Being on four legs again felt good! Being a pony had to be the biggest advantage this version of Canterlot had.
It was cold and dark all of a sudden, Sunset reminding herself that the seasons weren’t in sync between the two dimensions. She left in autumn and arrived in spring. Now she left in summer and arrived in winter.
She lit up her horn to find herself in a vault. Sadly, this wasn’t a room filled with cursed and dangerous artifacts, which made sense if Celestia thought there was a non-zero chance of Sunset coming back for revenge.
It was instead a wide-open room with the mirror portal bolted to the floor in the middle. A single door led out of the room, but there were no other exits. It looked like a good room to put guards to intercept Sunset if and when she came back.
Though clearly, Celestia hadn’t expected her to return this quickly. A year ago, Sunset might have gotten upset about the princess underestimating her, but she felt calmer now.
Maybe it was some lingering paranoia, but she decided to do a test to make sure this wasn’t another pocket dimension. She closed her eyes and cast a spell, making a mana particle appear and drop to the floor.
She’d learned a lot about pocket dimensions and interdimensional travel in the past year. If this was a pocket dimension, even one the size of a solar system, then the particle wouldn’t accelerate as you’d expect it to from gravity.
But this one did. Furthermore, from her estimate, gravity was the same as it was on Equestria. All the lights were green.
Sunset moved to the door. It was locked from the outside, but her magic got it opened easily enough. She peeked her head out of the door to make sure the coast was clear. Sunset didn’t want to talk to anypony else before Celestia if she could avoid it.
There didn’t appear to be any ponies in this area just now, so she stepped out into the hallway. Sunset could see, through the windows, that a blizzard was blowing right now, its icy winds occasionally howling but never with enough force to send a chill through the castle.
Her old home felt like such a lonely place right now.
As she snuck through the halls, avoiding the guards, she couldn’t stop every possible scenario of the coming meeting from going through her head.
She pictured Celestia becoming furious and resuming her scolding of Sunset just as harshly as right before Sunset left. Princess Celestia would call her irresponsible and undeserving. Sunset decided she’d bear that much if the princess did take her back. Though she still couldn’t help but imagine Princess Celestia demanding a guard drag her out of the castle.
She imagined Celestia not even recognizing her and dismissing her without a care. After all, Sunset was just one of a million ponies she’d known in her long life. She wondered which of those two reactions was a crueler vision.
She imagined a more hopeful scenario where Celestia became teary-eyed seeing her student again, dropped everything to embrace Sunset, and apologized herself. Sunset didn’t dare to hope for something like that but silently decided that if it did, she’d immediately forgive Celestia for every real and imagined offense the princess had ever committed.
Princess Celestia was the closest thing to family Sunset had. She could forgive nearly anything of her.
It didn’t take too long to find Celestia, there were only so many spots the princess liked to hang around in. She found Celestia in one of the castle’s many sitting rooms, one of Celestia’s favorites near the dorms of her school.
But Sunset hesitated briefly when she realized Celestia wasn’t alone. She hid for a moment to watch and decide if she wanted this other pony to witness her return.
Draped under her wing was a crying filly that Celestia was consoling. That filly looked familiar. She had a purple mane with a pink stripe through it.
Twilight?
The filly was an alternate version of Twilight Sparkle, which wasn’t too odd. Celestia wasn’t the only pony with alternate versions of herself, though it made Sunset wonder if any of her human friends had pony versions of themselves. Maybe somewhere on Earth, there was another Sunset Shimmer even?
“I’m so sorry,” Twilight apologized with a sob. “I didn’t mean to break down like that.”
“It’s alright,” Celestia soothed her. “I understand how much pressure you’re under.”
“It’s just taking care of the dragon and doing all that work is too much,” Twilight sobbed. “I know you’re trying to teach me to be responsible but - but I wanted to study magic, not dragon training. Why can’t I just do that?”
“Twilight, Spike isn’t here to give you responsibility,” said Celestia. “He’s here to be a friend to you so that you can learn about friendship.
“I don’t want friends,” said Twilight. “I want to study magic! And read books!”
“Friendship is the most important thing,” Celestia said to the little Twilight. “Your magical studies are important, but you must never lose sight of the importance of friends.”
