Living the Dream

“AB, wake up!”

Applebloom was vaguely aware of a familiar voice calling to her. It sounded like it was coming from far away. She wanted it to go away, to leave her wallowing in her pain and her misery. Her friends were dead. Her family was dead. Everypony was dead. Couldn’t whoever this was let her be dead in peace as well?!

Something struck her hard across the face. A hoof. The buttercream filly bolted upright, a furious expression on her face. “What in tarnation―?!” She took a swing at her attacker, barely missing the burnt orange face hovering over her.

“Woah!” A pair of ivory hooves looped around the earth pony and pulled Applebloom away from the pegasus she was trying to clobber. “Calm down, Bloom!”

Scootaloo’s face adopted a cocky smile as she leaned in closer to the panting earth pony. “Damn, that Dream Machine Daemon really took you for a ride, eh AB?” The flier’s purple eyes darted to the unicorn trying her best to restrain the burlier pony. “Sweets, get her disconnected. It should be safe now that she’s awake.”

“Roger, boss!” The unicorn paused for a moment though and leaned her muzzle close to Applebloom’s ear. “Easy there, Bloom. It’s okay; you’re out now. It’s okay.”

Applebloom’s heavy breathing began to slow, the sound of blood throbbing through her ears gradually softening until it was no longer all she could hear. Her senses returning to her, the earth pony mare started to take stock of her surroundings. There wasn’t a lot of light, so there wasn’t much for her to see at the moment, but she was able to piece a few things together.

She was lying in shallow water which seemed to be flowing past her. The walls were curved and smooth, the confines rather cramped. Her nostrils wriggled at the smell of feted―eww…Sewers. They were in the sewers. Why were they in the sewers?! And what sewers? Ponyville didn’t have sewers!

“Did you at least get what we needed?” Scootaloo asked the earth pony pointedly while their unicorn companion continued to work on something behind her.

Applebloom stared blankly at her friend. What under Celestia’s sun was she supposed to have gotten? She didn’t even know where she was! She fumbled around in her brain, wracking it to try and figure out what was going on. All the while, the flier was all but glowering at her, waiting for an answer.

“We got ‘em, boss!” Sweetie Belle announced from behind her just before she ripped…something out of Applebloom’s neck.

“Oww! Watch it!” The earth pony snapped, massaging the back of her neck. “Feels like that damn vampony bit me again―” The earth pony drew up short. Something was wrong. Something was very wrong. Her neck…wasn’t her neck! At least, it didn’t feel like her neck. Where there should have been fur there was…none! Somepony had shaved the back of her neck? Why?! And…And they’d drilled holes into her neck too?!

The pegasus was looking at her with a raised brow. “A what bit you?”

Applebloom had barely heard the question though. She was still trying to piece together what was going on with her body. She turned around to ask Sweetie Belle if the unicorn could take a closer look and tell her what the holes were about when she drew up short. Sweetie Belle was presently hunched over a small black case, stuffing a collection of wires back into it. However, it was not the strange case which held Applebloom’s interest. It was the unicorn’s own neck. Which was also shaved just below the base of her skull. And there were several small holes drilled into her as well.

“I…” Applebloom turned back to a now concerned-looking Scootaloo. “What’s going on?”

The flier cursed under her breath and shook her head. “DM ICE got you really good, huh?” She let out an exasperated sigh. “Unfortunately, we don’t have the time to set you straight; so you’re just going to need to trust us, okay? You know who we are, right?”

Applebloom gave a hesitant nod. “Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle,” she pointed to each in turn.

“Right, good!” The pegasus nodded. “And do you know what we are?”

“The…Cutie Mark Crusaders?” This was uttered with very little conviction.

The other two ponies exchanged a brief look, as if both were looking to the other for an explanation. Finally Scootaloo shrugged. “Eh, close. We’re part of the Midnight Crusaders, Canterlot Division. So: Canterlot’s Midnight Crusaders. CMCs for short.”

