Psychoanalyzing Her Reflection
Somewhere, in Twilight Sparkle’s heart, there was a nagging doubt. Buried under what could only be described as years of study, devotion to the Princesses, and her friends, there was a tiny seed of it. It nipped at the bottom of her soul occasionally, but never badly enough where she regretted a decision.
For the most part, Twilight never regretted anything she did for Equestria. Everything she’d done for the country she now ruled was for the greater good, and most of the time, there were very little casualties. On the contrary, even the casualties that should have existed during times of trial, battles, or freak accidents, were simply disproportionate. There should have been more issues after years of battling things out with magic rainbows and laserbeams, Twilight always thought, but in the end, she was happy it ended up this way.
There was very little that could sway her beliefs of way of life now. The windows in the Canterlot castle cemented her faith, the rainbow light shining through the glassy murals themselves being a reflection of her and her friend’s own magic. Twilight relished in the colored sunlight, occasionally opting to stand quietly in it’s beams, and take in the warmth. She would have passed it off as something the recently-gained pegasus side of her instinctually made her do, but she knew better. She knew that as a very young unicorn, she would play in Celestia’s golden sunbeams, coming through the windows of her mother’s kitchen. The best place to nap in the entire house was on the warmed stone flooring, listening to the idle chatter of her older brother and her parents.
But that was just it. That strangely anxiety-inducing feeling only got worse when Twilight thought of things like that. Pleasant memories of her own childhood that she couldn’t push past or ignore shook her a bit to her core at the moment. Yet again, another thing she decided to try and forget about, something she attempted to shake her head at. Something that she’d sit up with, late at night in her large, empty bed. Something she’d mull over during a beautifully prepared breakfast, made by a multitude of loyal servants. Something that would make each and every second spent in the castle gardens torturous.
She almost wished Celestia hadn’t moved them there. It had been this way for weeks now.
Putting one hoof in front of the other seemed like such a simple task, but lately, it was proving to be more difficult than she anticipated. The next step, the next right thing, the next meeting, it usually flowed so well in Ponyville. Perhaps the power she had on that sort of scale was such an insignificant fraction, that it didn’t prepare her well enough for the life she now led. Why was it so difficult to carry out the duties that she should have been accustomed to by now? Again, deep down she knew the answer.
Truthfully, if Twilight Sparkle were to stop running from her own feelings on the matter, maybe it would not have spiraled into the sort of problem it ended up being now. But, she already cemented the echoing idea in the back of her mind. The once small seed of doubt had slowly turned into a sinking thought that would crawl into the rest of her body, taking over her mind and muscles as she tried to ignore it.
Did she do the right thing?
In theory, yes. Twilight did the right thing. She always did the right thing. If she DIDN’T do the right thing, Celestia would have told her so a long time ago. She had saved Equestria, with the help of her friends, with the help of her allies, and with the help of hundreds of creatures who believed she was doing the right thing too. She had stalled the destruction of everything, and she’d stopped magic from being omitted from all of Equestria. That’s how she knew she did the right thing, that her moral compass was still in working order. And usually, thinking of that would temporarily release her from the hold of the now inescapable dread.
But she couldn’t think past that point. She couldn’t bear to think about how Equestria would perceive her rule, much less her decisions. Of course, they’d praise her. They’d praise the former Elements of Harmony, they’d praise the Princesses. And yet, it wasn’t satisfying to Twilight. The words of everyone around her weren’t comforting anymore, merely water rolling off of her back. Because, no matter how hard she moved her doubts aside, she could only ever prove she did the right thing for two of the members of her garden. The same garden that was a gift that the always generous and benevolent Celestia, one that she did not appreciate.
Twilight couldn’t even look at the courtyard without feeling ashamed. Yes, she could only ever prove that she did the right thing for two of the members of her garden, not all three.
