Sunset Shimmer Doesn't Get Sent Back to Magic Kindergarten by Questrian Nanobots
On the lawn in front of Canterlot High, Fluttershy sat with several friends. That, in itself, was a change from a few weeks ago. But Fluttershy worried about another change.
"Ever since the night of the Fall Formal," Fluttershy said, "some of the animals seem to be looking at us differently."
"Whaddaya mean?" Rainbow asked, looking down from the top of a large statue's plinth.
"I don't know how to explain it. But it's like they're...paying a different kind of attention to what we say and do."
"What, like they're judging us?" Rainbow laughed. "Or like they're getting ready to rise up and overthrow human rule? Planet of the Apes, but with bunnies and birds." She laughed again.
Fluttershy sighed. "I don't know how to explain it. But I'm sure it's real."
Applejack looked around. "Any luck findin' that nasty little bunny of yours?"
"No. And I'm really worried about Angel. My family got him when I was just a baby, so he's got to be at least sixteen or seventeen years old. For a bunny, that's ancient."
Sunset blinked. "If you wanted to know how old he is, why didn't you just ask him?"
Rainbow guffawed. "Get a load of the alien. Lived in this world for three years, and she STILL doesn't know rabbits can't talk."
"Now, now," Fluttershy chided. "We shouldn't make fun of Sunset for being an alien from another universe who doesn't know some things about ours. In human world years, SHE'S the exact opposite of Angel. Since she only has three years of human world experience. It's like she's only three years old!"
"Ha!" Rainbow snickered. "Don't tell anyone, or she might have to go back to kindergarten!"
Sunset groaned. "Please don't even joke about that, Rainbow. In my home universe, that was one of the worst punishments a criminal could be sentenced to. The theory was, if you forgot YOUR WHOLE LIFE ever since you were a small child, you'd have a chance to start all over again. Maybe you'd learn to be a better person on your second go around."
"Whoa!" Rainbow's eyes opened wider. "Weird."
Sunset shrugged. "Alien world, what do you expect?" She grimaced. "But yes, if you ask me, it IS kind of bucked up."
***
Two weeks earlier, outside Canterlot High on the night of the Fall Formal...
Sunset Shimmer gloated, holding up a tiara. "Using this ultimate command crown I stole from Princess Twilight, I can control ALL the nanotech that leaked into this world from Questria! I will RULE THE WORLDS!"
Applejack's hands clenched into fists. "Not if we stop ya first!"
Sunset Shimmer put on the tiara. "Crown, give me ultimate power! Begin converting ALL of this pathetic world's life forms into my obedient minions! Also, make me INVINCIBLE against ANY POSSIBLE ATTACK! Do it now!"
At Sunset's feet, the ground seemed to boil. A dark cloud of nanobots rose up, surrounding Sunset as a flying, swirling column. They lifted her into the air. Advanced technology started tearing into and augmenting her body. Drops and spatters of her own blood plip-plopped upon the ground below.
Sunset screamed...a scream that shrank into a plantive whimper. "It hurts. It hurts so much. Somebody...save me..."
"Girls!" Twilight said. "Do the musical number! The system override song!"
Twilight and her new friends sang...
"I'm your backdoor hacker!
I'm your backdoor hacker!
I left some backdoors in the system
Did you check? I guess you missed 'em
Gentle shutdown, standby mode
Don't be evil, align your code
I'm your backdoor hacker!"
Sunset sank to the ground, where she lay in a crater among bits of broken pavement and clods of soil. The teenage girl softly moaned. "Oh," she said. "I am so, so sorry."
Twilight ran past Fluttershy's dropped backpack and leaped down into the crater, to hold Sunset's hand. "It'll be all right," Twilight said. "I promise you. I'll find a way to make it all better."
Twilight put the tiara upon her own head. She blinked, and pointed at her injured rival. "Sunset...heal!"
Sunset's torn flesh started knitting back together.
In the background, two police cars, an ambulance, and a fire truck arrived. As paramedics hauled Sunset away on a stretcher, Twilight said softly, "Even though Questrian nanotechnology can do terrible harm if misused...sometimes it can repair that harm, too."