“Don’t worry, Bloom,” Sweetie Belle assured her friend with a warm smile, “it’ll all come back soon! Just takes your brain a little while to shake off the effects of the ICE. Here, this’ll help!” The white coated unicorn reached into a pocket woven into her purple and black jumpsuit and pulled out a small jewel. She placed a hoof to the back of Applebloom’s head and brushed her mane aside.

Before the earth pony could ask what was going on, she felt a slight pinch. “Ow! What was that?”

“A reintegration shard,” The unicorn answered matter-of-factly. “It’ll tag the false memories so they can be partitioned and deleted later!”

“Right. Yeah.” Applebloom rubbed the back of her neck, feeling the new little bump of hardened gemstone.

“We need to get moving,” Scootaloo informed them. “We’ve only got a minute or two before the Solar Guard shows up to investigate the breach.” She waved for the pair to follow her. “Let’s get trotting, fillies!”

The three mares made haste through the sewers below Canterlot, following in the pegasus’ wake. Sweetie Belle was taking up the rear, hauling the black case. Applebloom could barely keep track of where they were going through all of the many twists and turns as they alternated between trotting and crawling through pipes filled with filth and refuse. While she wasn’t sure of a lot at the moment, the earth pony was fully convinced that she would never―ever―be rid of the smell again.

“Feeling any better there, Bloom?” Scootaloo eventually asked as she led them through another of the city’s more accommodating pipe segments.

“Not really,” she admitted. “Everything’s still a jumble. I can’t make sense of what’s real and what’s not.” She let out a short derisive bark of a laugh. “Honestly? Kind of feel like this is all still part of some dream or simulation or whatever too…”

“Yeah, DMDs are pervasive like that,” the orange mare acknowledged with a knowing nod. “What’s important is to just focus on the here and now, not anything from the past. Not until that shard Sweets gave you has been able to fully reintegrate you.”

“The here and now. Right,” Applebloom grimaced as she felt herself step in something that she was used to only seeing at the bottom of the farm’s outhouse―No! Here and now, she reminded herself harshly. Keep herself in the here and now, because nothing from back then could be trusted. No thoughts of the farm, or her family…her sister AJ―No!

The earth pony shook her head in an effort to clear it. It was just so hard to keep herself centered with nothing but her own thoughts to keep her occupied. She needed distractions. Something to keep her anchored in the present. “This might sound weird,” she began, hesitantly, “but can you guys please tell me about yourselves and what’s going on? So that I know which of my memories are supposed to make sense?”

“Yeah, sure,” Scootaloo nodded. “Sweets, fill her in.”

The unicorn briefly quickened her pace and brought herself up alongside the earth pony now that they were traveling through a sewer section that was wide enough to easily permit it. “Okay, so, you know about Nightmare Moon, right?”

Applebloom nodded. “Yeah, the corrupted form of Princess Celestia’s younger sister―”

“Ha!” The pegasus barked before glancing over her shoulder and flashing Sweetie Belle and viscous grin. “Looks like we found the bogus shit implanted by that ICE real quick, didn’t we?”

“What?”

It was the mare who provided the explanation. “Nightmare Moon wasn’t a corruption of Luna,” the alabaster unicorn explained patiently. “She’s the enlightened form of our dear Mistress of the Night, to whom the Great Truth was revealed by the stars!”

Applebloom felt her pace slowing slightly as she listened to the unicorn gushing over Nightmare Moon. Suddenly the earth pony got a cold feeling in the pip of her stomach as she contemplated her next question. “And we’re…helping her?”

“But of course!” Sweetie Belle beamed. “How else are we supposed to free the rest of ponykind from beneath the hoof of that tyrant Celestia?”

“Right. Of course…”

“Hold up!” Scootaloo warned, raising a wing. The two ponies behind her drew up short and shut their mouths. Applebloom’s ear twitched as she listened intently for anything that wasn’t the sound of running water or the pounding of her own heart.

