Dinky Doo: The Scion of Wind

News of the encounter spread the next day. It found its way into the discussions of dinner tables the night before; it kept ponies awake into the night. It was the first and only thing that early risers gossipped about on their morning jogs. The residents of Carousel Promenade made their woes loud for all to hear; they had been told to vacate the premises by a Miss Twilight Sparkle and a group of her closest friends.

It was in hushes and whispers that ponies spoke that day. It was in huddled herds they trotted. Frantic glances were cast over shoulders, around street corners, at rooftops, and even through the windows of friendly neighbors. Gathering provisions for the Summer Sun Celebration was a task that the townsponies seemed to do just to keep their mind off the issue, which continued to loom over their heads like a miasma.

All the same, the Celebration was only three days away.

Preparations still needed to be taken care of.

Streamers still needed to be hung over each cottage. They needed to be strung in wide playful loops from the fringe just below the rooftop. They needed to 'say' that were the owner of the cottage were to be prompted, strangers would gladly be welcomed for a dinner of salted sunflower shrubs and honey-soaked oats.

Flowers should have been begging to be adopted from the care of a Miss Roseluck. But her flower stand was noticeably missing from the market, as was the rest of the latter's usual post-produce decor.

Foals should have been laughing. They should have been taking refuge from the sweltering heat and tumult of busy shopping inside the cooled walls of Sugarcube Corners. They should have been enjoying sundaes, laughing around tables as they traded stories about their plans, not big plans mind you but simple yet careful plans, for the day of the Celebration.

The streets shouldn't have been balding, with only a few pastel patches of ponies to keep them company. Spoils from the produce trade from the day before lay sad and forgotten. Any hustle and bustle that may have lingered was just gone now. The excitement at the prospect of a visit from the Princess of the Sun herself felt like an idle daydream recently.

A blanket of disquiet had fallen upon the village.

An earth pony, a stallion, was walking around town. He was walking as though a swarm of parasprites might appear out of nowhere and gobble up his shopping if he took a wrong step.

When his muzzle clunked against something like a wall, he jumped.

From the second-floor window of the Golden Oaks Library, Dinky watched him run. With listless eyes she stared: his bagful of noisemakers and ribbons was strewn in a forgotten trail. It was hard to see what colors he had bought; it might have been that Dinky had gotten color-blind recently. But the truth was that the magical dome covering her sanctuary was more purple than it was translucent. Dinky didn't care, in any case.

A toneless sigh fogged up the window.

She remembered when this town used to be so happy.

"Doing okay there, champ?"

The window unfogged, revealing a short purple dragon behind Dinky, who lay on Twilight Sparkle's bed. Dinky glanced at the dragon, then resumed her regularly-scheduled programming of Dinky Doo and the Big Scare She Made.

Spike pulled himself onto the bed so that he could better scout Dinky's face for a reaction. "Can I get ya anything? Cookies, punch, muffins…?"

He paused for an answer; Dinky turned her muzzle away, sorry to disappoint.

So he tried something else. "You know, it's still not too late to have breakfast. I can have it heated up for ya in a hot second," he said with a wink.

No reaction.

Dinky didn't mean to be so cold to him; she just couldn't help it. The more seconds passed, the more Dinky pitied him. Another sigh fogged him from the window's reflection. "You don't talk much, do you?" Spike said.

Dinky blinked boredly at him, then at the window again.

"Oh, so you've been reading out of Twilight's library?" he said, picking up the books lain carelessly over Twilight's bedspread. "Magic, huh? Oh! Are you another fan of Daring Do?"

"I'm her niece," Dinky said, and when Spike picked up Daring Do and the Sapphire Statue, looking as though he would restock it by mistake, "and that's mine." It occurred to her that the tone she had used sounded too threatening, so she added in a would-be foalish whine, "Can I have it back, now?"

So she did. "Are you done with these magic textbooks?" Spike said, scanning the mess of textbooks. Each textbook was marked on the spine with a sticker that meant it belonged to the library; Dinky had noticed this as Twilight led her through her shelves earlier that morning. "I can restock these for you if you'd like. And," he added, "I can get you some more. I know this library like the back of my hand."

Spike was jabbing a thumb-claw at himself; his chest was puffed out, his eyelids complacently closed.

How could Dinky not say no to that face?

"Can you get me some books about wind magic, please?" she asked.

"You can count on me!"

"Sorry for making a big mess," Dinky said.

Spike was scooping the textbooks into his claws with perfunctory agility.

A tall stack of books now stood high between them.

Laughing, Spike poked his head out its side. "C'mon, this is nothing. You should see the messes Twilight makes when she doesn't have ponies over," he said, finally softening the expression on Dinky's face; he jostled the textbooks into a slightly less lopsided stack. "Well, I'll see what I can find. Be back in a jiffy!"

