time in my life.

Another first is that she’s staring at me speechless. Winnow Winds is never speechless. She’s the type who just shouts over you if you try to talk back to her, or even if you just try to ignore her. She gets to decide when the conversation is over, not me, not dad, not anyone else. Just her. Even if that means bellowing over me until I was sitting on the ground shaking and almost pissing my pants.

Who knew all it took to shut her up was yelling louder than her.

Actually, in retrospect, that seems kind of obvious.

“Rainbow~” Mom’s voice drops low and deadly.

I don’t let her have it though. I don’t let her take back the conversation. If I do, then I’ll lose everything. I finally, finally have her on the back heel and I’m going to keep her there if I have to break her back to do it.

“No, shut up,” I snap, “you’re going to shut up and you’re going to listen for once in your life!”

“How dare yo— urk!”

The cane is out and in my hands before I can think. My rage is boiling in my veins, filling my mouth with the taste of the Fog. My left hand is twitching to grab one of the vials, and it’s all I can do to fight off the urge, while my right hand is gripping the shaft of the cane whose heavy, capped head I’ve jabbed forward to bury in my mother’s gut.

I think I felt a rib snap.

“I said—” I twist and press the cane forward hard, pinning her to the booth she’s sitting in— “shut… up.”

A dull wheeze escapes her, followed by a hacking cough as spittle dips from her lips while she tries desperately to drag air into her lungs.

“You’re finished with me,” I say calmly.

It’s strange. Despite the rage, everything feels cold, and in a good way. The way that a cool breeze feels good on a hot day. The way a cold rag feels good against a fevered brow.

“You’re finished with my friends.” I twist the cane again, and another crackle of fractured bone makes me smile. “And you’re finished with dad.”

I pull back the cane and Mom lets out a strangled gasp as she flops forward, scattering the two mugs to shatter against the cheap tile floor as she dry-heaves and pants against the table.

Before she can catch her breath I stand, cane planted on the ground still gripped in my right hand while I reach with my other to grab her by the hair, drag her out of the booth, and throw her to the ground. She hits the tiles hard and cries out as she lands on the fragments of the ceramic mugs. There are deep cuts on her hands, and spots of blood welling against her once-tidy blazer as she looks up at me, finally afraid.

I feel the gold-hue glow of the serum pumping through my veins. Liquid hope catalysed by despair. I don’t know how I know it. I’ve always been shit at stuff like chemistry and biology, but I know it all the same.

Grinning, I toss the cane up lightly and catch it in the center of the shaft before bringing the heavy head down to slap loudly against my open left palm.

“See this?” I ask with a smile, flourishing the cane. “My old boss beat the shit out of me with this.”

I take a step forward as mom starts to rise and plant a boot in her gut, scraping fractured and broken ribs, and sending her to the ground. She doesn’t scream or cry. I think it probably hurt too much to get anything real out.

“He was a drug dealer,” I continue as if she hadn’t moved. “And I was his runner, and he was a real shitlord, but he was right about a couple of things, just like you were, mom… he said I had no principles. You say I’ve got nothing to go all the way for, well—”

I take a single step forward and two-hand the lower third of the cane to bring it around in a brutal golf-swing against Mom’s face. She tries to twist and move, but she’s so slow. I can’t believe I ever thought she was scary. She’s slow and scared, and definitely no monster.

Or maybe she isn’t slow. Maybe I’m just faster now.

Maybe I’m the monster.

Well, good… let her be scared for once in her life. Let her have a monster haunt her dreams for a few decades.

It’s her turn to hurt.

“—and y’know what?” I laugh as I walk over to where my strike threw her and sprawled her against the floor. “You were both right.”

The heel of the cane clacks loudly against the tiles as I plant it on the ground and stare down at her. My blood is pounding in my ears, it sounds like the beating of an almighty heart, and somehow I’m positive that she can hear it too.

My hair has lost some of its color and luster since I stopped having regular showers, which I guess is fair enough, and it’s still kind of gross and oily. I run my fingers through the short, fine strands anyway and smile down at Mom even as my grip tightens on the grip of the cane.

“But now I do,” I say quietly, my smile fading away as I stare down at the woman I call my mother. Winnow used to terrify me, but now… now she’s just pathetic.

Just an angry, helpless, delusional psychopath hurting everything she touches just so she can feel like the big strong queen bitch, even if it means ruining her six-year-old daughter.

“I hate you,” I hiss, and my throat constricts around the words, and the next time they come out in a bellow. “I hate you!”

