Pinkamena could hear the sounds of rushing water as she slowly opened her eyes. She She was lying in the middle of a stream, with the night sky above her. A cold breeze ran against her skin as hundreds of tall trees surrounded her. “What the …” she muttered, slowly getting to her feet.

As her eyesight adjusted to the new environment, she noticed that Mena was standing a bit ahead of her, watching the sky. “Hey! What’s going on here?”

Mena continued to watch the sky, before turning her head and looking at Pinkamena. “ I think its time for me to get going.”

“Huh? What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It’s becoming clearer now. You don’t listen to me, you’re not thinking things through anymore. You’re slipping up, and I’m not going to be around when it all goes wrong.”

Pinkamena stood there, baffled at what she was hearing. “Huh? You think I’m slipping up? I’m doing better than ever! I’m making decisions that are making me happy, making us happy. What’s this about huh?”

Mena just glared at her. “You’re letting more people into your world. You’re getting more and more emotionally attached and acting on something because it makes you feel good, not thinking of the long run.”

“Is this because I took in Scootaloo? I’m making sure she gets the love and affection she deserves. Better than anything her parents could give her!” Pinkamena was growing visibly agitated, scowling.

“She doesn’t need the kind of love and affection someone like us has. She needs to be put in an environment that’ll actually help her cope with all the shit she’s been through. Not us feeding her beast.”

“I’m giving her what I needed when I went through everything!”

Mena just scoffed. “You’re putting yourself and her at risk. And especially, especially, with keeping Rarity so close.”

“Don’t you dare tell me I shouldn’t be able to feel love again. Rarity loves me for who I am. Do you know how long it is since I felt that sort of love in my life? No wait, you do know since you are me!” Pinkamena tried to get closer but stumbled. The bedding of the stream was made up entirely of uneven rocks.

Mena shook her head. “Again. You’re not listening to me or what I have to say. She’s fueling you and feeding you in ways that are making things worse. And you don’t see that because she says ‘I love you’.”

“... Didn’t you like it when she said that too? Didn’t you miss the warmth of sharing a bed, or a hug or, or, or anything?” Pinkamena suttered.

Mena looked aside, hiding her face. “I did. I liked it at first. When she loved you. But she isn’t the same Rarity anymore. Things aren’t the same and it’s beyond our control.”

“Mena, don’t say that. We’ve been able to－”

“We killed Fluttershy, Pinkamena. We killed another one of our friends because you were so scared of her taking everything awa,” Mena said, tears welling up in her eyes. “You don’t wanna listen to me anymore, so I’m… I’m just gonna go. I don’t wanna be fully aware and felling things when they come and kill us.” She turned away and started to walk off, before stopping and looking back. “I… I’m sorry for all of it, Pinkamena.”

Pinkamena just watched her start to head further down the stream. “H-hey wait a minute! Don’t go! Come on, we can fix this! I can fix this!” She paused, before gritting her teeth. “You wanna act like you were this great guide? How bout all the times you told me it’d be easy to just close my eyes and aim up, huh? How nice it sounded to sleep forever? Or how easy it would be to fuck up Applejack a bit?! I’m like this because of you, no walking it back!” She paused again, fists tightening. “I killed my mom cause of you! You’re the urge that made me bring down the rock! I could’ve hesitated, I could’ve backed away! But no, I did it and I killed my mom!”

She was shouting at the top of her lungs, tears in her eyes as Mena continued to walk further down. “You wanna leave me because you’re scared?! Fine, then fuckin’ leave you fuckin’ murderer! Don’t come back! I’m happy, I’m loved, I’m not alone! I’m allowed to have a happy ending! If I ever see you again I’ll… I’ll… I’ll smash your stupid head in! I’ll take the biggest rock I have and I’ll smash your face in on the ground! How bout that, huh?! Huh?!”

Pinkamena was panting, watching as Mena stopped in her tracks and slowly turned around to look at her again. There was a new person in her place. A young girl, no more than six or seven years old, standing there. She was trembling as tears ran down her face. The front of her shirt was stained in blood, along with a large rock that she was holding. “I… I … I … I killed my mommy…” the young girl said, before being dragged down into the water.

