Knock Knock Knock
Fluttershy woke up to the sound of quiet knocks at her door. It took a while for her to shuffle out of her couch and walk to the door. There was another set of knocks, this time a little louder. Fluttershy opened the door.
"What is it, Annika?" She said to the sweetheart. She kept a glare at Annika as she walked in.
"Fluttershy… I-" Annika tried to speak, but Fluttershy snapped.
"Are you going to say something stupid like 'oh, you need to move on' or 'he was going to go bad eventually'?" Fluttershy shoved her face right to Annika's own face, to the point where their noses were touching.
"…" Annika shut herself up. "No. I wasn't going to say that." She then pushed Fluttershy away from her. "I was going to bring up how you were shirking off your duties." Fluttershy simply looked to her cutie mark as it was glowing. "The map needs you. Who knows if there'll be a war that can only be stopped by talking to animals?" Annika said.
"Just send your 'faithful student'. We both know she's better than me." Fluttershy said.
"… Starlight's not my student anymore. She graduated and is now turning her town into a defense center to prevent what happened with the Changelings from happening again." Annika said.
"Shame someone already took care of that. Maybe we should reward him with- oh wait." Fluttershy said. Annika liked that Fluttershy had become more assertive over the years, but she grated her teeth with every remark that she placed.
"What happened to Tommy was not my fault." Annika said.
"I dunno. You seemed to be rooting for stoning him." Fluttershy rolled her eyes.
"Hey! I wasn't going to bring up Tommy! I was just going to talk about the map! It's you who keeps bringing it up!" Annika barked.
"You should have realized that it was an elephant in the room, Annika." Fluttershy just kept a cold stare at Annika. Annika knew this stare. It's the stare that makes even the most powerful of creatures bend to her whims. Yet it doesn't work on ponies, let alone Alicorns.
"It was Celestia's idea… And quite frankly, I had doubts about it too." Annika said.
"So why did you vouch for Tommy to be turned to stone?" Fluttershy said.
"B… Because he had to be stopped, Fluttershy. What happened to Chrysalis might happen to somepony else." Annika said.
"But Tommy's our friend!" Fluttershy said.
"He's known to relapse, Fluttershy." Annika said… Just then, a hoof smacked Annika on the side of the head.
"You of all ponies should know that he felt bad about that." Rainbow Dash said as she entered Fluttershy's house. Rainbow Dash gave a protective wing over Fluttershy as she began to weep into Rainbow Dash's body. Rainbow Dash looked to Annika. "It's best you go." Rainbow Dash said. Annika, without hesitance, flew off. Rainbow Dash then looked to Fluttershy.
"Shhh… It'll be okay… Trust me…" Rainbow Dash cooed.
Annika flew towards Sweet Apple Acres, ready to cry herself a huge storm. She remembered what had happened that caused Fluttershy to resent her so badly.
It was a surprise that the Changelings had overtaken them and captured them. Nopony, not even Celestia, saw this coming. Though, thankfully, nopony expected a ragtag group of heroes to go and save them as well.
Among the cast were Starlight Glimmer, the most powerful unicorn in Equestria, Trixie, her personal friend, Thorax, a Changeling rebel, and perhaps the most shocking of all, Tommy, Chaos personified.
While the three were able to sneak in or blast their way through the defenses of the Changelings, Tommy took a more direct approach. It was mainly because his closest friend, Fluttershy, was one of the captured ponies. To say he was angry was an understatement.
Celestia and Luna were among the viewers of the chaos that had unfolded in the main Changeling throne room. For them, it was a rerun of the reign of terror that Tommy once had over Equestria. Even ponies who weren't even born to see the carnage were shocked to see just how deadly a silly draconequus could become.
Changelings were on fire, trampled by bull ballerinas, and when they weren't ripping each other's throats out, they were turning against their queen. However, they weren't going to kill her. No.
Tommy was saving Chrysalis for himself…
"Lemee guess, Flutters still mad over what happened with Tommy?" Applejack gave Annika an apple. She ate a piece of it and munched on it for a bit as the two sat by an apple tree, stripped of its luscious red apples.
