@Background Pony #0FF0
 
Never mind guys, that was actually stated in the afterward…

@Kazapsky
 
When did she say she couldn’t survive another trip? I just re-read the last chapter, and her reasons for not returning were two-fold:
 
On one hand she wasn’t willing to ask any of those who she trusted (her friends) to give up their lives for her own quest, as when she thought “How could I ask from somepony else what I wouldn’t give myself?” She then later reiterated the point by saying “Everypony I know … they all deserved to be happy too. Just as much, or more, than I do.”
 
The other reason was that she later realized that Celestia’s loneliness was crippling: “”” “Nopony should be alone, Celestia.” Not even one like you. “Ponies need friends. They need the… the magic of friendship. Without it…” I trailed off. “””

@Kazapsky  
That puts a damper on the Pony’s mood.

@Vree
 
Then I guess you consider half of the decent stories out there to be riddled with mary sues, huh?

@HamburgerTime
 
Sadly, the SPP is now Celestia’s souljar, and the field is powered by her soul. The only way to shut the shield down would be to somehow extract her soul from the machine. Not an easy task when you consider the degree of insane magical shit Celly had to pull to get herself in there in the first place.

@Kazapsky  
Oh, right. Duh.  
But can’t they just turn the bleedin’ thing off from the inside? Ah screw it, I’m just gonna go back and re-read the bloody thing.

@The Toaster Repair Pony
 
No, she herself admitted as much.
 
 
@HamburgerTime
 
Celestia can still cast the spell in reverse to teleport things into Spike’s mouth.

@Kazapsky  
Okay, I do need to reread those last two chapters. How would Homage or anyone for that matter get back out? Spike can’t go in there to burn them back out again.

@Kazapsky  
So Celestia can’t power the damn thing down?

@The Toaster Repair Pony
 
There is a soul-powered forcefield that can’t be taken down blocking said door.

@Kazapsky  
There is a front door.

@Background Pony #44D3
 
I suggest you re-read the last couple chapters. A body, even with the repeated augments Pip got, can only take so much before it begins to break down. Major injuries never heal completely. Every time you hurt a body part, it becomes easier to re-injure that same part.
 
Littlepip explicitly stated that she couldn’t survive the dragonfire teleport a second time; she was lucky to pull it off once.

@Vree  
 
ABANDON THREAD  

@HamburgerTime
 
She did honestly believe that at the time she made that mental statement. But that was prior to her actually going to the SPP.
 
Given that the SPP hub is protected by an impregnable magic field that can’t be taken down, and can only be bypassed by dragonfire transmission (an extremely taxing ordeal), Littlepip’s sacrifice was basically made when she chose to have herself ported in there. As I said, she’s too beat-down to survive the return trip.
 
According to the epilogue, she did manage to get a couple visits from Homage, but again, dragonfire is a miserable way to travel - it generally took Homage about a day just to recover from a one-way port, and then she had to port back when the visit was over. Not exactly something you can do on a regular basis, or even more than a handful of times total.

Can anyone point to me to a quote in the fic that spells out that her health is poor? The way I read it, she’s healthier than ever: got JUST the right amount of taint and radiation to get super constitution and longer lifespan.

^I’m so glad I didn’t read it all the way through
 
“ultimate sacrifices’ are for cheap Mary Sues.

@Kazapsky  
Oh, okay. I interpreted it like she was actually uploaded into the thing, like Celestia was.  
But still, the way it was described made it sound like Pip was making the ultimate sacrifice. She said she would never see Homage again, and things like that.

@HamburgerTime
 
It’s not permanent insofar as she can disconnect herself. But after everything Little Miss Bullet Sponge went through in the wasteland, her health is shot. So she can’t stray far from her pod; her body simply can’t take any more abuse.
 
There’s also the bit that she needs to physically link herself to the SPP to do anything with the weather, which is kind of a 24-7 on-call job in Equestria. That would anchor her to the hub structure even if she did have the constitution left to venture outside.

Fallout Equestria Spoliers:
 
 
Isn’t Lil’pip permanently connected to the SPP hub or whatever? It would seem like it would kinda cheapen her sacrifice if she could disconnect any time she wanted.