Zodiac

LOL she'll have to dig him up for sex night

"NO!" Rainbow yells. "Why NOW?"

"Why...why are we in Zodiac?" Twilight cries in bewilderment.

"Hmm, I wonder."

The others all turn as Sunset Shimmer walks into view, a cruel, arrogant gleam in her eyes.

"Sunset Shimmer," Fluttershy says coldly.

Is she kidding with that stupid hat?

Applejack takes a step toward her. "Why," she says hoarsely. "Why now, of all times?"

whenever she talks i wanna punch her face

"Oh, Applejack," Sunset says in a patronizing tone, "I am so sorry for your loss. So sorry, in fact, that I thought I'd share something with you." She gestures around us. "All your classmates at CHS are expressing their sentiments!"

I thought about asking her out once but I heard she doesn't date outside her family.

Bet there's a dick under that skirt

Farm people are losers

"Isn't that nice of them? And just to make sure you get to read every last word..."

Her dad was a nip AND a hick, double loser lol

Hundreds of Shadows boil out of the corrupted graveyard.

I bet she does her little sister all the time

I wanna tie AJ and her sister up and fuck 'em both

"BITCH!" Rainbow snarls, activating Black Butterfly and readying her knives. "We're ending this right here, right now!"

AJ's so dumb she gives dumb blondes like me a bad name!

"Oh, I don't think so," Sunset says. "I'm not through toying with you yet. I want you to suffer. Killing you wouldn't be nearly as much fun as watching you squirm. You see...all the fighting you're doing? It's all for nothing. Oh, sure, you've figured out how to deal with the Hunters, but you have no chance of EVER winning." She tosses her hair. "I have all the cards. Here in Zodiac, out there in the real world...it doesn't matter. I am Canterbook. Your pitiful little lives are mine to control."

"BULLSHIT!" Fluttershy screeches. Her Eris outfit snaps into place, and she summons Echo.

Sunset's lips quirk. "I still don't understand where that new Persona came from," she says. "But it doesn't matter. It's even weaker than your old one."

"Try me," Fluttershy hisses.

"Pass," Sunset says dismissively. A thundering engine roars, and Nemesis Prime rumbles into view. Sunset jumps up onto the cab. "Enjoy my little gift to you, hayseed!" With a wave and a laugh, she swings down into the cab; Nemesis Prime speeds off into the distance.

Bet she's off crying 'wah, i miss my daddy, wah'

Did you hear? AJ's dad caught a disease when he was fucking her and died lol

"That fucking COW!" Twilight snarls. She looks at all the texts floating around and her face pales. "Oh God..."

AJ lost her father, husband, and brother all at once rofl

"Applejack?" Pinkie Pie says quietly. "You...you know it's all garbage, right?"

apples suck anyway hope saa goes under

Applejack doesn't answer. She's on her knees, her head in her hands and her shoulders shaking.

She thinks being country is cool, its not

every1 ready 4 the hillbilly zombie apocalipse?

The rest of us look around at each other uncertainly.

maybe she'll kill herself & we'll never have to hear that stupid accent ever again

"Let's...let's deal with this mess and get out of here," Cadance says.

Apple farmer didn't eat his apple a day lol

The others start summoning their Personas and blasting away Shadows. I'm doing my part, but I'm barely paying attention. I'm focusing on Applejack, who's rooted to the spot, Shadows closing in around her as her eyes move from nasty text to nasty text.

hey AJ can I shove an apple up ur pussy hahaha

bet AJ's her own mama

Apple Bloom's her daughter not her sister

Hayseeds dont deserve 2 live

who needs farms when u have fast food

Of all the horrible, cruel, cowardly things Sunset Shimmer has done this year, this is the most despicable.

u think her pussy smells like apple pie?

This is worse than what she did to Pinkie Pie by far, because that was probably going to happen on its own sooner or later.

I honestly don't even call on her in class because I can't understand that godawful accent.

This is worse than when she raped me, because the only thing on the line was my own pride as a man.

when aj comes back 2 school lets take her ykw & GB her

This...

haha yeah bet she wont even scream

She's taken Applejack's day to say goodbye and grieve for her father and turned it into a festival of shit-dumping.

yeah shell just cry all over my dick haha

A cold, black rage fills me as I watch Applejack cry, heedless of the Shadows moving in all around her.

Suddenly, a new text appears above us, bigger than the rest and blocking them out.

"What's THAT?" Twilight gasps.

Not even bothering with my phone, I whisper, "Persona."

A new Persona appears before me:

Dark Matter

Magus tugs on the brown leather gloves he wears and raises his hands. Dark orbs spin away from his body, creating a broad, spinning black triangle filled with the void of space. A smaller, white triangle spins around inside it. When the void collapses in on itself, it takes almost all the Shadows with it.