“Shit!” The pegasus cursed under her breath, and the buttercream mare behind her could guess why. She’d heard it too: the sound of steel-shod hooves splashing through water and voices. Though it was impossible to make out the exact words, Applebloom recognized the iconic military staccato in their pattern. Those were guard ponies. “Solar Guard!” Scootaloo confirmed.

Then she reached into her jumpsuit and withdrew a gun that she affixed to her hoof. Beside her, Applebloom saw the unicorn’s horn begin to glow as she too took out a pistol and chambered a round with a quick tug on the slide from her magic. The earth pony could only gape at the two of them in stunned amazement.

Scootaloo poked her head out of the pipe and looked to the right. She drew it back in quickly and let out another hushed epithet. “They’re going to box us in,” she concluded. Her eyes glanced quickly between the other two mares before finally landing on Sweetie Belle. Her gaze hardened as she uttered the next words. “We need somepony to hold them here while the rest of us get the data out of the city.”

It was evident to all of them who the pegasus intended that “somepony” to be. The little white unicorn didn’t balk in the slightest. Instead, she simply levitated over the case she’d been carrying on her back and deposited it on Applebloom’s. Then she faced the pegasus and placed her right hoof upon her chest over her heart.

“My life for the Republic; my life for the True Princess!” She declared. She and Scootaloo exchanged a brief nod and then the unicorn took a preparatory breath.

A moment later, Sweetie Belle was charging through the opening, the pistol she was levitating hovering in front of her as she cried out at the top of her lungs, “Die, solar scum!” The sewers became a deafening cacophony of gunfire.

A hoof grabbed onto Applebloom and yanked her into the pipe that Sweetie Belle had just charged though. However, where the unicorn had gone right, and into the path of the oncoming guardponies, the earth pony was led left, away from the heated exchange of gunfire. Her heart pounding and her mind racing, the buttercream mare just focused on putting one hoof in front of the other as she trailed after the orange pegasus.

As they ran, the gunfire suddenly ceased, though Applebloom could still hear the echoing yells of guardponies in their wake. Still Scootaloo pressed on through the twisted network of tunnels and pipes, and still Applebloom followed after her.

Then the pegasus rounded a corner and came to an abrupt stop. However, Applebloom had been running too fast and following too closely to realize what was happening until it was too late and managed to inadvertently collide with the orange mare. The two of them went sprawling into the shallow murky water and Scootaloo’s gun went skittering out of reach of either of them.

Applebloom was about to try and get up when she felt two sets of strong armored hooves yanked her forcefully off of the pegasus and dragged her roughly back before slamming her face back down into the sewage once more. “Don’t move!” A gruff voice yelled from over top her. Something cold and metal was pushed against the back of her head and the earth pony realized with cold dread that it was a gun. In front of her, she could see two other golden guardponies piling on Scootaloo in an identical fashion. The rebellious pegasus was cursing them and struggling, but it was obviously to no avail. The guards had them both dead to rights.

“Well done…” A voice declared from just out of sight. Both mares glanced in the direction of the new voice in time to see another stallion clad in golden armor striding into the tunnel. The white unicorn was clearly some sort of senior guard, because the attitudes of all of the others in the room quickly shifted to be quieter and more deferential towards him. At the sight of the new arrival, Scootaloo’s scowl somehow managed to deepen, though it appeared that the stallion wasn’t paying her any heed. Instead, his attention was focused squarely on Applebloom, his lips spreading in a broad grin. “...Agent Bloom.”

The scowl darkening the nearby pegasus’ face instantly evaporated as she now turned to look at the earth pony mare who’d been running with her. Confusion battled with betrayal on her face, only for white hot fury to swoop in at the last moment and best the both of them. “You traitorous fucking bitch!” Her struggle to throw off the guards pinning her renewed itself as she tried to claw her way over to the earth pony. “You Celestia-damn whorse! The True Princess as my witness, I will―!”

