As I galloped along the bustling streets of Maretime Bay, I felt a surge of joy and gratitude. I had finally found my place in the world, where I could be myself and pursue my dreams.

It was hard to imagine that this was the same me who had spent miserable years in the castle with Opaline, the cruel and snobbish princess. She had made my life a living hell, keeping me from my true destiny. She had isolated me from any potential friends and made me doubt my worth and abilities. She promised me a cutie mark, yet she was the sole reason why I didn't have one for so long. It seemed like an eternity ago.

I leaned back and smacked my cutie-mark-adorned butt. “But things change.”

Yet, one thing stayed the same: my feelings for my adopted mother Opaline. And there she was in my sight near the friendship tree, livelier than ever. Her whole body squirmed around as if she were dancing, and I felt inclined to take her for a ride myself.

“Mummy, what are those stallions doing to that alicorn?” A passing foal turned to her mother.

I slowed my fast pace, recognizing the filly. She was Peach Fizz, one of my friend Pipp’s fans, a Pippsqueak. She reminded me of myself when I was little, relying on my mother for the answers of the world.

“They’re fucking her,” the mother replied in a serene tone and hinted for them to go closer to the lively exhibit. We walked in parallel. If somepony were to see us from afar it would look almost as if I was a part of the family, taking a morning stroll.

The filly’s mother Melba Blossom was very unlike my adopted mother to her child. Opaline would often lose patience with me and punish me for asking stupid questions.

“What’s fucking?” The child persisted. “It looks as if they’re hurting her.”

“No, no, no,” her mother corrected her, but without beating the defenseless thing as Opaline would have if I ever persisted in my questions. “The stallions are teaching her a lesson.”

“I’m glad I don’t have to put up with so many teachers,” the filly smiled at her fortune.

Her mother smiled in turn, happy for her daughter’s well-being. “Continue to be a good student at school, and you won’t need any extra lessons.”

“Is she still learning how to speak?” The curious filly kept asking questions, almost making me jealous of her vast freedoms that I hadn’t had at the castle. “It sounds like she’s drowning.”

“That’s only because her throat is full of dick,” the mother educated her child. “She’s learning how to give and how to receive.”

Peach Fizz pressed her eyebrows together. “It looks weird. I don’t get it.”

Her mother glanced at me with just one eye.

It dawned on me that I had instinctively matched my pace with theirs which must have looked super creepy. I turned my head to her and offered an awkward smile in return.

Miss Blossom stopped in her tracks. “Misty, you were practically Opaline’s daughter, right? Why don’t you explain to my child what’s going on with your mother.”

I gulped and stopped, yet kept trotting with my legs on a spot. My instinct was to lie and say that I was in a hurry to excuse myself, but that was the old Misty! “Sure thing.” I turned to them and sat down on the pavement. The new Misty doesn’t run away!

“Yay, story time!” Peach Fizz jumped in Melba Blossom’s lap as she set down facing me.

“Long ago, in a time immemorial, my adopted mother Opaline came to Equestria together with her sisters Luna and Celestia. They were on a mission to spread unity among ponies. Unlike the two benevolent rulers, Opaline wanted to establish order with harsh words and beatings.” I caressed one foreleg with the other as my gaze shied away from them.

“That wasn’t nice of her!” Peach Fizz broke the sudden silence.

“You’re right…” I looked back at her. “That wasn’t nice of her at all. Her sisters and all the other ponies said the same thing. But Opaline always thought that she was the only one in the right and everypony else was below her. But that’s not the case, is it?”

“No, it isn’t.” The filly pointed a hoof behind me and said, “Two ponies are on top of her.”

“That’s called mounting,” the mother educated her daughter.

I didn’t have to look back to know the reality. I trusted the filly and my fellow ponies, unlike the times I only trusted my mother. “Opaline was wrong, and they showed her how wrong she was by banishing her. But she didn’t learn. She came back and was the same. So they banished her again, that time to a castle surrounded by a magic barrier she couldn’t break.”

The mother interjected. “But then somepony created a doorway for her to terrorize everypony again.”

I bowed my head. “And now she’s learning a lesson not to be bad.”

“Will she learn this time around?” Peach Fizz asked.

I looked up at her to see if it was me she was asking, but her mother Melba Blossom answered for me while staring directly into my eyes, “She better.”

“I already know that I shouldn’t be bad.” The filly thumped herself on the chest. “With so many teachers, I bet she’ll learn it too.”

“I wish so, too…” I sighed, bowing my head again.

“Okay, Little Inquisitor, time to go now.”

I just sat there, even after I heard them stand up and turn to the main street. Their voices got quieter and quieter as they gained distance from me.

“Mummy, can I teach Opaline the lesson too since I already know it?” the filly kept up with her questions.

“You don’t have a dick, Fizz.”

“I can use my horn instead,” the filly persisted.

“I guess that could work,” her mother replied. “Maybe when you’re older.”

“Older?” the filly continued. “How much time does she need? Opaline must be a really bad student if she’ll still be learning basic stuff by that point.”

“But I, on the other hoof, am not a bad student,” I whispered to myself. “And my mother can learn too; she just needs a good tutor.”

Author's Note

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