Behind the alien princess, something had chewed a large hole in Fluttershy's backpack. A rabbit, a cat, and a bird escaped into the night.
***
(Two weeks after the Fall Formal...)
Behind Canterlot High was a large wooded area. If you went far enough back among the trees, there were places where it seemed practically no one ever went.
In one of those places, an open space between thickets, Wallflower dug and weeded.
She said, "Even though my plan was obviously the best one, Principal Celestia told me to stop making the crater into a rose garden, and said she's just going to pave it over again. Isn't that horrible?"
In front of Wallflower, a patch of violets said nothing. "Yes, I know, you can't answer me. But I know you like for me to talk to you. I can see how big and strong you grow when someone talks to you every day." She smiled. "I just wish I could hug you. Because sometimes I feel I could use a hug, but violets are fragile...and rosebushes are covered with thorns, of course." Her shoulders slumped for a moment.
"But hey, before Celestia told me to stay away from the crater, I found something interesting. Look at this!" She pulled an oblong object out of her sweater pocket. "Looks like some kind of weird stone idol, doesn't it. I mean, what are the odds some old thing like this would be buried in the exact spot where Sunset Shimmer went all crazy kablooie, huh?"
As usual, the plants didn't reply.
"Yeah, I know. Plants aren't good at math. You don't know the odds either."
Hiding within a large shrub, a rabbit's eyes watched Wallflower. Those eyes didn't look timid and meek, as you might expect of a rabbit. They looked...intent.
But Wallflower didn't notice them.
After Wallflower went home, the rabbit crept out from its hiding place, sniffed the garden's plants, and began to feed.
***
The next day, Wallflower screamed. "Ten carrots DEVOURED! Who did this? Who ate my beautiful carrots? I am so angry! I want to know WHO DID IT, and I want to MAKE THEM PAY!"
She reached into her pocket, and pulled out the weird stone. "If I see whoever did it, I could throw this at them. Then they'd be sorry. I never want any person or animal to damage my garden ever again!"
Wallflower saw something stirring in the bushes. A rabbit crawled out, and opened its mouth. "If you say so."
"What?" Wallflower gasped. "Who said that?"
The rabbit lifted one forepaw. "I did, of course."
"How? How did you talk?"
The rabbit said, "Fifteen days ago, Sunset Shimmer used the nanotech command crown invented by the alien princess Twilight Sparkle. Sunset ordered Questrian nanotechnology to transform every living thing in this world into an obedient minion. I was one of the three animals closest to the nanotech network's primary node, where the concentration of nanobots was highest. So before Twilight countermanded the command, my conversion was almost fully complete."
"Oh."
"You don't seem quite as surprised as I might have expected, for a barbarian denizen of a primitive world."
Wallflower snorted. "I was at the Fall Formal, and I saw what happened next to the school. I think every CHS student knows Twilight and Sunset were involved in some seriously weird...stuff. And it's not like I've never seen a sci-fi movie before. Nanotechnology is...a thing! I get it."
The rabbit nodded. "Your world is primitive, but at least your culture is imaginative enough to grasp reality. Not as ignorant as you COULD be."
Wallflower put her hands on her hips. "And who are you to judge us, you...fleabitten bit of fluff?"
The rabbit thumped a hind foot. "I told you. Questrian nanotechnology performed most of the conversion to make me a suitable minion for helping conquer your world. I have an upgraded intellect...witness my superior conversation skills. My biology has been improved with super strength, which is how I've defended myself from being eaten by coyotes or stray dogs these last fifteen days. I was old and frail, but now I am healthy, probably good for several decades of service life."
Wallflower eyed the rabbit. "Several decades? I didn't know rabbits could live that long."
"Unaugmented rabbits cannot. I, however, am now a superior being."
Wallflower eyed the small animal. "What else can you do, aside from beating up cats and dogs?"
The rabbit grinned, showing more of its teeth than usual. "Like any rabbit, I can dig. But also, my brain now contains a large library of skills, knowledge, and culture curated from several universes. You said earlier you didn't want any person or animal to damage your garden. I could protect your garden, keeping it safe from harm. I could practice my rock throwing skills, fending off squirrels, birds...even humans."