"Take your time," Dinky called after the walking stack of books. "No rush!"

She winced; it sounded like a bunch of books were falling. Pulling the covers off herself, Dinky skipped off the bed, onto the floor.

Then, bracing herself, she stared down at the ground floor. Rearing back, she jumped. She hit the ground harder than she had thought. Shaking off the pain, she rushed for the staircase Spike had disappeared into.

Lighting her horn, Dinky trotted carefully down the stairs.

It didn't take more than ten trots to find Spike.

Lying on the floor was a copy of The Do's and Don't's of Offensive Magic. It was an older edition, but the information printed in there never really went out-of-date, Twilight had assured. It was the last book that Spike needed to collect.

He tossed it onto the stack he had set on the floor and stooped down to hoist the book-stack up again. But then he started scratching the side of his face, as he watched a green aura spirit the books away. "Huh? I didn't know you could do that."

"I learned it in Twilight Time!" said Dinky.

A trail of her books was now bobbing behind her. She didn't feel like using her wind magic to hoist the books up; her regular unicorn magic sufficed.

The stairs spiraled into the middle of a large musty floor. Traces of dirt littered the otherwise shiny marble that Dinky and Spike scraped beneath their hooves and feet, respectively. The ceiling was low. The shelves were arranged in a circle around the staircase; they grew out of the floor to kiss the ceiling. As Dinky walked between them, she saw the wall at which the shelves terminated; it was as green, white, and black as the floor. Except it was curved sharply up, almost like the graph of a really tall math function that Twilight had shown her on a chalkboard once; she had said something about x never being zero.

She had led Dinky down a cursory examination of her stores that morning.

Now, Dinky led the books Twilight had lent to her down the aisle whence they had been extracted.

With the books floating high above her and Spike, Dinky unwound the fabric of three of her magic clouds. Three books fell like hail, one after the other; Spike caught each and every one.

He traced a claw over the spine of a book, muttering something as he roamed his talon over the many books that lined the shelf. Pausing a talon before a faded spine of a volume and that of a less faded volume, he prised the slight gap between them and slipped the book in.

"Let's see, here…" he said, tossing up the next book like it was an excited foal; he held it like one, too.

"You make librarian work look so easy," she remarked, watching Spike shove the last of the third batch in. The Do's and Don't's of Offensive Magic fit in with a satisfying squelch.

Spike meanwhile was having his claws beckon for the next batch.

Deactivating her horn, Dinky let the batch fall into his grasp.

"Yeah, well," Spike shrugged, pushing one of the books in with a groan; he squinted at the last. "When you live with Equestria's biggest bookworm for fourteen years, you're bound to learn something."

"So you really get to help Miss Twilight with all this?" Dinky asked.

"More like I have to," Spike grunted, absently inspecting the next item to be stocked.

"Uh, which way are the Daring Do books?" Dinky asked, feeling weird saying the name of the book series, now that she knew the full history behind it.

"Eight o' clock from the front of the staircase."

"'kay, thanks!"

"Thanks for the help!" Spike called, as Dinky scampered between the shelves.

As there were exactly twelve gaps between the basement shelves, Spike's directions weren't hard to follow. Dinky had just left two o' clock; it wasn't exactly hard for her, since all she had to do was go to the section directly opposite her, while dodging a staircase along the way.

The second Dinky entered the eight o' clock shelves, it became muffled; Spike's stocking sounded distant. It wasn't hard for Dinky to imagine a pony sitting here for hours in the silence of solitude, reading far removed from the tumult and happy clamor of Ponyville and those who inhabited it.

Lost in her thoughts and excitement, Dinky missed it; she braked on her hooves and doubled back to an otherwise nondescript section. Planting her butt on the cold dusty floor, she stared up.

Spines of fresher, more colorful books towered above her. Even though she owned the whole collection back home, looking at a copy of the same collection elsewhere filled her with a fuzzy feeling; obviously, Dinky Doo wasn't the only Daring Do fan in the world, but it always made her feel good to be reminded of that. Twilight's collection was older and more worn than Dinky's; but that didn't matter much to Dinky, who was feeling the joy of being brought together with other ponies by the joys of reading. She didn't meet them, but she knew that she read the same books as them; in particular, she couldn't help but want to meet the pony who had inspected Griffon's Goblet some months prior. She smiled; a pegasus feather was sticking out of the spine, and its shade of blue was hard to mistake. Dinky had a shrewd feeling that her vague daydream-y wish had already come true.

Clapping the book shut, she reshelved it and sat down again, exhaling a satisfied breath. She could stare at these books for hours.