That was what was keeping Twilight Sparkle up at night. The idea of being wrong about this sort of thing plagued her nightmares. Discord had told her once that when he was held captive by the stone spell, he was able to hear everything around him still. Did that apply to Cozy Glow? Could she hear everyone mocking her in the garden? Could she hear all of the guards whoop and cheer at the prospect of her downfall? Could she hear the sounds of life going on without her?
By the time Cozy glow would emerge, if ever, the entirety of her childhood would have been squandered. There she’d be, possibly hundreds of years old, and still trapped in the body of a foal. Yes, trapping them in stone was the correct thing to do for Tirek and Crysalis, the likes of which Twilight barely spent a second thought on. Yet, for Cozy Glow, Twilight couldn’t convince herself that the same punishment applied.
That was a student. That was her student. Someone Twilight had failed to correctly teach. Someone she had allowed the Princesses to decide wasn’t worthy of redemption. How could she call herself the Princess of Friendship, if she couldn’t extend due mercy to a troubled foal? The equivocy of her thoughts made her want to push her breakfast away, run to her room, and curse into her pillow for hours. She couldn’t do that to Equestria though, not to the millions of denizens she had managed to save. She couldn’t abandon all of her sheep, for the lost one that had run away.
When Twilight had brought it up with her own friends, they had giggled initially. Pinkie pie had hopped over to her with a gentle pat on the back, assuring her that they had all done exactly what had helped Equestria. Rainbow Dash had expressed disgust for all three of the garden-dwellers, mocking them and their attempts to hurt her friends. Rarity had let out a sort of disgruntled huff, expressing disdain for anyone who pitied them. Applejack had given her honest opinion, that ponies and creatures that could hurt so many people didn’t deserve that sort of sympathy. Even Fluttershy, who wasn’t normally verbose, piped up to explain that it was completely justified for creatures who had almost destroyed the world as they knew it, to still be alive to some degree, living in the nicest garden in Equestria.
That was just it though, wasn’t it? Twilight bit her tongue in front of her friends and continued on with whatever activity they had planned for the day, but she couldn’t help but notice what they had said. Ponies, creatures, statues... None of those words implied that one of them was a foal.
Today was going to be different than all the days before. Today, Twilight wasn’t going to trip herself up with what-ifs and wrestling with her own thoughts. She was going to finally do what she needed to do to let go of this entire thing: Erase every trace of Cozy Glow from the school she had once attended.
The idea had been suggested to her by Rainbow Dash initially, after she had complained that Cozy Glow was on her mind more often than she should have been. The concept made sense to Twilight at the time; if she just got rid of everything that reminded her of the filly, maybe she’d stop being inclined to think about her so much. She had delayed the inevitable long enough, but now it was time to finally jump over that last hurdle.
It was easy enough to sort out which of the desks Cozy Glow had sat in, her own name etched onto the sides of them with some sharp object she had found around the school grounds. Twilight had interrupted so many classes that day, removing every desk and giving a discreet order to a faculty member to have them sanded, repainted, or disposed of. They, of course, happily complied.
Sometimes, the desks would have little remnants in them. A forgotten ribbon was one of the more notable finds Twilight had discovered, as well as a small notepad with scratches scribed in its interior. Once it was probably a list, but now every piece of information was covered up with clouds of ink, and the other half of the pages were empty. Twilight held back the urge to take the notepad back to her castle, in order to recover the lost information. The ribbon and notepad were ordered to be burned. That, too, was an order happily complied with. She had made a good decision entrusting that to a dragon student.
Twilight had scrubbed some bathroom graffiti off of the walls herself. Despite being clean for the most part, some of the walls had messages of devotion to the pink filly (Twilight chalked this up to rebellion). Other students had written down curses directed towards Cozy Glow. It didn’t matter what they represented, as long as it mentioned her or hinted at her existence, Twilight would happily clean the walls of the school from the traces of her. With each soapy streak through the foal’s name, Twilight could feel that relief course through her head. This was the right thing, she had to rid these walls of the irked past.