Whatever final threat the pegasus was about to level was cut short by the sound of a gunshot.

The orange pegasus went silent and Applebloom could only look on in stunned horror as blood and brain matter was slowly whisked away by the slow stream of feted water that Scootaloo had died in. Standing above her, a look of disdain plainly visible on his twisted muzzle, the unicorn stallion holstered the still smoking revolver gripped in his magic. “Fucking Lunatics,” he muttered before turning back to Applebloom.

The earth pony’s instinct was to recoil away, half expecting to receive the same treatment. However, the stallion did not shoot her. He didn’t even deliver a harsh word. Instead, he smiled warmly as his telekinesis removed his helmet. “Let her up,” he instructed the guards that were still pinning her. “She is a true hero of Equestria, and should be treated as such!”

The hooves holding Applebloom down immediately withdrew. In fact, several were extended to help her back up. Shakily, the earth pony mare allowed herself to be aided back up onto her still trembling limbs. A great deal had happened in just the last five minutes, and she was having a hard time keeping it all straight. Why was she being treated so well by ponies who’d just executed her friend in front of her?

Then Applebloom finally got her first good look at the stallion who had addressed her. Her mouth dropped open in amazement. She knew this stallion. Though the polished golden eyepatch was certainly a new feature, there was no denying this pony’s identity. “J…Jessant?” She managed to stammer out.

The stallion chuckled, smiling broadly at her. “I thought we’d agreed that it would be ‘major’ while we were out in public?” His eyes briefly darted towards the other armored figures standing around them who were presently looking as though they were mostly oblivious to the conversation taking place in front of them. He reached out a hoof to the buttercream mare. “Come along, agent; let’s get you cleaned up.”

Applebloom lost track of how long she’d been standing in the shower. However, she was aware that it was a lot longer than would have been strictly necessary to clean away the filth from that evening. Not that she’d been doing a lot of cleaning, beyond what grime was washed away by the simple act of standing beneath the trio of shower heads raining warm water down on her back at least.

She was simply still trying to process everything. Trying to sift through her thoughts in order to separate the fantasy from the reality, and that was proving to be a difficult task. Everything just felt so real to her. Attending the sisterhood socials with Applejack―and Big Mac that one time. Seeing the fire slowly drain from the eyes of her family as they watched Coscolt steal their products and customers. Watching over her four nieces and nephews. All of it―all of those lives―were as clear as day in her mind. It all felt real to her.

As real as the water running through her mane right now.

The earth pony mare’s downcast eyes drifted to her hooves. She hadn’t noticed in the dim sewer tunnels, but now that the lighting was better, and she was out of the black and purple jumpsuit, she could finally see that it wasn’t just her neck which was no longer entirely flesh. Her hooves too didn’t look like she’d ever remembered them…and yet, she did.

Applebloom closed her eyes and took a deep breath in an effort to steady her thoughts, which had once more become embroiled with conflicting visions of her walking on legs which were either fully organic or synthetic replacements from one heartbeat to the next. Her breathing began to quicken. Her heart started to pound in her chest, her ears filled with the sound of throbbing blood that drowned out the spray of the showerhead. The earth pony was dimly aware of her hind legs giving out from under her, her haunches falling to the tiled floor. She clutched her hooves to her chest, focusing on the feeling of her beating heart. That seemed like a constant at least: a beating heart.

She sat there in the shower like that for a while longer, simply feeling the rhythm as it gradually slowed back down. Breathing. Beating. Breathing. Beating. Only when she finally felt centered did she open her eyes again and actually proceed to thoroughly wash out her coat and mane.

A little while later she was sitting in front of the mirror in her suite in one of Canterlot’s many towering ivory spires, attempting to towel away the remaining dampness from her mane when she heard the merry chirp of her door’s chime. “Come in,” she said reflexively, barely even aware that she’d responded. It just…felt like something she’d always done in response to hearing that sound. She was even pretty sure she knew who it was that had come to call on her.