She closed her eyes.

She was strapped to a table inside a chamber of traps that would soon be her tomb. Walls were groaning, as desperate and as scary as a mummy trying to hug her. Sand was pouring in from unseen orifices in the walls. Snakes slithered amongst the rising sands, ready to swoop in upon their long-awaited feast like sharks in the sea. Spikes were bared, like the teeth of a vicious beast; but Dinky heard an actual Spike she knew calling her name, so she stopped, with great but practiced effort.

A neighboring gap stood between the eighth book and an adventure that Dinky was personally acquainted with. She could imagine, in a few moons, a new addition being shelved, and every filly in town clamoring for it. Dinky knew she would be one of those fillies; it would be really weird, but also really fun reading about an adventure she had just had.

But what about the adventure that was going on now?

She closed her eyes to imagine again. She saw the images, without needing simple but elegant prose to evoke them: the unknown Haissanian, the ongoing investigation, and the strange things going on around her. With a sigh, she wondered that maybe the strangest thing about it all was herself. "It sure sounds like another Daring Do adventure," Dinky said, blowing wistfully as trotted up the stairs, and having only the vaguest clue how she had gotten there. "Why can't I be a part of it?"

"Sorry, Dinky," Spike said, "what was that?"

"Sorry, Dinky," Twilight had said earlier that morning, leading Dinky through the stairwell. "I don't have the time to show you around the library. Matters more imperative demand my attention right now, I'm afraid." Twilight seemed to notice Dinky's ears droop. "Ask Spike. He'll help you with anything you need. He's also a good sounding board if you ever need to talk." She had glanced in a direction; she had giggled. "Once he wakes up, that is." Above mare and filly, a number of extracurricular textbooks had been floating; the magic encasing them had shifted from violet into green, as Dinky willed them into her magical grasp. "Good luck!"

A grey hoof had been on Dinky for seconds before she realized it. "Chin up. Mommy will be back as soon as she can," Ditzy had said, kissing her on the cheek. "Play nice with Spike, now."

"We'll be back before you know it," Daring had said with a wink.

She had closed the door almost six hours ago.

"Something the matter, sport?" Spike asked, now on the ground floor.

Dinky was still in the shadowy staircase. For some reason, it took great effort for her to lift her hoof. "Mister Spike?" she said, crossing into the light.

"Puh-lease! Just call me 'Spike'. Mister Spike is my father," he said in a throatier voice, with a weird deep chuckle to go with it.

"Spike," Dinky said with pleading eyes, "you live with Miss Twilight, right?"

"Well… yeah."

"And she saved the world lots of times, didn't she?"

"If by 'lots of times', you mean 'twice', then yeah," Spike said carelessly. "But she can't take all the credit. She couldn't have done it with the help of her best friends, not to mention the Elements of Harmony."

"And you lived with her for over fourteen years?"

Spike paused, darting his eyes around for a second or two. "Uhh… what's this about, Dinky?"

"Do you ever get jealous that she's doing all this awesome stuff, while you're stuck at home, just doing nothing?"

"I mean, I'm not doing nothing," said Spike defensively. "I keep her books organized. And boy, it sure ain't fun. Sure isn't easy, either, especially with how Twilight is."

Dinky had backed him into a wall without really realizing it. She didn't seem to notice the sweat budding nervously on his brow. "Don't you ever get mad that you're stuck here, while she's doing all this awesome stuff? Don't you ever feel like you're living in the shadow of such a great pony? Don't you ever feel like you could also be a great if she just gave you a chance?"

Dinky was looking to Spike for an answer.

Spike meanwhile was scratching the bottom of his neck, like he was tugging on the collar of a tuxedo.

The door burst. "Mail call!" sung a scratchy voice, before Daring noticed Dinky coming up to her. "Hey, kid. You alright?"

"Fine, Aunt Daring," Dinky huffed, as Spike fastened the door behind her.

Daring led Dinky to a table, where the former laid a mess of letters.

"Wait, Aunt Daring," Dinky said, after taking her seat and looking up at her. "You said this morning that the post office is closed because of… the thing that happened." Even mentioning it was hard; she mentally shook it off.

Daring sat.

"Yeah, well," she said like she did whenever she finished lifting her weights; she sat next to her niece, a foreleg casually leaned on the table. "Funniest thing happened, kid. While we were scouting the scene for clues, that stinker of a boss came up to us. He told us that there was a change in plans. I told your mother I could pull double-duty for both of us again. Oh, and speaking of your mother, she wants you to put this on," she said, unceremoniously slipping the magic inhibitor back onto Dinky's horn. "So anyways, I was called back. They said it was an emergency or whatever. So here I am, stuck delivering the mail. Yet again. To apparently everypony in town." Daring rolled her eyes, and they landed on Spike. "Say," she said, rubbing her chin, "you're a bit far from the Dragonlands, aren't you? What's your story?"