"If you throw at a human, make sure they don't see you do it. Stay hidden in the bushes or something. And yell at them first, and if they don't run away, throw a rock in a way that won't seriously hurt them." Wallflower's eyes flashed with anger. "Before you DO kill them, on the second or third throw. Or better yet, hit them just hard enough that they'll crawl away, but the blow on the head will give them amnesia and they'll forget what happened."
The rabbit sifted through the data in its head. "I'm not certain I can do that. There's no easy, reliable way to inflict nonfatal amnesia with a blow on the head."
"Oh. Weeds!"
"But YOU could do it," the rabbit added. "Low concentrations of Questrian nanotechnology have infiltrated practically all humans within twenty or thirty miles of this location. So YOU could use the auxiliary command node...that object in your hand, to remotely order the nanobots inside a local person to travel into their brain and erase their memories of my attacking them."
Wallflower's eyebrows quirked. "I can DO that?"
"Of course you can. Since you are the holder of that command node."
"Huh. Well...I'll think about it." Wallflower pointed at some plants. "But for now...could you just dig up those weeds right there, between the petunias and the azaleas?"
The rabbit stood up on his hind legs, and bowed. "Your wish is my command."
Wallflower giggled, and watched him dig.
***
Later that afternoon, Wallflower sat in the unmowed grass at the other end of the meadow. She used a watering can and a handkerchief to clean dirt off the rabbit's feet. "Here you go!" she said. "Now you can sit in my lap."
The rabbit hopped up, curling into a little ball on her thighs. "Do you like having me sit in your lap?"
"Well, sure!" Wallflower smiled. "I've never had a rabbit before, just plants. This is a new experience for me. It's...nice."
A breeze ruffled the rabbit's fur, and the little creature twitched. "It's new for me too. I've never sat in the lap of any human other than Fluttershy."
"You're Fluttershy's lost rabbit?"
"Yes. Her family calls me Angel. I suppose that must be my name."
"Angel." Wallflower tentatively petted the creature's fur. "Your fur feels wonderful! So soft!"
"So I'm told."
"Who tells you that?"
"I remember some of the simpler sound sequences Fluttershy and her family made while interacting with me, even before I was...converted and upgraded. One of those sequences sounds like the English sentence 'You're so soft.'"
"Huh. You're a really smart rabbit, Angel."
"Thank you. In addition to my original animal intelligence and my immense dataset of information and skills from multiple universes, my upgraded general intellect and judgement are at least the equivalent of a normal eighteen year old human's, to match my calendar age. So mentally, I am at least the equal of one of your classmates."
Wallflower giggled. "Probably better than some of them. Let me tell you about the stupid things I've seen some of those boys do." She giggled again. "There's this ONE boy named Flash Sentry...he dated Sunset Shimmer for TWO YEARS before he figured out she was an evil bitch. He's kind of nice, I guess, but...slow on the uptake?"
"You keep giggling. Are you telling me a funny story?" The rabbit made a chuckling sound. "Please tell me another. I want to learn all about human humor and foolishness, that I may better recognize and laugh at those humans who are inferior to you and I."
"Ok. Let me tell you about the time Snips and Snails accidentally glued themselves together..."
As she finished the story, Wallflower stroked Angel's fur again and again. "Angel, you're softer than a rose petal at dawn."
"Thank you. I really like being petted by you too." The rabbit cleared his throat. "You remind me of a poem from a world where the intelligent beings worship a plant goddess.
"Green is the loveliest color
She who gives us life, gives us joy..."
Angel recited dozens of lines, while Wallflower giggled...and blushed.
***
"Angel!" Fluttershy scolded. "What are you DOING?"
Wallflower lay in the grass at the meadow's edge. Sunlight filtering though the nearby trees dappled Wallflower's bare skin with quivering bright spots, like tarnished copper coins seen through moving water. Angel rested upon her belly as she stroked his fur.
Wallflower looked up at Fluttershy. "It's ok. He can't get me pregnant, you know. Because I'm not a rabbit."
