Starlight Glimmer sat behind the desk of her old Guidance Counselor office. That used to be her position at the School of Friendship, until Twilight Sparkle had appointed her as the new Headmare. Starlight had then given the Guidance Counselor job to her close friend, Trixie. Why was Starlight sitting in her old office then? Because what was to come was something only a seasoned counselor like Starlight could do.
It had been a few days since Twilight’s coronation as the new Princess of Equestria. Everything was just starting to get back to normal after the battle against the trio of threats that almost took over; Chrysalis, Tirek, and Cozy Glow. For the first couple of days, all Starlight had to worry about were the new batch of students wishing to apply to the school. Not the normal, all-pony batch, but with some griffons, yaks, and changelings mixed in. It was nice to see more and more creatures showing interest in the school. On the third day, however, Starlight received a visit from Twilight, who wasted no time in giving her a certain mission. She wanted Starlight to psychoanalyze one of the very villains who tried to take over Equestria! But which one? Not Chrysalis, for she was a creature bred for feeding on love, and was too consumed by her vengeance for Starlight to be reasoned with. Not Tirek either, for he’s shown no remorse in anything he’s done whether in the past or present. That left only one option.
Twilight reasoned that Cozy Glow was still a child, and there might be a chance to change her, if they could find out where she had gotten her manipulative, power-hungry nature.
“There has to be a reason for her being like this,” Twilight had said. “Behind every pony villain is a tragic backstory.”
Starlight had to admit that statement wasn’t that far from the truth. Princess Luna had turned into Nightmare Moon because she had felt neglected, Starlight herself had been abandoned by her friend, even Diamond Tiara (though not technically a villain) had faced high pressure from her verbally abusive mother. Maybe there was something deeper. Maybe all Cozy needed was a chance to tell her story, have a good cry, and then she’d be on the path toward redemption. Since Starlight has had dealings with Cozy in the past, Twilight thought it would be best for her to tackle this challenge. After some consideration, Starlight accepted, knowing that this would probably be the hardest child she would counsel.
Her last action as the School of Friendship’s Guidance Counselor.
And so, Starlight sat behind her old desk, watching the door with anticipation, and going over in her head what questions she would be asking. As she looked around the room one last time, Starlight felt that she was prepared for anything. She had a box of tissues sitting right at the front, just in case of sudden tears. There were some pillows behind her desk, just in case Cozy needed to scream into one. She even had a small pony doll in her drawer in case Cozy needed to show where her drunk uncle had touched her (She wanted to be prepared for all trauma possibilities). Sweeping her eyes back to the door, Starlight was ready for whatever traumatic backstory Cozy had to tell.
At that moment, there was a knock on the door. Taking a deep breath, Starlight called out, “Come in.”
The door opened, and in came Twilight. Behind her, followed closely by Twilight’s friends, was the curly-maned, dimpled-faced, big-eyed figure of Cozy Glow. It seemed that time suspended in stone had not really changed her appearance, except for maybe a few disheveled curls in her mane. Her expression was hard to read. She didn’t look scared or even angry. In fact, she almost seemed content as she looked up at Starlight and smiled her dimpled smile.
“Hello again, Headmare Starlight!” she greeted in a sickeningly sweet tone.
“Don’t even think of trying that innocent voice, Cozy!” Rainbow Dash scolded from behind her, staring at Cozy with distrusting eyes. “Every pony is aware of your wicked thoughts!”
“Now, now, Rainbow,” Twilight said calmly. “Cozy’s here to get past the sweet demeanor and reveal her true self. Then, and only then, can the true reforming begin.” She then turned to Starlight. “You ready to go?”
“All set,” Starlight responded with a nod. Twilight nodded back as she stepped aside to allow Cozy to trot past her and take the seat across the desk.
“Ya need us to stay put?” Applejack asked Starlight, though her gaze was still on Cozy, as if expecting her to try something.”
“No, no,” Starlight replied. “It’s best if we can just be alone.”
Cozy looked back at Applejack, a wide smile still plastered on her face. The others looked uneasy for a moment, for every pony knew that when Cozy smiled, there was usually a scheme not too far behind. It wasn’t until Twilight nodded at her friends that they relaxed a bit. Twilight turned back to Starlight with a soft smile.
“We’ll be in the hall if you need us,” she said. Starlight nodded again and the others turned to leave. Right before Rainbow left though, she whipped back around to Cozy, her eyes narrowed.
“No funny business, Cozy!”
When Cozy nodded, Rainbow didn’t look convinced. She pointed at her eyes, then toward Cozy before slowly backing out of the room. Twilight gave one final nod to Starlight, and then shut the door.