"Dude," Rainbow says.

There are still a few dozen Shadows surrounding us...

"That's enough!" Applejack yells. "This is my Papa's day and you ain't ruinin' it!"

Persephone appears and whirls around, holding her apple basket like a cannon. Hundreds of apples stream out, striking each Shadow multiple times until they all boil away into nothingness. Persephone fades, and Applejack stands silently, fists clenched at her sides, head bowed and trembling.

"Umm...shouldn't this all be going away now?" Pinkie asks.

Fluttershy frowns at her phone. "Something's keeping us here," she says. "Cadance?"

//Scanning...// She pauses. //It's...it's not a Shadow,// she says. //It's...it's Applejack.//

"Applejack, you okay?" Twilight asks.

For a long moment, Applejack doesn't say anything. Then, at length, she quietly says, "No, Ah ain't. All this stuff...people keepin' t' themselves, smilin' at ya on th' outside but thinkin' all this bullshit on th' inside..." She finally looks at us, and her eyes are like stormclouds. "An' it weren't jes' me but...but Apple Bloom too."

//Let's go back, we're clear now.//

"Hold on. Gimme a minute t' git mahself together here. Don't want Apple Bloom seein' me all tore up like this."

"Applejack, I'm... I'm sorry about all this. And about keeping our own secret from you for so long," I say.

Applejack looks at me, then at the others. "All this nasty stuff... Y'all been seein' it an' puttin' up with it all year long, ain't ya?"

Twilight sighs and nods. "We...try to ignore it. If you try, you can push it into the background, but..." She takes a deep breath. "It's always there. Every once in a while, you catch a glimpse of something you really wish you hadn't and, well, it still stings. A lot."

"Not just texts about ourselves, but about our friends, too," I say. "It...it makes it hard to keep a clear head sometimes."

"Yeah, it's one thing to know people think this stuff about you, getting smacked in the face with it is another story," Rainbow adds.

"But none of them know you, Applejack," Twilight says. She walks over to stand right in front of Applejack, locking eyes with her. "We do, and that's what we're here for. We know it hurts—believe us, it does hurt—but they only have the power you give them. And if we see each other through, and remember that we have our friends and it's only them that matter, we deny them that power. Just like we're here for you now, and will be there whenever you need us."

Applejack lets out a shaky sigh. "Thanks, y'all. Still hurts, like you said, but that takes the edge off a mite."

"Want to go back now?" Pinkie asks.

"Not jus' yet. Ah... Ah've been doin' a bit o' soul-searchin' an'..." She looks around at us again. "With what you said just now, Ah feel like...Ah haven't been all that fair to y'all."

"Nonsense, darling, you had every right to be upset," Rarity says.

"Maybe, but it still ain't right. Ah was right upset at y'all fer all the lyin' an' keepin' me outta the loop like that, an' to be honest, you doin' it 'cuz Ah had mah own issues felt more than a bit patronizin'. Ah mean, it's mah choice if Ah wanna be worryin' 'bout mah friends' troubles on top o' mah own. T'ain't fair, y'all worryin' 'bout me an' not lettin' me worry none 'bout y'all."

"Applejack—"

"You already apologized, Flash, an' that's plenty. But what Ah'm drivin' at is, it really felt like that at first, but patronizin' or not, y'all still cared about whut me an' Apple Bloom are goin' through. There y'all were, fightin' fer yer lives, doin' yer best so next time one'a us had a birthday you'd be there t' protect your friends, an' even with all that, y'all still took time t' come out t' Sweet Apple Acres an' all. An'...an'...friendship ain't 'bout 'fair', it's 'bout carin'. Y'all's hearts were in th' right place even if yer heads weren't."

Twilight rushes forward and hugs Applejack. "We promise, no matter what, we will never lock you out again. You're right, friendship is about caring, and we should have known that you cared about us as much as we care about you."

Applejack smiles and hugs Twilight back. "S'all Ah needed to hear, sugarcube. Ah ain't back on mah feet jes' yet, me an' mah family gotta sort out some stuff now that Papa's gone, but Ah can still lend a hand here like y'all done for me in the real world."

"And we'll be glad to have your help. And we're here for you, too."