Sunset’s eyes widened and she stepped back in horror. She froze in place and held her breath to keep herself from crying. Her legs trembled and she fell back onto her haunches. She felt sick!
This was exactly the same, wasn’t it?
Celestia replaced her! One year went by and Celestia had already replaced Sunset with a new student. She was still working her new student into the ground, still trying to get her to embrace friendship to activate some weapon, still not telling this filly what she was signing up for! It was the exact same plan!
Sunset looked down at Twilight, trembling as she watched the filly sob. It was like looking at her childhood self and Celestia was doing all of it again. Princess Celestia hadn’t regretted any of that, had done nothing different.
Sunset had just been a tool. When a tool broke you went out and bought a new one.
She realized then and there that it really had all been a lie. She had no family here in Equestria.
Whether she stood there for an hour or a minute she couldn’t say. All she could do was focus hard, trying not to scream or cry or puke. Sunset didn’t want to stay, but couldn’t move, couldn’t do anything that wouldn’t alert Celestia to her presence.
She didn’t hear what else Celestia said to Twilight after that, but eventually Twilight did calm down and Celestia did leave.
Finally, Sunset regained enough control to let out a breath. As she watched Princess Celestia trot off, she decided that the princess wasn’t worthy of explaining herself after all. Seeing this, seeing herself so effortlessly and carelessly replaced, spoke louder than any words ever could.
But Twilight… Sunset couldn’t just leave her here to make the same mistake she did. She stepped out from her hiding spot.
“Hey, kid,” Sunset said to her.
“Who are you?” Twilight looked up at her.
“Do you know anything about the elements of harmony?” Sunset asked. “Or Nightmare Moon?”
“Huh?” Twilight clearly didn’t.
It was all true. Celestia hadn’t changed one bit.
“Listen.” Sunset tried to smile through the tears. “Princess Celestia isn’t that great. She’s just using you as a weapon. She doesn’t care about you or friendship or anything of the sort. It’s all just part of her stupid plans. If you want to study magic, then do that and just forget about friendship. You’ll be happier that way.”
“What?!” Twilight was immediately offended by the idea. “How can you say something mean about Princess Celestia?! She’s Princess Celestia!”
Sunset just gave her one last smile before turning to leave, smile fading immediately.
She revered the princess like that at one point, when she was Twilight’s age and first came here. She knew she’d never be able to reason Twilight out of this, not without making a massive scene at least.
She just left, having said something.
Twilight didn’t call the guards on her or anything. Sunset simply walked back to the chamber that held the mirror portal. She held her breath and her tears and walked back toward the portal.
Back through the empty, snowy hall and finally to the empty room where just the mirror stood. She gazed into the dark mirror, the room just bright enough to show her reflection.
The first time she looked into this mirror she saw herself as an alicorn, blazing with light and magic. Now she was a broken, miserable thing. She put her hoof on the mirror.
Just like Principal Celestia said, it had gone from a place to escape from, to a place to escape to. One last time, she went through the portal.
Sunset stepped back through the portal. She felt numb even to a change of species at this point.
All of her friends and Principal Celestia were still there, talking about something Sunset was deaf to. Sunset hadn’t even been gone long enough for them to depart.
They didn’t notice her at first. Sunset spent a minute watching them from a painful distance, trying to think of what to say to them. She opened her mouth but failed to speak.
“H-hey!” Her second attempt to call out to them was more successful.
They all turned to her, more confused than anything. Her friends came up to surround her right away.
Her friends!
That thought and their attention were enough to give her a brief smile.
“Huh?” Twilight stepped back in surprise. “You’re back already?”
“See! Told ya!” Dash lifted her head with a proud smile. “After being in this place the outside world must be like a nightmare and uh - you okay?”
That brief smile quickly faded, and the others watched her with concern as she forced herself over to Principal Celestia.
“Can I come back?” Sunset looked up at Principal Celestia.
“Did your talk not go so well?” Principal Celestia knelt down and put a hand on Sunset’s head.
Just that much, just that tiny bit of contact, felt like the world. Sunset finally broke into tears and grabbed on to Celestia as she fell to her knees. Principal Celestia held her gently as Sunset cried.