As soon as they were alone, Cozy relaxed her smile a bit. Starlight was almost half-expecting her to try something, but she just sat there, looking at Starlight. After a few seconds, Starlight realized things must look pretty awkward with all the silence, so she cleared her throat and leaned forward on her desk a bit.
“So, Cozy,” she said. “How are you today?” A little cliched perhaps, but this line always seemed to work well as an opener for the students.
“Well,” Cozy started, “compared to the time spent trapped in stone, I’m much better. I noticed that there was pigeon crap on Tirek’s head, so hey, silver lining!”
“I see,” Starlight replied. “So, I take it, you know why you’re here then?”
“Yep,” Cozy nodded. “Princess Twilight told me that this is my chance at redemption. To talk about my inner demons, past traumas, and to let out some much-needed emotion.” She then frowned a bit and looked away slightly. “I’ve been given a second chance. I don’t wanna waste it.”
Starlight’s eyes widened a bit. She had never heard Cozy sound so vulnerable.
“Well then,” she said, trying not to sound too taken aback. “I’m glad you’re leaping at the chance for a new start!” She then opened a drawer and took out a notebook and pen. “Shall we begin?”
Cozy looked back and smiled, “Absolutely!”
Starlight smiled sweetly and placed the pen tip to the notebook. “How about we start at the beginning? Tell me about your home life, like before you came to Ponyville.”
Cozy screwed up her face, thinking. “Let’s see… I was born in a small town called Pennsylneighnia.” As soon as Cozy started speaking, Starlight started to write.
“Where is that?” Starlight asked.
“A few hundred miles west of Phillydelphia.” Cozy responded. “We lived in a townhouse surrounded by farmland.”
“Interesting,” Starlight mumbled to herself as she continued to write. “And what about your family?”
“Me, my mom, and my dad.”
“So, no siblings?”
“Nope. Only child.”
“I see,” Starlight nodded. She looked at Cozy with a sympathetic stare. “It must’ve been lonely then. Having nopony else around who you could spend time with.”
To Starlight’s slight surprise, Cozy shook her head smiling. “Not really. Mom and Dad made sure to spend a lot of time with me. They gave me a lot of attention.” Starlight blinked, and mentaly crossed Parental neglect off her list of possible motivations. Nevertheless, she regained herself almost immediately and continued.
“What about your life outside of home?” she asked. “Did you have any friends at school?”
“Oh I didn’t go to school,” Cozy replied, lounging a bit in her chair. “I was homeschooled.”
Starlight’s fire lit again as she scribbled harder than before. “So you didn’t have any friends then, and that led you to becoming bitter and overcome with a need for more friends than any pony else?”
“Not at all,” Cozy said sweetly. “My parents made sure to introduce me to the kids in the neighborhood, so I had plenty of friends.”
Starlight’s fire went out again as she crossed out a note she had made and huffed a dejected, “Oh.”
It was rather strange for Starlight to be disappointed at a happy childhood story, but she couldn’t help but feel a twinge of letdown. No abusive parents, no neglectful upbringing, no lack of friends, hell, there wasn’t even another sibling to take all the attention. It really seemed like Cozy’s homelife was a happy one, nothing that could possibly lead to Cozy’s villainous motivations. One way or another however, Starlight was going to find some link.
“Tell me, Cozy,” Starlight said calmly, “how are your parents now?”
Once again, Cozy didn’t bat an eye, but smiled and replied, “They’re fine!”
Starlight stared blankly at Cozy and muttered, “Just...fine?” Cozy nodded. Starlight took a deep breath and softly said, “You don’t have to hide anything from me, Cozy. I’m your friend. If there’s any issue you’re facing, I can help you through it. Anything at all.”
“Well…” Cozy hesitated a bit, looking suddenly sad. Starlight leaned forward more, her pen pressing hard against the notepad, waiting anxiously for the sad truth. Cozy took a deep breath and continued, “Around the time before I moved to Ponyville, my mom had died-”
“Oh no!” Starlight bemoaned, scribbling away on the notepad. “I’m so sorry for your loss, Co-”
“-a little inside when she lost the lottery. It was a pot of almost 10,000,000 bits. Broke her heart.”
And there went the fire again.
“I’m so sorry to hear that,” Starlight grumbled with slightly clenched teeth as she crumbled up the fresh note and threw it into the trash. After a few seconds of regaining herself once again, Starlight said, “Let’s talk about these friends of yours. Did you ever have any problems with them? Were you ever bullied?”