Twilight Sparkle was pleased with herself for the most part. She had almost left the building entirely too until a member of the staff had tapped her on the shoulder. Twilight didn’t mind staying a bit longer to help if she needed to, she had cleared her schedule to be here anyway. The one who tapped on her shoulder was a pony she didn’t recognize fully, perhaps a new hire? It didn’t matter to her at the moment, and she surely forgot afterward who exactly it was that brought the last part of this project to her attention. Yes, she couldn’t leave the school until she had addressed the most tainted area of all: The dormitories.
Twilight’s hard work felt like it crumbled in front of her in seconds, soul being sucked out at the sound. Despite this, her expression masked this intense discomfort, and the worker pony was none the wiser. She had simply nodded, thanking the unnamed pony and trotting towards the living quarters the students shared. She hadn’t even thought to check there.
Cozy Glow was a pony, right? There weren’t a lot of ponies that stayed at the dorms without a reason. Sure, it was well furnished, and it was convenient to be so close to all of your friends, but if you already lived in Ponyville, what was the use of it? Cozy Glow, Twilight thought, had moved to Ponyville, assumedly with her family or guardians, and didn’t stay overnight at the school like some of the other students.
She was dead wrong.
The entire room was littered with her belongings. She had been staying there for some time to amass this sort of destruction. Somehow, Twilight had assumed that the room of such a cunning pony would be in perfect order, like her own as a filly, but she was proven wrong at the display of memorabilia. After thanking another staff member for the room key, she dismissed them, walking inside of the full, yet hollow room.
Papers were scattered about the ground, for one. They seemed to carry a thin layer of dust upon them. Some were covered in drawings of Cozy Glow herself, self portraits of the alicorn she wished to become. Some of the papers had red ink on them, phrases like “I NEED POWER!” and “I HATE TWILIGHT SPARKLE!” etched on their once pristine white faces. Those were understandable, and even expected. Twilight had grabbed a bag to put them all in, pushing them down with her hooves to make room for more.
The closet was even more predictable, one or two dresses that would make sense for a filly her age to have, especially if she was attempting to blend in with the crowd. Nothing about these dresses stood out to Twilight. She also put those into the bag, barely allowing herself a second thought. If she had allowed herself to reflect on the slices of normalcy wedged in Cozy’s busy life, it would only cause more conflict.
The sheets on the bed, along with the comforter, were crumpled and dirty. They were once a pastel yellow, with purple lace accenting the bottom. A very pretty, yet neutral, choice to have in the dormitories. Most student’s rooms all held small clues to who they were as creatures, especially some of the older students with defining characteristics. Some ponies could afford bedspreads with their cutie marks and mane colors all over them, sometimes they were covered in cute pictures or something designed to match their personal style. For some reason, Cozy Glow seemed to not have changed them since she had started staying at the school, despite that being what most of the students did. And for some other inexplicable reason, they had been thoroughly stained. Twilight couldn’t explain that one very well, nor did she want to. The mare clamped her jaw shut in mild disgust as those, too, were placed into the bag, and shoved down with her hooves.
There were death threats pinned to the walls. She had taken those down.
There were books on the desk, all about the magic that Cozy Glow herself couldn’t wield. Twilight made a mental note to return those to the castle library.
The more Twilight explored the space in front of her, and the more she placed into her large bag for incineration, she felt the weight of what she had done lift off of her back. Cozy Glow clearly didn’t want help, did she? The evidence buried in this room was all mounting against her, and Twilight was relieved to feel justified in her own actions. This was not the filly she had nightmares about destroying the life of, this was a monster. A creature twisted from her own pride and greed, someone who could never truly understand friendship at its fullest. Each small token she placed into the bag seemed to guide her, nudging the purple mare towards the direction all her friends had been pointing in for so long.