"Aunt Daring…! It's not very polite to ask."

Aunt Daring ignored her.

"It's okay, it's okay," Spike said to Dinky. "My name's Spike. I was adopted and hatched by Twilight as an egg. Long story. Pleased to meet ya, Miss Do!"

Chuckling genially, Daring extended her hoof. "Please," she said as she and Spike shook limbs, "call me Daring. Miss Do was my mother. Well, actually, she wasn't," she added, while Dinky was shooting a smirk at Spike, "not technically, but I won't bore you with the finer details, so anyway, I got a letter for you and the pony who lives here. Give me a sec… Hm… Okay. Golden Oak Library… Golden Oak Library… Aha! Two of them, one for you and one for the pony who lives here."

"You mean Twilight?" Spike asked, taking the envelopes, which would have seemed ordinary if not for their golden glamor.

Daring was too busy tossing three envelopes Dinky's way to bother answering. "Stash these away for us, eh, kid? Also, one of your mother's stops took me to the local apple orchard," she drawled, ("You mean Sweet Apple Acres?" said Spike), "whatever it was called. One of the farmponies there wanted me to give this to you."

Daring slid an envelope Dinky's way.

It was rougher and sandier than the other three.

"Kid, why are you sniffing the letter?"

Dinky giggled behind the letter. "No reason."

Daring chortled back. "Weirdo," she said, getting up.

"When are you and Mom and Miss Twilight going to be finished?" Dinky asked.

"Dunno, kid," Daring said, shrugging. "Look. Kid. These things took time, even back in the day. Right now, we're trying to find out where the perp went. We think he might be hiding around the house. We checked, but…" To finish her thought, she shook her head. "Oh, yeah. I also went and fetched this for ya while I was there."

Catching her old flute case between her hooves, Dinky looked up.

"In case you get bored or somethin'," Daring absently continued, turning mid-sentence to check the clock. "Anyway, these letters sure as hay ain't gonna deliver themselves."

So, saluting Dinky, and then Spike as an afterthought, she trotted towards the door, pulled it open, and was off. The gust she left behind slammed the door shut. The silence that followed held.

A low whistle broke it. "Now, that's one cool mailmare. You should feel really lucky to be related to her, eh, Dinky?" Spike said, prodding her with an elbow.

Prising it perfunctorily off, Dinky changed the subject. "What did you get a letter for, Mist — I mean, Spike?" she said as he unfolded it.

He held it up for her. "See for yourself," he said as she squinted at it.

"'Dear Spike'," she read aloud; she read the rest silently, her mouth moving at the start of every other sentence her eyes scanned through. "Mom never told me the Princess sends invitations to the Summer Sun Celebration." Or maybe Dinky was just too hyper to care; or maybe Ditzy just didn't bother, knowing that she'd be too hyper to care. Dinky was definitely too hyper to care about Spike doing something as mundane as refolding parchment, no matter how glittery it was.

"Weird thing is," Spike said, tucking the invitation back into its envelope, "we, which is to say Twilight and I, don't usually get letters by envelope. All our mail from the Princess usually comes through my dragon breath. Not that I'm ungrateful, obviously."

"Maybe she thought you were having lunch."

Spike snorted. "You're funny, Dinky," he said, before glancing at the clock like Daring had; a thumb was suddenly jabbed at it. "Well, speaking of lunch, it's time I go make us some. Because it sure as hay ain't gonna make itself, right?"

Doing a passable imitation of Daring's salute, he waddled into another cove. It was from there where he called to Dinky, who was still in the bedroom / antechamber. "It shouldn't take more than half an hour!"

The running water sounded familiar, but somehow also different when it came out of a faucet that wasn't Ditzy's. A ripping sound came, followed by the rustle of plastic bags. The kitchen and its ornaments sounded like they were being jostled out of their comfy corners. Water bubbled; frying pans hissed; idle humming backdropped the busy workings of Spike the Dragon.

Imagining him wearing an overlarge chef's hat, Dinky clamped her flute case shut, an envelope within it.

With the flute case wrapped over her neck and dangling from it like a necklace, she glanced outside.

The shadows of the branches above were faint and close to the roots of the magically-sheltered library: Over half the day had gone by. During it, Dinky had learnt to enjoy the simpler moments in her life, for such moments were so fleeting, so precious and few. Listening to a little dragon cook up a storm was certainly one of those moments.

The musty scent of country wafted into her nostrils.

With a happy yawn, Dinky stretched her forelegs.