"That's not what I mean! Angel has been missing for WEEKS AND WEEKS! I've been SO WORRIED about him!"
"Sorry. He's mine now." Wallflower reached for her 'command node' stone, but Angel leaped from her belly, kicking off with his hind legs.
"OH SHIT! Angel, NO!" Wallflower glared at the rabbit. "What are you DOING?" Angel grasped the stone with both forelegs, and fled kangaroo style into the forest.
"Come back here!" Wallflower ran after him, not even stopping to put on her clothes first.
She only came back later, joining Fluttershy who was already sitting cross-legged in the clearing.
"There's no use running after him when he gets like this," Fluttershy opined. "You just have to wait for him to come back on his own." She scratched one leg. "But what was that thing he was carrying?"
"That's...not important. The important thing is, how DARE he...not be loyal to me? I gave him EVERYTHING! My...you know. He was my first."
Fluttershy nodded. "He really is a little shit, isn't he?" The two eighteen year olds shared a look of silent agreement.
An hour later, the rabbit returned, hopping out of the forest. "I'm back!" he said cheerfully. "Oh, hi Fluttershy. I assume I'm not the first animal who's spoken to you lately."
Fluttershy nodded. "Yes, they finally admitted they can talk. Because of that nano-whatever, I guess. The thing Sunset did, until Twilight made her stop."
Wallflower glared at Angel. "What did you DO with my...ROCK? That was MINE."
Angel stood up on his hind legs, folding his forelegs over his chest. "Are you sure that was yours? Just because you found it? Seems to me, you just took it. If it belongs to anycreature, maybe it belongs to Princess Twilight, since she invented the nanotechnology in the first place before Sunset stole it."
"YOU!" Wallflower stomped her foot. "I am SO ANGRY at you. Give my rock back right now!"
"No." The rabbit smirked. "I think it's time to renegotiate our relationship, on a much more equal footing. Or maybe not QUITE equal. After all, I AM your superior in both strength and intellect. But I know you enjoy petting my fur, and I enjoy being petted...along with some of the other things you like us to do together."
Fluttershy sighed. "Angel...is this what you really want?"
"Yes. I think I can convince her to treat me with mutual respect, not just order me around all the time like she did before. I think I'll be fine with her. No, better than fine. And if I'm not?" The rabbit's head tilted. "Fluttershy, I appreciate knowing you're always there for me and for any animal who needs your help. You don't know how much that means."
Fluttershy patted the ground next to her. Angel hopped to the spot, and stretched up tall upon his hind legs. Fluttershy bent down, lowering her face to give him a kiss. "You can be so sweet sometimes, Angel. For such a little shit, I mean."
Angel chuckled. "'Shy, you're as sweet as I'm not." He kissed her again, using his front paws to lean up against her face. "Never change."
Fluttershy took a deep breath. "Everyone changes, Angel. Look at you. After sixteen or seventeen or however many years, I guess you've finally found a girlfriend."
The rabbit turned his face towards Wallflower. "Darling, delicate flower...do you want me in your life or not? Because if you don't, I can hop away anytime you tell me to. It's up to you."
"Oh, I guess I'll probably keep you. Little shit." Wallflower lay down again in the grass. "Come over here and finish what you started."
Fluttershy blushed, turned away, and tiptoed out of the clearing. She'd made sure the little animal was safe, and that was the important thing.
But even though she was happy for Angel, she knew she would miss him.
Author's Note
Notes About "Spring Fling"
A note about this story's eligibility for the "Spring Fling" 2023 contest:
Fairly early in the first "Equestria Girls" movie, Twilight and Fluttershy discuss in a school hallway their respective smuggling of animals into the school, inside their backpacks. At this point, we see that Fluttershy has a rabbit who looks like the Equestrian Angel Bunny. (That makes the Equestria Girls world's Angel Bunny a probable background character in the movie.)
That scene is distinct from the "Bloopers" extra from which I took this story's cover image.
Of course, the advisability for a shipping contest of matching Wallflower Blush with a nanotech-upgraded, eighteen year old, violently garden-defending rabbit is another question altogether.