Cozy started to look worried. Starlight could understand this, after all, bullying was a serious issue. And it was something that Starlight usually dealt with when talking to her students about past experiences.
“It’s alright, Cozy,” Starlight said soothingly. “Let it all out.”
Taking a deep breath, Cozy started, “There was this one big colt in my class. He beat-”
“Oh, Cozy,” Starlight said sympathetically as she started on a new note. “I’m so sorry you had to go through-”
“-his meat when he thought the teacher wasn’t looking. I think he was going through an experimental phase. Weird, right?”
SNAP!
The pen had gone right through the notepad. Starlight sat there motionless, her left eye starting to twitch. Without a single word, she ripped the pen out of the hole, threw the entire notebook in the trash, and put the pen down. Cozy was still looking at her with a slight smile, and at that moment, Starlight was beginning to despise that smile all over again. Not wanting to do something she would regret later, Starlight took a few deep breaths, forced a smile, and leaned forward on her desk again.
“Let’s talk about what led you to Ponyville,” she said, forcing with all her might to stay calm. “What caused you to move over here? Did anything happen at home?”
“Nope.” Cozy replied.
Getting tired of the lack of story, Starlight forced a smile and said, “Care to expand on that?”
“I said I was leaving, packed my bags, said goodbye to my family, and caught the next train over to Ponyville,” Cozy said, sounding as nonchalant as if she was discussing the weather. At this point, Starlight could feel her frustration starting to rise. Her job to help and her temper were starting to clash, and she felt that if she didn’t get a proper motive soon, she was going to snap.
“Are you sure there was no reason for moving to Ponyville alone?” Starlight practically begged. “Maybe something traumatic that could be hard to talk about but you can to me because I’m the former Celestia-damned guidance counselor and I’m Celestia-damned here to help Celestia-damned you?!”
Cozy didn’t even seem to register the growing frustration in Starlight, nor the “very subtle” language used to show her urgency. She just looked up at the ceiling for a moment, thinking hard.
“Well…” she started, looking sad again. Starlight held her pen at the ready again. “I did have this uncle…”
“Yes?!”
“And, well, he molested-”
“AHA!” Starlight snapped, wrenching open her drawer and pulled out the pony doll. “Where did the bad pony touch you, Cozy? It’s alright to tell-”
“-a mailbox once. It was so odd, but then again, you fill him with hard cider, and he does the strangest things.”
Within a second, there was a loud RIP, and the doll’s head had separated from its body. Starlight, a vein throbbing on the side of her head, threw the two halves of the doll into the trash with a loud THUNK, and stared at Cozy Glow as she breathed like an angry bull. Looking at her still unfazed smile, Starlight wanted nothing more than to strangle that cutesy-wootsy head until it turned dark blue!
Then, slowly, the frustration started to seep out of Starlight like a deflating balloon as she regained her senses, and she slumped her chin onto the desk, feeling drained and defeated.
“What’s wrong, Starlight?” Cozy asked innocently.
Figuring that she might as well just tell the truth, Starlight said sorrowfully, “I just wanted to find out why you are who you are.” She let out a long sigh before continuing, “Infiltrating the school, acting all innocent, taking over the school, trying to destroy all magic, everything with Chrysalis and Tirek, just why did you do all of that?”
To Starlight’s surprise, Cozy started to giggle.
“Why didn’t you just say so in the first place?" she smiled. "I'll tell you why."
Instantly, Starlight's expression brightened as she looked up at Cozy. "You will?"
"Of course!" Cozy responded cheerfully. "I have nothing to hide."
Feeling the fire return, Starlight sat back up, picked up her pen, and pulled a fresh notepad from her drawer.
“So what was the reason?” Starlight asked intently. “Some past trauma from home? A feeling of loneliness somewhere in your life?”
“No, no,” Cozy said, shaking her head. “Nothing like that.”
“Then why did you do all that villainous stuff?” Starlight asked, leaning more towards the filly, her pen once again touching the surface of the notepad. Cozy paused for a moment, letting the suspense build inside Starlight, before smiling sweetly.
“I wanted to.”
Silence broke through the office as Starlight continued to stare at Cozy. A ringing was muffling Starlight’s hearing, for she must’ve heard wrong.
“I’m sorry, what?” she quickly asked.
“I said I wanted to.” Cozy repeated, still smiling. “I had a dream to take over Equestria, and I tried to do it.”
Starlight blinked. So she hadn’t misheard her, but the answer wasn’t at all what Starlight was waiting for. There was no hiding how taken aback she was this time. Starlight had sat back in her chair with a soft THUMP, and stared open-mouthed at the smiling filly.
“But…” Starlight started, trying to find her words again, “why?”