She pulled the simple letter closer to her.

She had to shear the envelope open with her horn the old-fashioned way.

'Old-fashioned'.

The word echoed inside her head. Images were flashing inside it, unbidden and unforgettable. Suddenly, she wasn't there, not completely, sitting at a table in the Golden Oak Library. Carousel Square. Dusk. Wind blades were slashing wildly like an angry beast. More screaming; Applebloom begging her sister to wake up.

The guilt was heavy.

Somewhere in the background, Spike was singing merrily, about laughter and singing, and circles of friends.

Gasping back into herself, Dinky wiped her brow, surprised, when she looked down, to see a letter open before her.

Hiya Dinky,

Applebloom writin'!

And Sweetie Belle, too!

The latter's spell-writing was getting better, Dinky noted. A smile visited her lips; playing in her mind now was the scene of them writing the letter side by side.

Hope yer doin' well. Things are goin' okay* up here at Sweet Apple Acres.

*Okay and boring. Applebloom's big brother is watching over us now.

Sweetie Belle draws the nicest stars.

They're not stars, Applebloom; they're asterisks. They're supposed to mark stuff that might need to be explained.

Anyway, Big Mac's been watchin' over Applejack and Rarity too.

Dinky gulped.

Listen. Dinky. Applejack's awake now. She says "Don' worry about me none, ya hear? Y'all just focus on stayin' outta trouble." If ya ask me, she looks embarrassed enough what with not bein' able ta tackle that pony all the way ta timbucktoo.

Rarity's alright, too. She's shaken, but mostly about the Boutique being condemned☆☆*.

***That's… erm fancy-talk fer "Nopony can go in, or anywhere near the place."

Hey!

At least not 'til yer folks are done takin' a look at it.

Yeah, yeah. …Oh. Speaking of, we have to cut this letter short. I think your aunt's getting grumpy at how long we're taking.

Anyway don't keep yerself up feelin' guilty or nuthin'. AJ is embarrassed enough.

Your magic was so amazing, Dinky. It's not like anything we learned in Twilight Time.

Sweetie Belle! We can go on about gushin' 'bout Dinky's magic later! C'mon! Her aunt's givin' us a mi-ighty funny look. She's crossin' 'er forelegs, tapping 'er hindlegs… Anyway hold on. I think I saw an envelope somewhere. Y'all fold it up nice and tight hear?

…Wait, why are we putting this conversation in writing?

Anyway, hope to hear from you soon! Hopefully, the mailmare Daring Do (heh, how many times do you get to say that in a lifetime?) won't be too grumpy waiting for you to write your reply. She is your aunt, af

A gash in the letter cut her off, along with the rest of the paper.

"Help! Somepony, please!"

The plea prefixed pounding of purple palisades. The pony's pounding sounded like pounding on a bouncy beach ball.

Stuffing the Apple envelope, the letter with it, into her flute case, Dinky scampered through the open doorway.

'What you do matters,' she had been taught, and in that moment, no other thought persisted in her mind.

Lowering her piano-ivory hoof, the mare let her gaze drop down. "Oh." Her saddlebags jangled onto the ground lamely.

Dinky stopped dashing, sliding to a halt a foot or two away from the purple barrier. "Yes?" she said. "Can I help you with something, Miss…?"

"Jubilee," the mare said awkwardly; clearing her throat, she straightened up. "Cherry Jubilee, love."

"I'm Dinky. Nice to meetcha," she replied, extending her hoof.

But it rebounded off the barrier; the poing it made tickled Dinky's fur, making her feel a little like she had been accidentally zapped by one of Rainbow Dash's lightning strikes on Nightmare Night by mistake.

"Oh, ho, ho, ho, ho!" Cherry said, a hoof over her mouth. "My, oh, my, Miss Dinky. It does seem we can't engage in the usual platitudes and pleasantries in these here troublin' times. But ain't you the talk of the town, little missy! Facin' off in a quick-draw against that vile villain of a pony all by yer lonesome. Why, yer parents must be so proud of what a brave young filly y'all are!"

If Ditzy had been the one to say those words, Dinky would have been whining, cheeks red, 'Mom…!' And then Ditzy would continue smiling her pride and ruffling Dinky's hair, despite how much she was embarrassing her; that had only been because Dinky had played an extra in a Hearthswarming play. But as Dinky was talking to a complete stranger, she contented herself with staring at the dirt she was kicking up. "Yeah, I guess…"

Cherry was hoisting her saddlebags onto her back again. "Anyhoo, are yer Mommy and Daddy home, young one?"

Dinky shook her head.

"Well, then perhaps y'a-all can aid a troubled mare with somethin' mighty small. That is, if y'a-all don' mah-nd."