Pinkamena just stood, silently as tears continued down her face. The sound of the stream echoed around her, along with wind rustling through the trees. She looked down, watching as the waters began to turn red from a trail of blood slowly appearing.

It was leading right back to her.

Suddenly, Pinkamena blinked and sat up. Her head stung badly and the air smelled damp. “Ugh…” she muttered under her breath, rubbing the sore spot. She noticed that she had on rubber black gloves, and was wearing a large and heavy pale apron.

“M-Miss Pinkamena, you’re awake!” She was pulled into a hug as she recollected herself. She smiled as she saw it was Scootaloo, wearing a bloodstained apron and black rubber gloves. “I got so scared when you tripped like that. I didn’t know what to do besides a wet washcloth. A-are you alright?”

Pinkamena chuckled, nodding. “Yeah, yeah. Just a bad fall. Happens sometimes when your work environments get so wet and messy, yeah?” she joked, as she got back on her feet.

The area around them was barely lit, illuminated by the warm orange glow of a few sporadically light bulbs. Pinkamena had found that she had grown rather accustomed to the lack of lighting in the basement, thanks to spending so much time down there now.

“I think it would be best if we did a bit of clean up later this weekend, Pinkamena. Some of your work stations reek of old blood and it makes me just want to gag.” Pinkamena felt herself blush as Rarity pressed against her from behind, her head appearing over her left shoulder. “This place already has to deal with the stink of fresh bodies, you don’t need the old ones too.”

Pinkamena nodded. “Yeah, yeah, I guess I can look into it,” she muttered. Looking at Rarity’s face, she took a close look at the three large claw marks that ran over her lover’s left eye and the three in the middle of her face.

“What? Is something bleeding again, darling?” Rarity asked, moving a hand to her scars.

Pinkamena shook her head. “No, no. Just… admiring your beauty,” she said, before pulling her into a deep kiss. “God, you’re something else, Rarity.”

Scootaloo made audible gagging sounds as the two kissed. “Bleugh. I like the corpse smell! I think it makes this place feel even more like home.”

Before Pinkamena could respond, a loud and raspy groan came from behind the three. A body was standing behind them, suspended by ropes, blindfolded and gagged. Pinkamena could note a few tear stains were on the blindfold as they groaned and struggled. They pulled on their ropes to no avail. “Oh right, you. Honestly, I keep forgetting you’re there.”

She pulled away from Rarity, walking to a nearby cart. Dozens of knives were on it, all different shapes and sizes. She picked up a kitchen knife, hand getting comfy with its handle. “Let’s deal with that, yeah?” she asked, walking towards the body, smiling as she watched them start to flail and struggle.

Pinkamena Diane Pie was happy with her life.

Pinkamena gasped for air and coughed as her hands gripped onto counter. Her nose was burning and couldn’t smell anything at the moment, but if it could it would be overwhelmed by the putrid stench that the vomit in the sink was giving off. Tears were streaming down her face as she quickly turned the faucet on, blasting the bile down the drain and splashing her mouth to wipe away anything left.

She looked down at the sink for a few more moments before looking around her. It was still the same kitchen, with the same shelves and drawers and refrigerator that had been there when she first woke up here. The kitchen was still the same, the living room was still the same, the bedroom and the bathroom were still the same. Pinkamena Diane Pie was still dead and stuck in her coffin.

It was another day in the coffin, which one she wasn’t sure. She had stopped counting the actual days after her second or third year. Trying to keep track of it had just caused her to grow neurotic, and she didn’t need that on top of everything else while living in purgatory.

As she turned off the faucet, she felt her forehead. Still damp and clammy, thick beads of sweat rolling down her face as she let out heavy breaths. Just because she was long dead didn’t mean she couldn’t feel things. This place was made to have her suffer. And currently, she was going through another particularly bad bout of withdrawal.