A saddlebag, filled to the brim with hoof-drawn maps of Equestria. Impressive, but the writing on the sides of them, depicting what she’d do to every city, sickened Twilight to look at. Good, she had found something else to ease her worries. Into the bag, it went.
A hairbrush. Easy enough. It was a bit dirty, with remnants of Cozy’s blue mane stuck in its bristles. Twilight deemed the wooden brush further evidence still that she had been correct, musing that if Cozy took better care of her things, it would show her capacity to care about anything at all besides her dark plans for everyone around her. Into the bag, it went.
By now, the very last thing to remove from the room had come into Twilight’s view. After all of the papers detailing Cozy’s intentions were thrown away, after all of the floor had been swept and mopped to perfection. After the comforter and sheets and pillows had been taken off the bed, after the clothes in the closet had been placed in the bag. After everything had seemingly been finished, Twilight was fully ready to congratulate herself on healing her own itching wounds, turn to walk out of the school, and burn the bag she had brought with her at her castle.
Under the bed, there was a box.
It wasn’t a very large box, and it wasn’t ornate in any way. It was a simple, rustic wooden thing, a brass latch keeping it shut, with no paint or decorations on it to dress it up. It wasn’t an interesting shape either, just a square box with a flat lid. The wood was thin and cheap, the smells Twilight had come to associate with wood weren’t even present. There was no aroma of pine or cedar, there was no smell of the lovely trees on the Apple Family Orchard, and there was nothing hinting to her at what type of wood it was. The top of it had the same thin layer of dust that the floor, bedding, and desk had on them. Twilight blew out through her mouth, allowing the dust to soar off the box and dissipate in the air.
Part of her, the invigorated and enlightened part of her, wanted to throw the box into the bag and be done with this entire situation. It would have been so easy to ignore such a boring and unassuming thing. It would have been incredibly easy to toss it aside, dismiss its existence, and forget about it tomorrow.
And yet, the terrible sinking in her belly came back with a vengeance. The swirl of conflicting feelings and doubt crashed over her in just an instant, metaphorically knocking her body further into the seas of her own internal moral dilemma. Despite all of the evidence pointing to exactly what Twilight’s friends had assumed, she couldn’t help but surprise herself with more left-over anxiety. The Princess of Friendship couldn’t manage to turn her back on the stupid little box, and that aggravated her. She wished she could just let go of the frustrating feelings that had been plaguing her. That’s what this entire day, this entire cleansing, was about, wasn’t it? Why after all of this, could she not let this single item be thrown into the bag?
With a grunt of resentment, she unhooked the latch of the box.
Immediately, she knew why she couldn’t have left it by itself.
The magic she had been using to hold the box up dissolved, sending the wooden box careening towards the floor below. Twilight herself felt her face contort in shock, her legs not obeying her as she slowly walked backward, her gaze completely locked onto the contents.
All of the feelings Twilight had, buried deep inside of her all this time, pressed at her eyes and mouth. She couldn’t escape the hot tears that had decided to form now, pricking at her eyes and trickling down her face without her command. Stumbling slightly, she sat down on her rump, her quivering lip threatening to release sobs that she had been containing inside herself for what felt like years.
In this dusty box, there was no secret journal. There was no plan to ruin Equestria. There was no plot to kill her and her friends, and there was no incriminating evidence ready to damn her to her life as a statue. Twilight should have been grateful for the change of pace, but the purple mare couldn’t manage any graitutufe. Trembling on the ground, Twilight Sparkle stared straight into the eyes of a matted, dirty, and familiar teddy bear.
Her chest tightened as she cried, covering her eyes with her hooves to try and block the image out of her mind. After all of this, after everything she had painted over, thrown away, and left to burn. After everything she scrubbed free of the foal’s influence. And after everything Twilight’s students and friends had tried to convince her to believe. After the exhilaration she had felt when she was finally letting go of her own guilt, after everything was said and done.
Cozy Glow really was just a foal.