Mom flinches and scrambles back and away from me. There’s blood leaking from her lips where she probably bit her tongue or cheek. Her face is bruised and cut up from little fragments of ceramic, and there’s a bigger, nastier gash on her right hand. Her clothes are askew, torn, and bloodied. She looks nothing like the terrifying icon that I remember. She doesn’t even look like my mother.

Except for the eyes.

I hate those eyes.

“You were supposed to take care of me!” I scream and the windows rattle. “You were supposed to love me! But instead, you just tore me apart over and over and over!”

For a moment I can feel them again, the raised ridges of scar tissue that covers my arms and chest. I can feel the sequences of fours and fives, finger by finger, where Her hand touched me. I can feel the cold bite of her fingers.

I want to feel them again.

Something beneath my skin snaps and stretches. I can feel the muscles around my jaw cramping and flexing against my will, the same happens through my arms, legs, and chest, and swelling the muscles and stretching skin taut. All I have to do is inject one dose of that serum. Send one vial of gold spilling and rushing through my veins. All it will take is one, and I’ll be stronger than Mom could possibly imagine.

I’ll be able to send her to Father. And she’ll understand what real monsters are.

My fingers are already slipping into the Fog to reach for the thick, heavy pouch that’s resting at my hip, searching for the leather cord that keeps it tied shut to retrieve two of the little metal syringes.

A full one for me.

And an empty one for her.

My phone chimes again, and it cuts through the clangor of my thoughts and pounding in my skull. The Fog recedes for a brief moment. Just the span of a heartbeat, but it’s enough.

I know who it is.

And I promised I’d try.

Mom is staring up at me with wide eyes, eyes that are so much like mine, and her chest is rising and falling with rapid, staccato motions. I can practically taste her fear. I can feel the hammering beat of her heart like she’s a rabbit about to be eaten by a wolf.

“Leave Canterlot.” I draw my hand back from the Fog and away from the pouch. “And if I even think that you’re trying to mess with me or my friends, I’ll come to Manehattan, and I will beat you into a pulp, understand?”

I raise the cane between us and smile.

“Nothing personal, y’know?” My grin widens and I wonder what my mouth must look like to make her go pale like that. “It’s just the principle of the thing.”

She deserves to die. After everything she did, after all the threats she’s made and all the times she’s tried to ruin my life, she deserves to die. But I deserved to die too for what I did to Sunset. For betraying her, for abandoning her… and she still made sure I got out of the Trials, even knowing that she’d end up left behind.

I want to be better.

Like Sunset.

Mom licks her lips as she stares up at me, then swallows hard and grits her teeth.

“You’re a freak,” she hisses. “A FREAK!”

Once, before Sunset, before the Fog, and before the Trials… before the whispers our positions would probably be reversed, but now her insults sound like what they are. A desperate woman trying to convince herself that she’s still the one in control. It’s a little funny actually. Funny and sad. Looking at her now, I can’t really figure out why I was so scared of her. She’s not a monster, she’s just a bitch I had the misfortune of being born to.

I flick my eyes up and look over her head and outside the window. The East End beyond the dirty windows of the diner is gone. I hadn’t realised how quiet it had gotten because there are no slums, no Canterlot, just Fog. Fog and darkness, and a twisting and writhing thing outside in the dark that’s whispering to me.

Welcoming me home.

“Yeah, and?” I reply finally, looking down at my mom. “I’d rather be a freak than whatever you are.”

On a whim, I reach through the Fog around me and into the leather pouch at my hip and draw out a single empty syringe. My mother’s eyes grow wide at the apparent sleight of hand—to her, it must have looked like I pulled the little device of glass and polished steel from thin air—as I toss it to her.

My Mom’s reflexes, broken ribs or no, are pretty good. She grabs it out of the air and stares at it for a long moment before looking back at me.

“Keep it,” I say as I step past her and put a hand on the door. “If you ever mess with me or the people I care about again, you’ll find out what it’s for.”

I turn the knob of the door, and the sounds of the East End flood back in with a palpable force as I open it. The scent of the Fog is chased out by the bitterly cold winds of the city and the stink of trash it carries with it.

This world really is a cesspit, but it’s not all bad.

I put a hand into my pocket and pull out my phone. Seven missed messages from Fluttershy. Rather than answer them, I tap her icon on the app and open her contact info, then tap the call button and raise the phone to my ear.

//RAINBOW!?//

Of course she picked up before the first ring even got through.

