Moondancer stood perplexed at the great event Twilight had thrown for her, to tell her she was sorry for missing out on the party Moondancer threw for her once, and she didn’t come.
“Come on in.” Twilight invited, but Moondancer coldly threw her party hat to the ground and insisted, “Thanks, but no thanks. I don’t do parties.”
Twilight refused to let her go this time, and teleported in front of her as she tried to leave, and attempted to apologize for hurting her friend—still desperate to try and reconcile with her.
Every pony and Spike tried to convince her they were all friends.
Pinkie even motioned for Spike to go a fetch something important for the party, and so he waddled off over the footbridge.
“Please, don’t let my mistake be the reason you can’t be friends with any pony else.” said Twilight.
“We were your friends then too…” added Minuette as she Twinkle Shine and Lemon Zest approached her. “…And we’d honored to be your friends now.”
She and the others all gave her sincere and loving smiles trying to show how much they meant it.
Moondancer was trembling softly, and everyone else, especially Twilight thought maybe she was finally going to open up to them… but she didn’t!
Instead, Moondancer shouted a great big “NO!!!!” and in her rage she had unleashed such a forceful wave of magic that tipped over the tables, burst many of the balloons, and wrecked the food too, much to the complete and total shock of everyone, especially Pinkie!
“The Party!!” she cried. “It’s… It’s…!!” she collapsed on the ground in tears before all her ruined work.
The trio of friends went to comfort her, and before Twilight could say or do anything, Moondancer had approached her and looked her deep in the eyes. “You listen to me, and you listen good…!” she thundered while pointing her hoof at Twilight. “It’s not that I can’t be your friend… I DON’T WANT to be your friend. I don’t want to be friends with ANY PONY!!”
As if that blow didn’t strike Twilight hard enough, what came next would had destroyed her!
“Maybe I was opening up when we were fillies, but that’s in the past. I’ve been this way longer, and I like it just fine. I don’t have to be friends with any pony and run the risk of being hurt again. I can study all I like…
…and I don’t need some pony like YOU to force her ideas on me and telling me how I live my life! HUMPH!”
She began to stomp away while Twilight’s eyes filled with tears. “But… Moondancer...?!” she begged, but she got shot down.
“Just leave me alone!” bellowed Moondancer. “If you disturb me once more, I’ll write a letter to Princess Celestia and demand a restraining order! In fact, maybe I’ll do that anyway.
…Goodbye! Good Luck… and Good Riddance!!”
Then she was gone, and she didn’t see Spike bringing three other guests along with him over the bridge…
The Librarian…
The book selling pony…
There was even Moondancer’s own sister, Morning Roast. All had come for the party, but came over the bridge just in time to see and hear everything, and they were easily as shocked and appalled as everyone else, so was Spike.
Twilight stood where she was, hurt and humiliated, and her tears were streaking down her face.
Spike softly approached her.
“Twilight…?” he would have asked if she was okay, but even if she hadn’t run off crying, he already could tell she wasn’t. Who would be after what happened…?
…Certainly not Pinkie Pie who was blubbering softly, and then took a big bite out of one of the ruined cakes lying on the ground near her… to help with the pain.
Twilight's other three friends stayed behind to help clean up the mess, and try to perk Pinkie back up, while Spike sent the other three guests home.
“What a waste.” he grumbled. “Twilight goes to all that trouble-- all that work, and it was all for nothing.”
He could not believe how cruelly Moondancer had behaved, but right now he had excused himself from the cleanup to check on Twilight.
He knocked at the door of her suite, there was no answer.
Thankfully, the door wasn’t locked and he could walk in, and what he saw was not a pretty sight.
It was dark in the room. All the curtains had been drawn tight.
Twilight had been sobbing for hours after running out, and now she was curled up under the covers of her bed, which was laden with and surrounded by used, damp tissues.
“Twilight…?” Spike called very softly.
The sheets stirred softly as Twilight softly lifted them up enough to peek through.
“Spike…?”
Spike climbed up on the bed, but he didn’t say a thing. What was there to say?
It was actually Twilight who spoke first. “She really hates me.” she said tearfully. “I’ve never had any pony act that way towards me before.”
Spike sighed. “That was pretty bad of Moondancer, wrecking the party like that.”
“It’s not just the party…” corrected Twilight. “The fact that she doesn’t want to reconcile; that she wants to continue to be asocial and denounce friendship…” she began to sob softly again.
To her, this was the worst possible thing that happened. She couldn’t convince Moondancer to change and reconcile. She really felt she had failed friendship.
Spike knew what he was about to say wasn’t all that helpful, but he felt Twilight had to be told. “Twilight… I know this is hard for you, but you have to accept that Moondancer just isn’t interested in friendship. Not every pony is.
They can’t change the way they feel simply because you want them to. You always said: “Friendship is a two-way thing, and no one pony can make all the decisions.”
Twilight sniffled, having completely forgetting her own lessons made her feel worse. She had just been so obsessed with trying to reconcile with her old friends and clear her conscience about leaving them, and especially after ignoring Moondancer’s part all those years ago.
“Spike, you heard her.” she cried. “She’s going to write to Princess Celestia. I could get in real trouble for all this. My reputation as Princess of Friendship could be in danger, and what if other ponies start to hate me for what I did? What if more of them start to follow Moondancer’s ways?
Friendship could start to wither away, and all of Equestria could be plunged in a dark age!”
She could see it now… Equestria, now a gloomy, shadowy place, where ponies were all asocial and hostile towards each other, that is if they weren’t already busy keeping to themselves.
The Tree of Harmony would lose its magical glow, causing chaos and destruction to spread all over, and without the power of friendship… everyone would be doomed!
Such a thought began to churn in Twilight’s stomach, making her feel number, more upset, and more frightened than ever.
Spike felt she was overreacting, but rather than tell her to calm down, or shake her back to her senses. “It won’t happen!” he simply said. “So you made a mistake, and you got some-pony mad at you.
It’s not like it could never happen.
The point is, you can’t keep letting this one botched plan keep holding you down.
Moondancer is just one pony, but you still have me, and Pinkie, and all the others too, and we’ll all be here to help you, even if things do get bad.
All I can really say, Twilight… learn from this. You made a mistake, next time you can work more carefully, and show ponies that you’re not obsessive or bad, or anything horrible.”
Twilight poked her head out from the covers, and she looked terrible. Her eyes were red, and her mane was all messed up. She still felt weary and weepy. Spike could only comfort her, hug her softly while letting her cry all her emotions out so she could find her strength again, so she could rise again.
Perhaps someday she and Moondancer would reconcile, and perhaps not. Such as how friendship goes… it’s just sometimes how it ends.
Author's Note
Let this be a lesson to Twilight Sparkle, and all of you...
You cannot force forgiveness on someone, and you cannot make them forgive you. No matter how much you may want it for them... or for yourself.
Forgiveness is a choice, not a moral obligation. Only the person can decide to forgive you, and if they don't... there's nothing much you can do.
Harassing and nagging at someone, and hoping the change the way you feel they should... will only make things worse.