Had Twilight ever seen her parents? She couldn’t remember a single parent-teacher meeting they had attended. Had Twilight ever seen anybody take care of her, besides the staff of the school? She couldn’t remember that either. Cozy Glow had silently lived her life under the muzzle of the head mare herself, plotting herself to her doom inside of this tiny room, without any adult to guide her. Practically alone in a school meant to consolidate friendship and teamwork.
She could have been there. She could have shown Cozy Glow the way, and she and Starlight could have worked on some sort of plan to help Cozy get back on the right track. And yet, after the first infraction, the so-called logical next step for the Princesses to take was to send that foal-- a child that slept in a dirty room alone with a teddy bear hanging on by threads, a child who desperately tried to make friends and tried on pretty dresses like her peers, a child who played outside in Celestia’s golden sun like Twilight had as a filly-- to live an eternity in stone.
The alicorn princess couldn’t hold back any of the offending thoughts anymore. Lowering her upper body to the ground and placing her hooves over her head as she sobbed, Twilight tasted the bitterness she had felt towards Cozy Glow wash away, and be replaced by pounding, nauseating guilt.
Who else did Twilight know that didn’t understand the value of friendship, even as a cutie-mark aged foal? Who else did Twilight know that studied magical power above all else, who was expected to hold the weight of the world as an adult, and make good conscious decisions? Who else was given so much responsibility at such a young age, the murmurs and whispers of the adults around her implying that she really was such a mature young pony, that she was Celestia’s prized pupil?
Where was the kindness and tenderness when she broke a dish at home, and her parents berated her, saying that she was too old for mistakes like that? Where was the loving guidance when Twilight made mistakes in her oral reports, when teachers shook their heads disapprovingly, because she should know better than that by now? Where was her sympathy when she had no friends at school? There was none. Only cheerful exclamations about her being too smart, too mature, too grown up for the other ponies her age.
She assumed the kindness would be with Celestia. At some point, the distant leader of Equestria would invite Twilight to her personal living quarters, and brush her mane, telling her that such a little filly should be getting to bed by now. She’d tell her that all the problems in the world shouldn’t matter to her yet, and that studies so advanced should be left until she was old enough to fully comprehend them. Celestia would hold her tightly, whispering about how brave and courageous Twilight was to be going to such a prestigious school all by herself every day, and how sad it was that the little purple foal couldn’t understand her peers.
Her assumptions were wrong. Celestia had interfered just in time in the end, pushing Twilight towards making friends, and moving her to Ponyville to slow her studies down. Twilight knew that it was probably Celestia’s OWN guilt, this same feeling that was shaking her entire body and ringing in her ears, that made her attempt so little so late. Maybe, for Celestia, it wasn’t too late to try and mend some of the hurt that she had caused. The sneaking hurt that had been weighing Twilight down for years.
Twilight Sparkle was not an adult.
She had been, at the time of meeting her friends, yes. But before that, when she was studying at the school, or living by herself at the Canterlot library. Before that, when she was told that playing with toys was for little fillies and that she was too old and gifted to be thinking about things like slumber parties and painting her hooves. The hurt that had festered when she was robbed of her childhood by something of a quiet killer, puzzling and bizarre in concept until this moment. On the floor of Cozy Glow’s former room, the memories of her foalhood causing her eyes to burn from the tears that escaped raw lids. She finally could articulate the dread she had been feeling sink in her stomach for so long.
Twilight Sparkle had not been an adult when she had started being treated like one.
And Cozy Glow was not an adult when they had punished her like one.
She had been sent to Tartarus without a second thought. She had been treated like a mastermind instead of a very sick little filly who needed guidance and love. She had been outcasted for crimes less severe than what other ponies had been fully redeemed for. Twilight gagged.