"I don't."

Cherry grinned appreciatively. "Don' suppose y'a-all know nothin' about where I can find that mayor's office, then?"

Dinky didn't, so she shook her head.

"Well, ain't that a shame," Cherry said, kicking the ground with a harrumph.

"Why do you need to see Mayor Mare?"

"The trains."

"The… trains?"

"Yes, m'dear," Cherry repeated, "the trains. I'll have y'a-all know I had a roundtrip ticket ta head back ta Dodge Junction. I keep a mighty fine cherry orchard there, ya see. Them cherries will a-go pining for me 'f I'm away fer too long. Oh, do forgive me, younglin'. So sorry for makin' ya listen to an old mare prattle on."

So, pulling a slip of paper out of her saddlebag, Cherry pressed it against the barrier.

"As y'a-all can see, the ticket gone promised a train'd stop here two rings befer high noon. And by my reckoning," she said, aiming her muzzle skywards. She squinted at the sun, which cast a short shadow beneath her. "'t's almost an hour after by now."

"Sorry, Miss Cherry," Dinky droned, almost saying 'Cheerilee'.

"Psh, come now," Miss Cherry said, waving a flirty hoof at Dinky, "ain't there nothin' to say sorry fer, lil' filly."

"Lunch is ready!" a voice called, startling Dinky and Cherry. "Dinky! Dinky! Dinky? Dinky, where are you?"

Poking his head out the doorway, Spike craned his head around; then he spotted them.

"Oh, mah," Cherry said, covering her astonished mouth, as Spike came waddling over, "a dragon? Here in these here parts?"

The 'Kiss the Chef' apron was coming loose from his waist. His hat was shorter than Dinky had imagined, and it was teetering back and forth as Spike slowed his footsteps to stand beside her.

He looked up at the would-be visitor. "Oh, hi! My name's Spike. Can I help ya with anything?"

"Oh, mah," Cherry Jubilee said, biting her hoof, "why ain't ya the cutest little thang?"

Her pupils were glittering with adoration; Spike rolled his eyes.

"Miss Cherry wants to know where Town Hall is," Dinky said, gesturing to Cherry, who was still ogling Spike like Rarity would if she also sounded like Applejack.

"Oh? Town Hall?" Spike said; he pointed over her left saddlebag. "Head straight behind you, keep going until you hit First Street. It'll be on your left. Can't miss it; it's the tallest building in town."

Blinking, Cherry drew back, her enraptured pupils shrinking to their normal size. "I'm sorry, dearies, did y'all say something?"

It was like she had just noticed the dragon and the filly talking to her behind the purple barrier; the dragon and the filly sighed. "Head down straight behind you, keep going until you hit first street. It'll be on your left," they droned in perfect harmony.

"Oh, oh, why yes," Cherry said, flustered; turning away, she headed in the indicated direction and poked her muzzle over her shoulder. "Thank y'a-all for the directions! And do have yerselves a Happy Summer Sun Celebration!"

"Goodbye!" Dinky said, waving.

"See ya!" Spike said, also waving.

Lowering his claw, Spike walked back to the library with Dinky, who was slightly taller than him, in tow. "Listen, kid," he said to her, "you can't just go running off like that. There's somepony very dangerous in Ponyville."

"Yeah, I know," Dinky said with a roll of her eyes.

"Kid, at least try to take this seriously."

The door had been left ajar; once the duo reached it, Spike let Dinky in, and himself afterwards.

Dinky stepped inside.

But her forehoof paused; under it lay a slip of glassy paper. It was beside a copy of Griffin's Goblet, whose folds it had probably slipped out of when Dinky leapt off the bed to help Spike with the fallen books.

Daring was smiling up at her, a foreleg roped a little too tight around Ditzy. Between the Sisters Doo was Dinky's own face, smiling the first day all three of them returned to Ponyville as a family. The photo was extremely rare and valuable, and obviously not because this was one of the few pictures of Daring Do in the world without an autograph on it.

But lately, Dinky found her feelings about it to be more mixed: shaking them off, she stepped over the photo without a word.

'These foul Equestrians… they hold you back!'

Shaking off those words too, Dinky seated herself at the table where Daring had negotiated all her mail. No mail lay upon it now; nor did it cross Dinky's mind to ask where her family's invitations had gone. The sight lying before her had pushed it out of her mind. The black of her pupils grew to consume the spectacle; she didn't bother sucking up the drool that was oozing from her mouth.