That assumption proved itself to be correct when the door quietly slid open, revealing a white unicorn stallion with a two-toned blue and pink mane and a stylish golden patch hanging over his left eye. The armor was gone though. In its place was a relatively plain, though obviously well-tailored, black blazer. Though the door was now open and he had been invited in, the stallion simply leaned forward and smiled at her. “Knock, knock!”

“Jessant!” Applebloom felt her heart swell at the sight of the stallion, and a great deal of the tightness that had been building up within her chest seemed to just leave her in an instant. The stallion wasted no additional time and trotted into the suite, taking up the earth pony mare in a tender embrace.

“I wanted to come by and make sure you were okay?” He pulled away from her slightly now but kept his hooves on her shoulders as he took a moment to look her over. His warm smile gave way to obvious concern. “I know today was particularly rough for you.”

Applebloom nodded, swallowing back some more of the tension that was already starting to rise in her once again. “I’m…still adjusting,” she admitted. “A lot of this still doesn’t seem real.” She looked around the room, nibbling at her lip as her mind once more filled with conflicting realities.

A tender hoof was lightly placed against her cheek, gently turning her head so that she was looking up at the stallion holding her once more. “This is all very real, my darling.” He took her hoof in his own and guided it up to his face, holding it against his ivory coat. “See?””

The earth pony felt her heart flutter at his touch. Her hoof gently stroked the stallion’s cheek, relishing its warm feel. A smile spread over her lips. She let out a relieved breath and set her head to the stallion’s chest. She remained just like that, listening to the beating of his own heart for several more seconds, the stallion’s hooves encircling her and holding her close to him.

“Feeling better, dearest?” He murmured softly in her ear. The smaller earth pony mare nodded. “Good.” His lips placed a gentle peck on the top of her head. “I’ll leave you to finish getting ready. Meet me for dinner on the terrace in fifteen minutes?”

Again Applebloom nodded as she reluctantly receded from her coltfriend’s chest. “I’ll be there,” she assured him.

“I’ll be waiting.” With a parting peck on the tip of her nose, the stallion left her alone again.

Applebloom felt herself taking in and letting out another shaky breath as she tried to dispel the last of her anxieties. Jessant was right, this had to all be real. She was finally out of the simulation. This was her real life, living here in Canterlot as part of Princess Celestia’s Covert Security Services. She had a life, a nice apartment, a cute stallion who loved her…everything was good.

She picked up the discarded towel and resumed drying out the rest of her mane. However, when her hoof brushed up against something on her neck, she paused. Frowning, she craned her head so that she could get a better look in the mirror. Her eyes spotted the tiny shimmer of blue crystal in the back of her neck. The gemstone that Sweetie Belle had given her in the sewers to help sort out her experiences.

Carefully, the earth pony extracted the little sliver of sapphire and held it in her hoof. Now able to get a better look at it in the light of her apartment, the earth pony felt her breath catch in her throat, her heart starting to pound once more. The faceted jewel she held looked exactly like the gemstones that the zebra stallion had given her and her friends when they used those Dream Machines in his tent for the Nightmare Night celebration. The ones that had needed to be stepped on to end the simulation.

Her hoof started to tremble violently as the mare experienced a swelling of anxiety. The sapphire shard fell from her hoof…and shattered upon hitting the hardwood floor. Applebloom let out a terrified gasp, closing her eyes tightly in anticipation of being enveloped in a brilliant flash of light and transported away…

When she finally gained the courage to open them once more, and found that she was still standing in front of the mirror in her apartment, Applebloom let out the breath she’d been holding. Her gaze lingered on the glittering dust of the gemstone at her hooves. The earth pony mare suddenly found herself feeling less certain about how ‘real’ this all was. After all, being attacked by those vamponies had also felt very real to her.

Her hoof once more rubbed absently at the back of her neck where she remembered being bitten. She very much didn’t like that the shard recesses grafted into the nape of her neck seemed to align almost perfectly with where she’d felt those fangs pierce into her flesh.