"Mmmhmmm…" Annika said.
"Yeah, I'm a little miffed too. Tommy was a fun guy to be with!" Pinkie Pie pronked as she brought a cart of apples towards Applejack.
"But you saw what happened! Tommy could be a very dangerous threat if he ever became evil again!" Annika said.
"But he wasn't darling, and to be fair, it didn't seem like he would be a threat for a long while." Rarity arrived with a blanket that she laid down onto the grass. The other ponies gathered for a picnic as the group ate some apples.
"I know… But… Celestia said it herself." Annika then cleared her throat and began to speak in Celestia's tone. "If there's even a one percent chance that Tommy will be evil, we have to take it as an absolute certainty."
"And you believe her?" Applejack raised her eyebrow.
"Y-yeah. She's our sweetheart. The sweetheart is never wrong!" Annika said.
"Well what about that time Cadance was kidnapped by Changelings and Queen Chrysalis did a reaaaaaaally bad imitation of her?" Pinkie asked.
"Or the time Tirek went marching around Equestria?" Rarity said. Annika remembered both these moments and they cut into her like knives. Mostly because she was the one who was hurt the most in those events.
Her own friends turned against her after they refused to listen to any proof that Cadance was Chrysalis, with Celestia being none the wiser that her own niece was really a psychotic queen and even siding with her.
Tirek went around absorbing her friends' magic and blew up her own house, nearly killing Spike in the process. And not only did Celestia vouch for Tommy to capture Tirek solo, but when that obviously backfired and he joined sides, Celestia advised Annika to hide in a hole and not tell her friends, leading them into an inevitable trap that nearly doomed Equestria.
She sighed.
"I'll talk to Celestia about giving Tommy some mercy as soon as the sun sets." Annika said. The rest of the ponies finished their picnic and as soon as the orange glow in the sky was visible, Annika set off for Canterlot, remembering what happened…
Tommy had Chrysalis right where he wanted him. His claw piercing into her neck and making even more holes for her body. He glared at her with burning eyes as he growled out her name.
"W-what are you going to do me, Tommy?" Chrysalis chuckled. "You've gone soft… these ponies have made you weak!" Chrysalis said. Tommy simply held out his lion's paw in front of Chrysalis' face. He gave one glance to the crowd of ponies she had captive, and in particular, Fluttershy. He glared at Chrysalis. He knows her type. The type of person who won't rest until her enemies are nothing but ash. The type of person who would terrorize endlessly and care not for friendship. Tommy had to make sure Chrysalis would no longer be a threat to not just him, but also his friends. And so, he muttered out:
" Destroy ."
Nothing happened the first second, but afterwards, Chrysalis screamed out as every part of her began to fade away into nothingness. Starting from her hooves all the way to her horn, each piece of her being atomized before the ponies' very eyes. The only thing that remained was Chrysalis' head, still screaming until Tommy crushed her neck, rendering her head to be nothing but a puff of pink clouds. Tommy looked to the ponies as he freed them. He looked to a scowling Celestia. He knew what his reward would be.
"sweetheart Celestia?" It was now night time. Usually this is when Celestia would go to bed, but at the call of her faithful student, she obviously had to answer.
"Yes?" Celestia asked Annika as she entered the throne room.
"I was thinking… About Tommy…" Annika said.
"Don't. Tommy knew what he was getting into when he destroyed Chrysalis." Celestia said.
"Yes. I know, but he saved us. And quite possibly saved us from future attacks from the Changelings. Spike and Thorax are educating the Changeling Larvae so that they could be more open to friendship so we won't have another incident like this again." Annika said.
"He shouldn't have killed Chrysalis…" Celestia said.
"With all due respect, Celestia, I think Chrysalis wouldn't have stopped. We defeated her once before and she came back stronger. She managed to kidnap us overnight, for your sake! If we let her live, who's to say we'd end up losing more than just Equestria?" Annika asked.