Steam was meandering from a dish of stacked tofu marinated, red and tangy. Healthy green leaves protruded out a bowl that upon closer inspection, sheltered diced tomatoes and sliced bits of small mushroom stalks; their severed tops, too. Forming the core of the arrangement were deviled eggs, with a necklace of red onions and olives huddling them close together. Dinky recognized one of the dishes, but something about it was different: It was a spice-scented bowl of hay noodles, quite unlike the kind she and her mom ate together whenever the latter's bit reserves ran low; it was richer in that it was stewing in richer soups; the splatter of gourmet sauce atop it tingled Dinky's nose, and that was when she knew that it was a stop that wouldn't go unvisited by the end of this culinary adventure. Beside the noodles sat another, no meaner arrangement of hay. Dinky had never seen hay prepared seasoned before. Minute garlic bits were mixed, almost melted in with the oily strands. Two cubes of sugar sat on a tray beside the dish.

"In case it's too salty," Spike explained, as Dinky lapped it happily up like the pigs she helped Applebloom feed.

Dinky got busy slurping and licking and gulping and making a bunch of other shameless noises that Ditzy would scold her for; that is, if she were here to do it. Food had never tasted so good before in her life. If Dinky wasn't careful, the tastes hugging her tongue might have lifted her back into the sky.

Spike examined his claws, uncaring if she was listening or not; she definitely wasn't. "I know you didn't eat breakfast. So I decided to make your lunch extra special. I guess it's a bit too late to go, 'Ta-da', or 'Bon-appetit', eh?"

Dinky was too busy inhaling the buttered hay to respond.

Smiling his satisfaction, Spike crossed his arms, and left her to her devices.

Twenty minutes into the feast, the door creaked open. "Muffin, we're back!" somepony sang.

Sniff, sniff, so went the grey muzzle, before it curled up. "Why, Twilight," Ditzy said over her shoulder, "you didn't tell me you hired a personal gourmet chef."

Giggling as she walked in after Ditzy, Twilight said, "Spike gets bored when I'm away."

"It's true," said Spike, crossing his arms smugly.

He was leaning against a wall, watching the sauces fly from Dinky's general direction.

"Well, Monsieur Chef de Cuisine," Twilight said, about to step out again. "Why don't you whip something up for Miss Doo and I? I'm going to go tell the girls to stop the search."

Dinky whipped her head up. "Search?" she mumbled through a helping of hay noodles; she gulped. "Is that what you were doing all morning?"

Opening her mouth, Twilight found Ditzy's gaze. "Sorry, Dinky," Twilight said, shaking her head slowly, "but I'm afraid it's not my place to say."

With that, she was out the door, whose knob was radiating with purple magic before it kissed the doorframe.

Spike returned to the kitchen.

Now he was humming a new tune, one that Dinky was already catching onto. Her musical mind, nurtured one busy afternoon by a Miss Octavia Melody, was automatically transcribing it into letter notation. She paused her eating to see the letters in her mind:

F#4-A4-F#4-E4 A4

D4-E4-D4-C#3 A3

Surprised, Dinky found herself not only bobbing her head with the notes, but whistling them, too. She also found her mom beaming down at her in pride. "It's like it was a blessing that I couldn't find another foalsitter that day," Ditzy said, before walking away.

Letting her latest helping of noodles ooze out her mouth, Dinky got off her seat.

"Wait, Mom."

It was then when she remembered her foray into the salad bowl. During it, Spike had told her that he was going to leave her mail on Twilight's bed, which was where Ditzy was headed to now.

"Mom!" Dinky called again, starting to get frustrated. "What were you and Twilight and Aunt Daring looking for? Where's Aunt Daring?"

Inches from two golden envelopes, the grey hoof paused. "What was that Muffin?" Ditzy said absently, mildly surprised that Dinky had followed her; she turned away. "I think your aunt is still delivering the last-minute mail, dear."

"The search. The search, Mom. Were you looking for the bad pony?"

"Sorry, Muffin. Mommy just found a clue," she droned with a hint of irritation in her tone.

"Liar!" Dinky roared, making Ditzy jump.

"Muffin," Ditzy said, turning to find her red-faced and upset, "what's gotten into you?"

"What got into you!?" Dinky threw back, a sting budding at her eyelash. "Ever since Aunt Daring moved in, it's like you don't even care anymore!"

Ditzy huffed, and was about to return her attention to the mail. "Dinky. Please. Mommy's very busy right now."

"With what?" Dinky shot back, making Ditzy freeze and turn back to face her, "grown-up stuff? You can check the mail anytime! You're a mailmare!"

Slapping herself on the face, Ditzy muttered, "That's… not how my job works."

"Then how does your job work? Do you even work there anymore!? What were you even doing when I was at the market!?"

Ditzy drew back, her mouth bobbing up and down as she struggled to form a retort. "H-how…?"

"Aunt Daring."