A shiver ran through her body and she shook her head vigorously in an effort to dislodge those intrusive thoughts―the memories―from her mind. She picked up the towel and defiantly resumed drying herself. No, this was reality.

…Right?

A little over fifteen minutes later, Applebloom was stepping off the elevator onto the tower’s ‘rooftop’ level. It wasn’t actually the uppermost level of the massive skyscraper which played host to her apartment. However, this level did play host to a number of restaurants which featured outdoor seating along an expansive terrace. So it certainly felt like they were out on the building’s roof.

The glittering lights of Canterlot spread out before her, along with a number of other tall ivory-clad spires much like this one. In the distance, Applebloom could see the Royal Palace and its slender minarets clinging to the side of the mountain. She’d always loved this view of the city.

…Hadn’t she?

Another firm shake of the earth pony’s head and a fortifying breath. She cast a glance at how the scarlet dress was falling along her flanks to ensure she hadn’t gotten anything out of place during her trek up here. The slit up the side of her leg that rose right up to her dock was considerably more daring than the occasion likely called for. Indeed, the earth pony had found that she’d apparently intended to wear a much more conservatively hemmed―though still quite flattering―blue dress tonight, judging by what had been laid out on her bed. However, the mare found that she wasn’t much of a fan of anything that reminded her of sapphires at the moment.

“Praise the sun; what did a stallion like me do to deserve a mare like you!”

Applebloom tensed briefly before relaxing once more when she recognized the stallion’s voice. She turned to see Jessant standing nearby, still dressed in his blazer, his uncovered pink eye wandering appraisingly over her body. The earth pony felt her cheeks flush as she noticed his gaze lingering at the apex of the slit of her dress.

“Should I double-check my calendar to make sure I haven’t forgotten an anniversary or something?” the unicorn teased.

“Heh,” Applebloom laughed nervously. “Just…liked this color better.”

“Well, I approve,” the stallion beamed before stepping aside and holding out a hoof towards his marefriend. “Shall I escort you to our table?”

“Y-yes. Please.” The buttercream mare took the offered hoof with her own and allowed herself to be guided to the waiting table close to the terrace’s edge, allowing them one of the better views of the city. Just before sitting down, Applebloom’s gaze darted towards the south, in the direction of Ponyville. She froze.

What she saw wasn’t a cozy little town filled with rustic homes topped by thatched roofs surrounded by fields and orchards, but rather a gloomy bastion of onyx stone. The fortress of Nightmare Moon. Once more the mare found herself having to work to clear her mind of the flood of memories that couldn’t possibly be real.

She jerked slightly as she heard a chair being moved along the terrace’s tiled floor. Jessant looked at the earth pony expectantly as he gestured to the seat he’d pulled out for her. His smile faltered slightly when he saw the trepidation on her own face. Applebloom forced a smile and thanked her coltfriend as she took the seat and made herself comfortable at the table. The alabaster unicorn stallion sat down across from her.

“I took the liberty of ordering already,” he informed her when she started to glance around for any sign of a menu. “I hope that was okay?”

“It’s fine,” she assured him, managing a more genuine smile this time. He knew her tastes well enough to know what she’d like. Her eyes darted to the glass of water sitting in front of her. “Maybe some hard cider though? To help take the edge off?”

The unicorn’s eyes rose in mild surprise. “Cider?” He let out a light laugh even as he waved down a waiter. “Since when do you go for the hard stuff? You don’t even like to be in the same room with me when I break out the brandy during father’s visits!”

Applebloom was about to point out that she’d always liked cider, but stopped short. He was right, she realized. She didn’t like hard cider. She preferred champaign. So then why had she―

Her thoughts were briefly interrupted by the sudden eruption of a tittering laugh from a nearby table which drew her attention. The earth pony mare recoiled so hard that she very nearly fell out of her chair when she beheld the witch seated just a couple steps away.