Cozy giggled again. “You really think I needed a reason for me turning into who I am?”
“Well,” Starlight stammered, “that’s mostly how it works…”
At that point, Cozy let out another laugh. Not the cute giggles she had before, but bordering on the maniacal cackles. She laughed so much she was holding her sides and even spinning gleefully in the chair. Starlight, still in shock, just sat there watching her laugh herself silly. When she finally calmed down enough, Cozy wiped the tears from her eyes and looked humorously at the former counselor.
“Let’s cut the shit, Starlight.” she said bluntly, making Starlight’s mouth fall open. “Just because a pony’s a villain doesn’t mean they have some kind of hurtful backstory of the past. Maybe that’s how you were, and even then, your backstory is a pretty pathetic reason to turn into a cult leader. I mean, swearing off cutie marks just cause Sunburst got his first?”
“To be fair,” Starlight interrupted, “he also left me behind to-”
“If I wanted to know your opinion, I would’ve asked, bitch!” Cozy spat in her sickenly-sweet tone, making Starlight gasp. “Anyways, sorry to disappoint you, but I don’t have a traumatic backstory. I had been wanting to take over Equestria since I could fly. I spent much of my time growing up at home to learn about the Elements of Harmony and the power they held, also how to strategize and plan, and then when I was ready, I set out on my own, ready to strike.”
“Wait a minute!” Starlight interjected. “What about your parents?”
“Who do you think encouraged me to follow my dreams?” Cozy answered. “When I told them I was leaving to conquer Equestria, their exact words were, ‘Go get them, sweetie. Pack a scarf.’
With a CLUNK, Starlight’s pen fell to the floor as she stared in shock at this little filly who clearly did not have a tragic reason for turning to a life of diabolical villainy, whose family actually supported her in that goal, and was clearly not sorry, even now! Starlight had never seen something like this from a pony, not to mention a filly at that.
“So, let me get this straight,” Starlight finally said, rubbing a hoof to her temple, “you’re messed up. You’re more than aware you’re messed up. You’re proud that you’re messed up, your parents are proud that you’re messed up, and you plan to continue to be messed up?”
“Pretty much,” Cozy answered, smiling widely again.
There was a short pause, in which both parties stared at each other for a solid minute, Cozy just keeping her dimpled-smile ever so present.
“THEN WHY THE HELL DIDN’T YOU JUST START WITH THAT?!” Starlight shouted. All of the anger and frustration had finally exploded with the realization that this pointless mission was a complete waste of an afternoon.
“Because I wanted to watch you lose it,” Cozy said happily. “Duh.”
It was at that point that Starlight stiffened in her seat, as she looked at the smug grin of Cozy Glow, and her eye started to twitch again.
Twilight and the others were waiting in the hall outside of the office, keeping a watch to make sure Starlight and Cozy weren’t disturbed. To give them complete privacy, Twilight had cast a sound-proof spell on the office door, so all that could be heard were the soft hooves of Fluttershy, who was pacing back and forth near the door.
“Do you think things are going well?” Pinkie asked.
“I’m sure Starlight is doing a fabulous job,” Rarity replied. “After all, this was her old job.”
“Very true,” Twilight nodded with a smile. “Once their session is done, we’ll finally know what happened to Cozy Glow, and lead her on the path of redemp-”
Twilight was suddenly cut off by the office door, which was opening slowly. Every pony looked up just in time to see Starlight calmly trotting out of the office. Instantly, every pony crowded around her.
“Well?” Twilight said excitedly. “What’s the diagnosis, Starlight?”
“Did she have abusive parents?” Fluttershy asked.
“No friends?” Applejack inquired.
“A drunk uncle who touched her in inappropriate ways?” Pinkie implored.
Starlight looked once around at her friends’ interested faces, took a deep breath, and let it out.
“None of the above,” she said calmly. “She’s just a little shit.”
The six ponies blinked, sure that they had heard wrong. When Starlight didn’t show any signs of joking, they looked at each other, some with glum expressions, others looking not so surprised. Twilight looked rather shocked.
“B-b-but there’s always a reason,” she insisted. “There has to-”
Starlight placed a hoof to Twilight’s mouth, silencing her, and softly repeated, “Twilight, she’s just a little shit. That is all.” And then, without another word, she casually strolled down the hall, around the corner, and out of sight. Curious, Twilight and the others moved slowly to the open door and all peered in.
There was Cozy Glow, sitting on the floor, back to her stone form, with a frozen laugh on her face.
As the six all looked at each other again, Rainbow cleared her throat and said, “I could have told her that.”