Starlight Glimmer had tried to change the entire course of history, moving through timelines and destroying them effortlessly, and without much care. She didn’t even care when Twilight had told her how many ponies she was hurting, not until she had shown Starlight how it affected herself. That selfishness was rewarded. Starlight was redeemed. No one in Equestria harbored any hate for her anymore.
Fizzlepop Berrytwist, a pony who had worked under The Storm King loyally, was accepted back into pony society with open hooves. Her distaste for Equestria, her attack on the Princesses, all was forgiven in an instant. Forgiven with the help of Twilight.
Discord, a being who had destroyed everything Equestria held dear twice, had been having tea with Fluttershy on a weekly basis. The two of them were growing so close that Twilight and her friends couldn’t help but joke about the pair beginning to date. He was allowed to be reformed.
Those were all adults. Adults who had committed far worse crimes against the ponies of Equestria consciously. So why then, was the filly Twilight saw herself in, sent to the depths of pony society’s hell, and encased in stone?
Twilight cried on the floor for what felt like hours. Her entire body had begun to ache after a while, and once the tears slowed to a manageable amount, Twilight rose to her hooves. Sniffling faintly from what she’d tell anyone was the dust in the abandoned room. She shook her mane to try and settle the straight indigo and pink hair back to a presentable state. The bag she had collected was tied up silently, lifted into the air with the crackle of magic. The key Twilight had used to get into the room was left on the side table, next to the stripped mattress.
The box that the bear had been resting in since Cozy had last touched it had been thrown into the bag of things to burn. Twilight hoped to Celestia- No- to herself, that she could manage to get over the feelings she couldn’t control today. There was no way to fix anything that had been done, Cozy Glow had already been damaged enough where Twilight doubted she could ever heal her to the point of redemption. The spell was cast with the help of Celestia, Luna, and Discord, and there was no way to undo it by herself anyway. Her friends, mentors, and allies would advise against it, and attempt to bar her from it.
Maybe Twilight would never be able to control her feelings. Maybe the guilt would etch in her soul forever, but maybe one day she’d be able to release herself as a victim of circumstance. Maybe she’d be able to shift the blame to one of the other Princesses, onto the other terrorists of Equestria, or onto Cozy Glow’s dead or negligent parents.
The purple mare shut the door behind her, walking through the halls of her school with feigned pride and excitement. No one dared mention the bloodshot red of her eyes.
Secretly, later that night, Twilight couldn’t help herself.
Her body was sore enough from the day’s work to rest, and her eyes were heavy enough to close, but her heart wouldn't stop racing. She couldn’t manage to relax her mind enough to sleep, despite having one of the most expensive and comfortable beds in Equestria.
So, as quietly as her hooves would allow, Twilight stalked her way down the steps of the castle, into the garden that now belonged to her and the residents that were cursed to stay there forever. A gift given to her by the sometimes generous and benevolent Celestia, one that she did not appreciate. Perhaps though, if Discord was correct, Cozy Glow would appreciate the one Twilight had brought for her.
The purple mare carefully placed the mangled stuffed animal on the extended wings of Cozy Glow, those wings that were frozen in time, and whispered a desperate plea of forgiveness.
Even with the dimness that came with subtle moonlight, Twilight couldn’t help but notice the disheveled, brown teddy bear in front of her, with one of the buttons for the eyes coming loose, with patches crudely sewn onto rips to try and hold the lumpy stuffing inside, looked a lot like Smartypants.
Author's Note
Thank you for reading my story! This is my first post onto Fimfiction ever, so i'd appreciate any comments or feedback I get!
Really, this fanfic was something that came to me pretty quickly. I had always felt this way about Cozy Glow's final punishment, and when I saw the prompt I jumped at the chance to write a dramatic scene with Twilight sparkle.
This fic REALLY would not have happened without the amazing Ishi! Xey haven't posted anything here yet, but she's an astounding writer, and I look up to xem. :> Thank you so much for taking the time to sit with me and teach me some new English words! Thank you for your edits!! <3