Only, upon closer review, it wasn’t a ‘witch’, Applebloom realized. It was just a hippogriff mare wearing a black dress and stylish hat. The laughing hippogriff wasn’t even paying the earth pony any attention, reacting to something that one of the other mares she was dining with must have said. She tried to get her breathing under control as she recentered herself in her seat. All the while Jessant was looking at her with a concerned expression.

“Are you alright, dearest?”

“Y-yeah, I’m―” Applebloom began to say, only to find herself distracted yet again as another stallion walked up to their table, a pair of small trays suspended in the glowing magic of his horn. The mare’s eyes widened in shock as she beheld the red and black vest that the waiter was wearing that prompted flashes of memory in her mind. She was only just beginning to reassure herself that it was a coincidence when her meal was placed down in front of her.

Applebloom’s instinctive offer of muttered thanks was cut off by her terrified scream. Her hoof lashed out and smashed away the bowl of black thorny vines. The offending bowl went sailing, bouncing soundly off the back of the not-a-witch’s head before shattering on the tile floor behind her. Only then did the earth realize that the bowl hadn’t been filled with Discord’s lethal tendrils at all, but merely black-colored noodles.

The panting mare became aware of the many eyes upon her now. Some were wide with shock and confusion. A few, like the hippogriff massaging the back of her head, were far more critical. Jessant’s were worried.

“...No,” Applebloom corrected herself, swallowing back the lump of fear in her throat. “No, Jess; I’m not alright.” She started to shake her head.

“What’s wrong?”

“Everything!” She snapped, waving her hooves broadly at their surroundings. “Everything’s wrong!

“Where’s my family, Jess?! Where’s AJ, and Big Mac, and Granny?!” She was yelling, but the earth pony didn’t care. She needed to yell, if only to allow an outlet for the anxiety this whole situation was causing for her.

“Your family? Honey, your parents died years ago when you were just a foal,” the unicorn replied, still looking at her with a mixture of concern and confusion. “You were an only child.”

Applebloom was vehemently shaking her head. She didn’t want to believe that any of that was true―she refused to believe it! “No! I had a family!” She insisted. “We lived in Ponyville,” she jabbed a hoof towards the dreary distant castle that shouldn’t have been there.

“You grew up in fosterage in Canterlot―”

“I grew up on a farm!” She screamed in the stallion’s face. “Where’s the farm, Jess! Where’s my accent?!” Applebloom was only now realizing that she wasn’t even talking like she should be. “It’s just all so wrong…” Her eyes were starting to tear up again.

The unicorn leaned across the table and tried to take hold of her hoof, intending to give it a gentle reassuring squeeze. “It’s the Dream Machine ICE. It’s just got you confused. We’ll go and get you sorted out at the hospital,” he told her. “Come on, let’s―”

“No!” Applebloom recoiled away from the stallion, shooting out of her seat. She was shaking her head. She didn’t need help. It wasn’t her that was wrong; it was the world! The earth pony took a step back, her frantic eyes darting between the other creatures looking at her. They were all wrong too. Everything was wrong!

“I…I want to go back home…” The earth pony’s voice trembled in a soft sob, tears flowing freely down her cheeks now. “I want to go home!”

“We’ll go back home, dearest,” the unicorn stallion assured her, getting up from the table now and taking slow, cautious, steps towards his marefriend. “We’ll go back to my apartment,” he promised her. “We’ll talk about this. We’ll get you help―whatever you need! Just…please, my light. Come with me?”

He once again reached for her.

Applebloom once again took a step away. Her hoof stepped in something soft and wet―the spilled noodles she’d swatted away earlier―and slipped. Startled, the earth pony reared up in an attempt to regain her balance, but in her panic she overcorrected and stumbled backwards even further. Her flank bumped up against the terrace’s railing. Her noodle-slicked hoof slipped out from under her completely, sending the mare tumbling over the railing.

“Applebloom!” She heard a stallion cry out as she went tumbling end over end down to the street below…