“Yeah,” I say with a chuckle. “Cool it with the volume, Flutters… everything is fine.”

//What happened?// she asks much more softly. //Your… W-Winnow, sh-she—//

“—she won’t be bothering us anymore,” I finish. “It’s over with, she’s going back to Manehattan… alone.”

Or at least she had better be, or I’ll have to make good on the promise I made which… actually, I’d probably enjoy that a lot more than I should.

//Really?// Fluttershy’s voice is light with awe. //She’s just… just like that?//

“We came to terms,” I reply quietly as I turn and start heading down the street and away from the East End. Away from the diner, and more importantly away from the train station. “She’s leaving me and dad, and everyone else in my life, alone.”

//That’s wonderful!// Fluttershy says, audibly relaxing. //And your dad?//

“I’ll talk to him next,” I say quietly as I continue towards the northern part of the city. “Tomorrow, I guess… I’ve got a few things to take care of tonight.”

//Okay, so long as you’re safe,// Fluttershy replies, then yawns and squeaks slightly. //I’m just… I’m so glad you’re safe.//

“Yeah,” I say, smiling as I reach my right hand out and tighten it into a fist. “Me too.”

As I grip hard, the Fog swirls around me, shrouding me and taking me into the place between here and there. Between Canterlot and home. The taste of ash and copper settles on my tongue as my hoodie melts away into a long , mantled coat of dark brown leather that’s ragged at the edges. My tread goes from a swift clip to a heavy tread as my converse become heavy, steel-toed boots between steps, and my hands relax as thick leather work gloves bleed into place around them, and in my right hand, the cane folds back into being.

And at my hip is a heavy leather pouch tied shut with a stout cord.

“Anyway, I gotta go but—” I swallow back my nerves and put a smile on— “I was thinking maybe after I talk to dad tomorrow we could go see a movie? Just, like… you and me?”

Fluttershy’s breath catches on the other line.

//Are you… uhm… but—// Fluttershy trails off quietly before finding her voice again. //—what about… y-you know.//

“She’s—” Not dead. She’s not dead, just like I’m not. And she’s stronger than me, so she’ll be back. I know she will. “She’s gone, Fluttershy, but I’m still here and so are you, so… whadya say? Dinner and a movie?”

There’s a soft hiccup and a quiet, happy sob that she’s trying and failing to stifle. I can hear her shifting around in her room, probably looking for a tissue or something. Hopefully she doesn’t wipe her face on Angel Bunny. She did that once and the little gremlin held it against me for months. How it knew it was my fault I have no idea.

//That… that sounds really nice, actually,// Fluttershy says finally, her voice a little raw, but free of tears. //I’d like that.//

“It’s a date,” I say with a smile. “Call you later, Flutters, and… and thanks… for always being there for me.”

//Always, Rainbow Dash,// Fluttershy replies happily. //Always. Be safe.//

I chuckle as I end the call, lower the phone, pocket it, and then reach back behind my head to grab the hood that’s draped down my back. I pull it up and over, shrouding my face, and I take a deep breath of the Fog.

It’s late, and the Danse Macabre will just be gearing up for the night, which means a certain girl with a bag full of drugs will be walking around filling peoples’ heads with lies and their veins with poison. No one will miss her. The world is better off without people like her and Chase.

I reach into my bag and run my fingers over the syringes. I’m tempted to use, but I won’t. There’s no need. I don’t need that kind of help for this. She’s not worth wasting even a little of a full dose on. So instead, I draw out an empty syringe and smile as I turn it over in my fingers.

Will I… b-be better?

I take a deep breath of the Fog, set my feet to the ground in a sprinter’s start. It’s a long run to the north end where all the ritz and lights of Canterlot mask a club district full of pushers preying on rich addicts.

My Daughter.

Father gave me a job. He gave me a purpose. He is the thing in the dark, but I get to choose how I fulfill that purpose. For once in my life, I feel like I’ve got something real. Like I am something real, and not just a second-best waiting to fail again.

What will I… b-be?

I push off and the Fog swallows me. I breathe deep as my bones crack and shift and my muscles swell. Traces of the serum in my veins catalyse and activate, filling me with subtle power. I can feel the gold-hue glow of it backlight eyes and fill my veins with shocks of lightning that beg for another hit of the needle.

My Harvester.

I’ll take everything from them, the way they take from others. I’ll break them, take them apart, and leave them empty because they deserve it.

My Blight.