"…" Celestia simply looked to the moon. "I considered killing Luna when she became Nightmare Moon." That was enough to make Annika's jaw drop. "But I couldn't. She was my own sister. So I sealed her for the next thousand years." Celestia said. Annika sat on her rump as Celestia marched forward. "I could have killed Tirek as well, but I didn't. He was Scorpan's brother and I did once believed that he could be good as well." Celestia said. She walked by, passing through the stained glass representation of Spike saving the Crystal Empire.
"Sombra was once a pony like you and me… then he became evil and our hooves were forced. Luna and I sealed him, believing the darkness would seep out of him…" She said. She sighed. "But Chrysalis…" Celestia looked to Annika. "Chrysalis was not like them… She was evil to the core." Celestia said. Her hooves trembled a little. "Even so… I thought that… perhaps we could reform her." She said.
"Your majesty, she said that her childhood dream is to see Canterlot burn to the ground. I'm pretty sure she wasn't in the mood for friendship." Annika said. Celestia stayed silent.
"Exactly… But she could have been. When Tommy destroyed her, he denied her any chance to be redeemed. And with that chaos he brought onto the Changelings, I have worries that he will do the same thing over and over again, or worse, go back to his evil ways." Celestia said. She placed a wing over Annika and patted her on the back with it. "See, I just want to prevent another case like Tirek from emerging, so I turned Tommy to stone to punish him. In about a hundred years, he'll be released." Celestia said.
"But… all his friends will be dead by that point!" Annika said.
"Well, maybe he should have thought about that before he killed Chrysalis." Celestia took her wing off Annika and walked away.
But… He did it to save his friends… Annika thought about it. She then cracked a smile. "You know… I think I may have been mistaken after all. We should have extended a hand of friendship to Chrysalis. Even if she rejects it and sends her army to reduce Equestria to a smoulder, we should just turn the other cheek and try to befriend her. Besides, you're right… We need to prevent another Tirek incident. I have only been looking at things from one perspective." Annika said.
Celestia smiled back. "Annika, I'm glad you see things from my perspective now." Celestia said, her back still turned to Annika. Annika's horn gave a faint magenta glow as she aimed towards Celestia. She shed a tear. Never in all her life would she end up doing this to her own hero…
But to prevent another incident like Tirek... is to prevent someone like Celestia to make an Equestria-dooming decision that would lead to it being an incident.
Annika did what she had to do.
BLAST!
When Fluttershy woke up in her cottage, she saw someone in front of her. Someone she thought she would never see again.
"T-Tommy?" Fluttershy asked.
"In the flesh! Or rather, in the fur…" Tommy said to her. Fluttershy leaped up and held Tommy. As she cried into his arms, she opened her eyes and saw Annika behind him.
"Annika… did you…" She asked. Annika nodded.
"Yes. I talked with Celestia and I got her to understand that what Tommy did was wrong, but was necessary. He will be hailed as a hero from now on and not treated as a potential relapse like Trixie or Thorax." Annika said. Fluttershy smiled.
"Th-thank you… And… Um… sorry…" She said. Annika smiled. She liked the meek Fluttershy better than the assertive Fluttershy. Annika then bowed and flew on her way out of the cottage… There, she remembered what she did to Celestia.
BLAST!
Celestia's throne was blasted into tiny bits. Celestia turned around and saw Annika with a smoking horn. At first, Annika was horrified at the appearance of Celestia's widened eyes… But she kept her stare.
"Tommy is a hero. He shouldn't be treated like some criminal just because he stopped someone from becoming a threat later in the future by means of killing them. I'm going to go with my student and together we'll unseal Tommy. You make any attempt to hinder us, like hiding the statue or destroying it, and the next bolt will be at your head." Annika's horn then glowed as Celestia's golden throne, also bathed in her magenta light, began to mend itself back into what it was before.
"I could have killed you, you know. But you were my teacher. I believe you can make the decision to recognize Tommy's heroic deed. Consider this mercy." With that, Annika walked away as Celestia slumped to the ground, unable to cry as she watched her former student fly off.