Sweetie Drops sat on the ground, in front of her house. Lyra was next to her. It had been a long, long day.

While it wasn't a complete surprise when they came back to find that the bugbear had half destroyed the place during it's rampage, it [i]was[/i] very annoying.

And maybe she deserved this. But Lyra sure didn't.

She seemed unfazed by the destruction. "It doesn't actually look too bad," she said, "I think it's pretty much just the upper floor that's gone. The downstairs is still intact."

Of course she was. It would take more than property damage to shake her. Her best friend suddenly revealing she wasn't the pony she seemed to be—that might do the trick!

It had been a long day, and would be a long night.

They went inside. It turned out the monster had got the ground floor too. The kitchen was missing a wall.

Sweetie Drops lay down on the floor. She had limits, and that...

"I'm sorry, Lyra. This is all my fault." It took the last of her willpower to keep the words from breaking up into sobs.

"Come on, Bonnie, it's not like it's a big deal. And it's still better than that time I burned the place down," Lyra said. "Oh, wait. I mean Sweetie Drops?"

There it was. "Call me whatever you want," she said.  "This is all my fault. I was the one who let that bugbear get out the first time around. I got our whole thing shut down and let a monster get out into the world.

"My last orders were to go undercover somewhere and just keep my head down. 'Wait for further instructions.'" She looked at Lyra. "But I know how things are. I know what I left everypony else to clean up. Those instructions aren't coming. That's all gone now."

Lyra didn't get it though. She just kept stroking her mane and telling her it was going to be okay. When would that damn mare see that not everything could be okay?

Sweetie Drops couldn't take it anymore. "Don't you understand! I'm a liar! A failure! You're in danger just by being near me."

Lyra was startled by the outburst. The mare who was certainly now Sweetie Drops's former best friend stood up. "I'm going to go grab some blankets and stuff from upstairs. It's getting late."

Sweetie Drops was alone now, so she could wallow in misery like she wanted to.

The wedding had been nice. No thanks to her. What had she done to make up for her first failure and stop the bugbear with her second chance? Nothing. Twilight and her friends had done all the work.

It was just as well she had gotten the agency shuttered. With ponies like that around what was left for ones like her? That was all she would have needed to do, not mess up for a few years, and she would have been able to retire. Instead she was exiled in disgrace. Way to go, Sweetie Drops.

A pillow hit her in the face. Deep instincts rolled her out of the way of the second one just behind it.

Lyra was standing in the doorway with a smirk. "Gotcha." Her horn lit up with golden light, and she rearranged the pillows side by side. "So would you believe that there was only one blanket that didn't get torn up?" She lay down next to Sweetie Drops.

The blanket spread over both of them. Sweetie Drops looked at her ex-marefriend. Despite the omnipresent cheer in her voice, her expression was fragile.

"Lyra, you're a terrible liar."

"And proud of it!" The words came out sharp.

Sweetie Drops could only wince.

"We're gonna talk about that. But you're being way too hard on yourself about the other stuff."

"How can you say that? I failed my mission."

Lyra shrugged. "So what? Look what it got you: the greatest marefriend of all time."

Sweetie Drops tried to argue, but got a hoof stuffed in her mouth.

"I know what you're going to say, but you know me. Do you really think I hate you? Me?"

Somehow Lyra's embrace was much warmer than it had been a few seconds before. There were still plenty of other problems to deal with. "Aren't you afraid I'll put you in danger?"

"More danger than Princess Twilight?"

Sweetie Drops couldn't say anything to that.

"Aha, so I do know you as well as I thought, [i]Bon Bon[/i]."