Ditzy's mouth creased to a line. "Oh," she grumbled.

"Lately," Dinky continued, "I feel like she's been doing a better job at taking care of me than you! You aren't even around anymore. You're never around anymore. You're just always away, always doing your 'top-secret project' that you don't even tell your own sister about! What kind of sister and mom are you… Ditzy Doo!"

Panting, Dinky felt moons of frustration overheating her body — frustration that she glared at her mom. Her hurt, her anger was infused with every vile thing she was thinking about the legendary Ditzy Doo, proud adventurer, ace detective, and now, bad mom. No guilt nagged at Dinky. She was not going to apologize for anything she had said.

Not this time.

Golden eyes trembled through Ditzy's tears. "Muffin…"

The wood sounded like it had almost snapped beneath Dinky's hoof. "And don't try to say you're sorry! You say that every time you come home late. You say that every time you forget to pick me up from school. You say that every time Aunt Daring has to pick up Hay Burger for dinner!"

"But… but you used to love Hay Burger…" Ditzy whimpered, her lips barely moving.

"Not every night!" Dinky yelled, stamping the wood floor again; this time, cracking it and making Ditzy's wing ruffle. "Huh? What's this?"

Something had pecked at Dinky's hoof, something dark-blue lined with silver: a letter.

Panic seized Ditzy's good eye. "Dinky, no!" Ditzy said, diving for it, but missing, since it was on her bad side.

Dinky was breaking the silver seal… She was spreading the letter flat… She was scanning the contents.

"You!" Dinky shouted down the landing, where Ditzy lay, scared, "you hid this from me?"

No longer was Ditzy scared; her frown was stiffening into a snarl.

Flying up, she pointed. "It's for your own good, Dinky," she growled. "Don't you remember the last time we went to Haissan?"

Dinky growled back like a defiant dog.

"Give it here, Dinky," Ditzy said, hoof outstretched.

"No."

"Dinky."

"No!"

"Dinky Doo!" Ditzy said in a tone she had never used on her little muffin.

Hissing between her teeth, finally tearful, with something whorling above her, Dinky said, "I. SAID. NO!"

Boom.

The world was silent. The ringing was back. Something was pounding on the inside of her head. Was it her anger? Her fear?

Something was cratered into the ceiling like a swatted fly.

The last of the summoned leylines were swirling, dissipating as the full impact of what had been done sunk in.

Blood was dripping onto the floor.

Nearby, two halves of a magical inhibitor rolled towards each other and clinked, before wandering away, broken and useless.

"What… What… did you do?" said a pony holding a door open; then that pony yelped, pushing a dragon out of the way.

What had she done?

'What you do matters'.

The words rung mockingly inside her head now.

'These foul Equestrians… they hold you back!'

Outside the library, rays fell warm against her coat; but they could do nothing to pierce the darkness spreading within her.

'I sense great power within you…'

For the walls of the magical purple dome she charged.

'Power that is gone to waste.'

And then she was through.

Everything was buzzing.

It was all fuzzy and meaningless to her.

Dinky ran and ran. She didn't know where to go. She was a monster. She replayed the fight inside her head, over and over again. She was a monster. She deserved it. She wished she could redo that moment. She wished there was a way to turn back time. But as far as she knew, there wasn't. She had to live with herself for the rest of her life. Where would she go? Who would accept her? What was going to happen to her mom? Was her aunt Daring going to go away now? She hated herself; her fear was twin with hers. She tried to forget the sight of her mom, just like how she tried to forget how she had hurt Applejack, fewer than twenty-four hours before. She was a monster. She was a monster. Out of breath, she wished things could go back to the way they used to be.

She was panting, over and over again, with the sun beaming down at her, oblivious to her crimes.

Blinking, Dinky rubbed her eyes.

Surprised, she found herself looking at a familiar porch. Not-so-familiar police tape cordoned it. In another world, in another pony's life, a best-selling author was bowing that somepony in. Dinky tried to sniff for the familiar musty aroma. It was gone. Or had she just grown up too much to be able to smell it anymore?

All that was left in Dinky Doo was bile, repulsion at the pony she had grown into.

All that rung inside her head now was a cacophony of her own shame, repeated a billion times, the better to torture herself.

No semblance of rational thought survived within it.

She had to push out her memories of her family. She was a disgrace to them. She didn't deserve them, not as she was, and not after what she had done. How could she look back on them now? How could she reminisce fondly of all the moments they had shared? She wished she could have forgotten. She didn't want to remember their voices, Daring's and Ditzy's, anymore.

No other voice was allowed inside her heart, save for his…

'You can be better than them, all of them, even that shameless tyrant! All you must do…'

"…is come with me, Dinky Doo."