“God…” she moaned under her breath and staggered away from the sink. She slowly moved out of the kitchen and into the living room. Her legs felt like lead, causing pain to spike through her with each step. She just wanted to crash on the couch and sleep until it stopped hurting, to sweat out all the pain.

As she took another step, her foot snagged against the carpet and tripped, sending her to the ground with a loud thud. She let out a sobbing groan as she hit the floor, sliding across it in agony. All she could feel was pain. Pain that she couldn’t treat or ignore or deny. She could feel her eyes watering as tears ran down her cheeks alongside all the sweat. She had been through this time and time again, and it never got any easier.

But then, something changed and the mood shifted. Pinkamena felt another presence, someone was standing above her. Watching her. Through her blurry tears she saw a figure in front of her. They were tall and looming, silently observing her. A pearly white grin ran across their face as they locked eyes.

She slowly rubbed her eyes and blinked, only to see that that the tall figure was gone. In their place stood the front door, still locked and moving. She shook as she crawled closer to it, resting her head against it. It wasn’t a pillow, but it would have to make do.

Her eyes widened as she felt a cold breeze on the back of her neck. She turned around, feeling a gust of cold air hit her in the face, followed by a few scattered snowflakes. Through the tiny crack at the bottom of the door, she could feel a breeze. There was an outside.

She got to her feet, all sensations of pain leaving her body as she wrapped her hand around the doorknob. She took a few seconds, before turning the knob. It rattled in place a bit but didn’t turn. She gave it a few more tries, but with no success. The door remained locked.

Pinkamena rested her head against the door, letting out a few deep breaths… before a smile slowly crossed her face. There was something out there. There was somewhere out there. Somewhere with fresh air, snow… and at least one person wanting her out there.

Or maybe, they just wanted to put her in a new coffin.

Pinkamena took a deep breath as she looked up at the sky. It was a brilliant blue, a color she hadn’t seen in a long time. She could hear the wind, a slight breeze on her arms.

None of this felt real. She was half expecting to be jumped by someone and wake up back in purgatory, another delusional dream coming to a depressing reminder of an end. But that moment hadn’t happened. It wasn’t going to happen. Because whenever she put her hand to her chest, she could feel her heart beating. For the past few days, she had been alive again.

She tapped her foot slightly, leaning against the balcony railing. The Golden Oak Library had always been such a good spot for when someone wanted to just get a reminder of where they were. She could see all the buildings and shops, the people happily walking to and fro, waving and chatting with each other. It was like nothing had changed at all.

But then she’d see the giant, sparkling castle on the other side of town, and it’d remind her that this wasn’t her town, her home. This was a world with a Pinkie Pie and not a Pinkamena. A world where people got to live their lives without the fear of being taken and forgotten, one where life got to go on as it was always intended to. One that did not care if she died again.

Pinkamena rubbed the back of her neck, sighing. It was cool, and yet it was like there was a heat bearing down on her at the moment. “Damn it…” she muttered, feeling her palms start to burn up. Probably best to head in soon, maybe take another shower and deep cleansing before heading out to meet up with the others.

She turned to head in, before hearing a crunch under her shoe. She bent down, seeing a reddish-orange leaf’s top half poking out from under her shoe. She watched the free half flap around for a beat, before pulling it off and looking at it. How long had it been stuck there? It was nowhere near fall yet and none of the trees had leaves matching this color. She watched as the leaf she was holding got swept up and blown away in the breeze, joining dozens of other leaves that looked just like it.

She looked down to the various crowds below, seeing the backs of people she knew among the many others. She’d only see them for a few seconds before they would head deeper in and disappear, being swallowed by the seas of others. No one was looking at her, no one was calling out to her.

Pinkamena blinked, and she was back to reality.Her head felt light and she swayed a bit, before going back inside and heading to the bathroom. The sound of warm water pouring out into the sink was oddly calming for her. Like, it was another reminder that she was back in a reality that had fresh running water or something. She let it fill her hands before splashing it on her face, giving out a few long and relieved sighs.