"Here's the thing, though," Applejack says pensively. "When Ah first got inta this Zodiac stuff, Ah thought, this was somethin' Ah could handle with mah own two hands." She looks down at her hands. "Ever'thin' 'round me was crashin' down, but this was somethin' Ah could still do. But seein' that Sunset Shimmer here got me thinkin'..." She looks up, searching each of us with her eyes. "That's all wrong. It's wrong 'cuz it ain't all crashin' around me, not with y'all there t' help out. An' it's wrong 'cuz Ah shouldn't think of it as th' only thing Ah CAN do. More like, it's somethin' we gotta do, fer ourselves an' for Apple Bloom an' Sweetie Belle an' all our other friends an' even all them jackasses at school sayin' all this bullshit, even if they don't know it. 'Cuz...'cuz all this stuff about nasty texts an' Shadows..." She shakes her head. "Th' world smacks us every which way with all these bad things happenin', an' all this hate from people what don't hardly even know us, an'...Ah guess these Personas are our way of standin' up for ourselves, of sayin' 'No, Ah won't roll over an' take it, Ah'll stand up an' face y'all head-on.'"

She finally falls silent, and we all stand around, contemplating her words.

"I think...that's a good way of looking at it," I say slowly.

"That's how Echo feels every time," Fluttershy says. "And...when Eris awoke, I...I felt so powerful." She looks at the ground. "But then I used her to do even worse things than I was already doing. Back then, I wasn't standing up for myself, I was just joining the bullies... until I became the worst of them all."

"And then there's Sunset Shimmer."

"Yes. I don't know how she got her Persona. I don't think anyone's ever dared bully her. And how much more does she need to stand up for herself? She already gets off on showing you how much better she is than you. Trust me, she was very clear about that the first time we met in Zodiac."

"She gets off on trolling, too," Rainbow says with a sour frown. "Seriously, what's up with crashing today, of all days, just to fuck with Applejack?"

"It don't matter none no more, Rainbow. Ah know she's just a bully, and Ah ain't lettin' her get her kicks from seein' me down. Matter of fact, Ah think Ah'm fine with headin' back."

"All right. Cadance?"

Twilight holds up a hand. "No, wait a second."

"We really shouldn't stay in Zodiac much longer," Fluttershy warns.

"I know, but we're not going to get another chance to have all of us together for a few days, and..."

"Yeah?"

"It's just... what Applejack said about Personas."

"About them being us standing up for ourselves?" Rainbow asks. "What about it?"

"I started thinking... each and every one of us awakened their Persona exactly like she said: as a response from our hearts to a world that was bearing down on us. We drew from deep within ourselves and found strength to protect ourselves and our friends. It's just... I never thought about what that meant until now."

"And what does it mean?"

"It means... I know where our new Personas came from," Twilight says.

"You've been wondering about that for months," I point out.

"I know. But I've been looking at it the wrong way. I kept trying to figure out why they had changed, but in reality they changed because we did. Don't you see? Applejack is right: Personas come from our own determination, and our own strength. But when Athena changed..." Twilight looks down at her hands. "I know now, it happened because I realized how important my relationships with other people were. It wasn't about just my own strength, but the strength I got from my friends... and I'm sure Pinkie, Cadance, and Rainbow Dash felt the same way."

We all look at each other. Pinkie and Rainbow nod.

"Yeah," Pinkie says with a smile. "Mine changed after...after I realized that as long as I have my friends...my new family...I'll be okay."

"Mine changed when...when I accepted myself and stopped worrying so much about what people think about me," Rainbow says.

"But the thing is," Twilight says, "it's more than just our Personas. It's not Zodiac that changed us, it's knowing each other, and relying on each other and caring for each other every day. No matter what life has thrown at us, we've been there to lend an ear or a shoulder, or even a hand, and all this...Persona stuff is just a reflection of that. That's what Sunset Shimmer doesn't understand, and that's why she can't beat us."

"Ooh! Ooh! Because there's nine of us and one of her and she doesn't have any friends?" Pinkie says.

Rainbow frowns. "Ganging up on her doesn't sound your style, Twilight."

Twilight waves her hands frantically. "No, no! Pinkie, that's not right! Sunset Shimmer should have friends, she should want to have friends! But all she cares about is being superior to everybody else. As long as she's alone, it won't matter how strong she is, she'll never have a chance to grow into a better person."

Everyone stares at Twilight.

"You have to admit, that does sound like the key to beating her," I say.

"Flash, this is more important than Sunset," Twilight says in a patient, lecturing tone. "It's about how everyone can be great and do great things on their own, but it's only through our friends that we can bring out the best in each other."

Rainbow gives Twilight an odd look. "Twilight, that. Was. The SAPPIEST, corniest thing I've ever heard. And when you live in our dorm? That's saying something."

"Darned if it all ain't true, though," Applejack says with a grin.

"Well, yeah. But it's still sappy."

I frown. "More important than Sunset, huh? If she hears you say that, she'll come at us with everything she's got."

Twilight smiles. "Then she'll find us standing strong...together."

We all look at each other. Everybody is smiling.

"TOGETHER!"

---

"Speakin' of together...whut say we git th' hell outta here now?" Applejack says.

And just like that, Zodiac collapses around us.