Unfinished Pizzaportal epilogue

Besides her lone figure, the streets are empty. Most of the city's inhabitants are still at the celebration, she guesses. Faint music is still audible even here. She scoffs. Let them have their celebration. Who cares that they are celebrating her master's defeat? A defeat that she had made possible, but that felt so much like her own that it hurt.

She still can't believe that they simply let her go. It feels like a stay of execution. Every corner that she rounds, she half expects a detachment of royal guards waiting for her. There are none. She hates how nervous she feels. Nervousness is weakness. Something she has gone to great lengths to eliminate in herself. Yet as she walks these streets, this uncanny feeling returns. It is less about the guards, she finally admits to herself. It is more about who she is going to face tonight.

Seeing an old relative shouldn't get her riled up like this.

So why is there a shiver running down her back as she stands in front of the house she had been looking for?

Tentatively, she raises a hoof to knock. Is it just the cold of the night, or is she really shivering? Such a show of weakness would have left her disgusted with herself, but she can't bring herself to muster the rage.

She raps at the door. There are noises inside, as someone moves down the hallway. The mare shifts in place. She almost wishes that she got the wrong house, that the one she came to see doesn't live here anymore. Then she could tell herself that at least she'd made an effort. How easy it'd be to just slink away into the night and leave behind her past once again-

The creak of hinges interrupts her dream of escape. The stallion standing in the doorway is on the far side of middle-aged, with a bit ouf a paunch and a solid amount of grey in his hair, but there is no mistaking it: He's the one she's come to see.

"Good evening, uncle," she presses out, a hoarse whisper desperately trying to sound casual. Then, quickly added, almost desperate: "Mind if I come in?"

"F-Fizz! I mean An-" Quick stammers. His eyes are wide and he looks like his knees are going to collapse under him at any moment. Despite this, he manages to stagger aside.

"Who is it, honey?"

The Professor doesn't answer. His brain can't quite produce words right now, all its capabilities focused on taking in the familiar stranger in front of him. His sins personified, finally come home to roost. His legs carry him aside as if moving on their own, leaving the door wide open.

Finally he manages a sound that might be a "welcome home" just as much as a dry rasp and the mare steps past him into the hallway.

 

Hurriedly he closes the door behind her.