Her relaxed tranquility was then cut short as she heard the sound of a radio coming from another room. Funny, she didn’t remember turning on one… or this place even having a radio to begin with. But that wasn’t the issue. The issue was who was currently on the radio. “Ah, dearest listeners, it feels like a lifetime since we last chat, despite it only being a day or so.” The voice of Minerva Gethsemane filled up the bathroom, almost as if she was simply doing her show from the shower. “I hope you’re doing well, especially with all the oddities that have been going on this whole week.”

Pinkamena grumbled, washing her hands and looking up at herself in the mirror. She still had a bit of a pause whenever she gazed at her new appearance. Spending a decade or so in purgatory had led to her coming out looking much different. She had become heavier, sporting a big round belly, and tons of thick body hair all over. Add along the numerous scars covering her from head to toe, and it sounded almost impossible to believe that she used to the skinny black girl with the big puffy pink afro that threw parties and made cupcakes. At least her hair was still pink.

“You know, it’s been these recent events, that got me thinking,” Minerva said, Pinkamena able to hear the sound of her chair creaking as she leaned in closer to the mic. “Our lives are something truly sacred. Something that we’re supposedly supposed to take for value. But a lot of people don’t like telling us why. Why should we try to live our lives when we can just curl up and let death take us? Not like life is easy or anything, right?”

Pinkamena didn’t understand most of what Minerva said in her broadcasts. To her it was mostly just the forgettable nonsense that any other disc jockey would say between music tracks. As she looked at her face in the mirror, she found her eyes gazing down to the long horizontal cut that ran across the center of her face and nose. She softly touched it.

“I’ll tell you why. Because, there’s no fun in rotting away on purpose. No fun in it at all. Especially when you’re a woman like me, a woman of a certain… pigmentation. Others really, really want you dead and gone, along with the other cruelties of life.”

As Pinkamena looked up back at the mirror, she blinked. Her reflection, it was different. It looked younger, missing the cut across the nose, and oddly it wasn’t looking directly at her rather it was looking up at her with an expression of fear. There was a slight sting as she felt blood trickling from the scars on her face.

“But I guess it’s up to you really, dear listeners.” Pinkamena felt a hand softly squeeze on her shoulder as Minerva’s voice came from behind her. “You can become and remain a corpse in the land of the living, or you can become something truly greater. You can keep going and see what comes next, what awaits you at the end of it all,” Minerva said, laughing. “Of course, like I said, it’s all up to you. And if being dead is what’s better for you, then at least make it entertaining.”

Pinkamena felt the hand leave her shoulder as she looked around, seeing she was still alone in the bathroom. Looking back to the mirror, she could see her reflection was back to normal again, displaying a walking corpse. “This next track’s for all my other dark skinned sisters listening in. And especially for my favorite Black Bastard, you better keep going.”

As the Minerva’s voice faded into the start of the track, Pinkamena looked at her reflection. After a few seconds, she smiled. She splashed some more water on her face, cleaning away the blood running down her cheeks and chin. She watched it get sucked down the drain before she turned from the mirror and started walking out of the bathroom as the radio kept playing.

Pinkamena smiled as she got out of the library and headed for Sugarcube Corner. She had people she had to meet up with, she had things she had to do.

Pinkamena Diane Pie had to get to work.

Author's Note

Happy day-late Halloween and Doomsday everyone. As of now, all chapters of this story have been switched out for the updated/revised version. If you weren't able to buy a copy of the book at Ciderfest 2023, you can now read it online for free! Is this the end of me added and fixing stuff up for this story? Probably not no. It's a fascinating story to me that explores a lot of stuff I think about in my identity. So naturally I'm gonna keep thinking up more and more things. One day in the future I wanna do a deluxe edition with more scenes that do straight up body horror and things like illustrations for each part. But that's in the far, far future when I have a more stable grasp on my writing. For now, enjoy. And don't touch that dial, cause I can assure you there's still more fun writing from me to come!