Xenophilia: Plague's End

Chapters

Chapter 2: Burdens
Chapter 3: Recovery
Chapter 1: Infection

Chapter 2: Burdens

Fluttershy hummed merrily to herself as she trotted about her cottage. Oh, today was such a wonderful day! Angel Bunny was being so perfectly behaved today, and all of her animal friends were just the very bestest of the bestest little cuties anywhere! She tugged out the bag of nuts for her little squirrel friends and sang out, "Come on out! It's breakfast time! And don't all of you just deserve the very best there's ever been, yes you do!"

The squirrels rushed right over and began animatedly chattering. She admired their sleek, glossy coats, their marvelously bushy tails, their perfectly kept teeth. She was just the best at taking care of her little friends, and they'd be in ever so much trouble if she wasn't there to help them all out. And Ponyville would be in so much trouble too! Why, they'd have mice nibbling all sorts of things they weren't supposed to, and the poor hydra would come on out of the Everfree, and the beavers wouldn't know where to build their dams, and all sorts of other problems.

Really, the whole town needed her so very much, and they didn't appreciate her at all! But every pony had their own personal little sun to raise, and she was just going to accept their little failings with her own considerable stores of grace, and she'd forgive them for not noticing what an utterly ideal pony she was.

Down where ponies belonged, too. On the ground! Not up in the sky, which was clearly far higher than ponies were supposed to be, wings or none. Why, of course she could fly up to the clouds if she really had to! Hadn't she outflown Rainbow Dash, even, when Fluttershy had to save Equestria from Discord's simply awful naughtiness? Sixteen wingpower, hah! Fluttershy was sure she could have shown off a little more and demonstrated twenty wingpower, maybe thirty, but it just wouldn't have been nice to show up Rainbow Dash like that, not when that silly pegasus was so proud of her flying all the time!

But Fluttershy could forgive other ponies their little lapses. Of course Rainbow Dash was proud about her flying, and Rarity was proud of her appearance, and Applejack was proud of all her farm animals, and Pinkie Pie was proud of how everyone loved her, and Twilight was proud of her magic... well, she did happily admit that Twilight Sparkle's magical powers were quite impressive, and nothing at all that Fluttershy wanted to be involved with, and if her other friends didn't notice just how much better she was at their personal points of pride, why, she could smile politely and let them think that!

She was so very, very humble, after all. And that lovely new dark fur across her chest set off her wings so nicely.

***

Lyra held her hoof against Rainbow Dash's neck. "Even for you in the mornings, this is pretty bad," she told the multicolor-maned pegasus. "Is this the Luna thing, or did the plague set you into heat early and you need to get onto a train to Canterlot?"

Rainbow Dash glowered up at her herdmate, from her spot on her back on the floor. "I am not going into heat!" she insisted. "I can wake up in a bad mood every now and then without it being an all-Equestria-beware emergency, okay? Maybe it is the Luna thing, but I feel fine. I just didn't get a good sleep. She messed up my dreams or something. Now get your hoof off of me before I break it off!"

"You're not helping your case, Rainbow," Lyra said, without moving.

Rainbow Dash glared up at her... then gritted her teeth. She took several hard breaths and forced herself to relax. "Sorry. Sorry, Lyra. You're right. I'm fine. Maybe it is that thing Luna did." She reached a hoof up to the side of her head. "She did something, that's pretty obvious."

Her coat was cyan as ever, her mane as rainbowed as ever. It was just on her head that a helmet pattern of dark, dark navy blue had manifested overnight.

"If I have nightmares for Luna until she gets better, then I'm not gonna sleep too well, so I'm gonna be kinda a nightmare myself," Rainbow Dash admitted. "I don't remember having nightmares, but if she rules dreams and she has nightmares, maybe I'm just having them for her. I'll take some extra naps and try to let everypony know I'm on edge, okay? Maybe this afternoon we can spar some and I can work some of this off getting my flank kicked?"

Lyra stepped back, taking her hoof away from Rainbow Dash's neck. "If you start feeling strange in any way, come get me," she warned. "Luna herself doesn't know what's going to happen to you."

Rainbow rolled onto her hooves. "Yeah, yeah, I know. And no stunts yet either, I didn't forget that either. I'm back up to a twelve, but no stunts until I hit at least fourteen, or I might still hurt myself, blah blah blah."

"They're your wings. You know best," Lyra said.

Rainbow Dash glowered at her again. "If you already know I'm in a bad mood today, you really oughtta know it's a bad day to be doing the whole annoyingly-enigmatic thing, right?"

***

Rarity stood in front of her sewing machine, frowning at the pattern she'd prepared yesterday for Fancy Pants' new order. She had done a magnificent job, of course. The new jacket would look simply smashing on him. But then he'd take it away, and no matter how wonderful a job she'd done on it, she'd never get a chance to see it in its proper environment. And that would be such a waste, wouldn't it?

The only thing to do was to set that little task aside for the moment so she could concentrate on something really worthwhile, something she'd get to properly enjoy. And it really had been quite a while since she made something just for herself. Not just a little shawl or hat, but really outdone herself on herself. And if she couldn't give herself things, then who could she give them to, really? She wouldn't want anypony else to think she was neglecting herself for them. It'd be simply cruel, and they'd think such awful things of themselves!

So she settled in to work. Neighponese silk, of course, a subtle mulberry to make a mingling between her prized mane and her gorgeous, meticulously maintained coat. Diamonds, sapphires, and amethysts for accents, with a few rubies at strategic locations to make it all really shine. A traditional train of lace, full enough to accent the flanks but with just enough gaps to artfully provide glimpses of her tail. Oh, and a single emerald bracelet about the right fore-ankle, to set the whole thing off! It was going to be so magnifique! And all for her!

And it would go so well with that lovely horn, so dark and mysterious! Why, all the stallions would ask how she came to have such a distinctly, dramatically offsetting horn, and she'd laugh and tell them that it was a little gift for her, just a little token of appreciation from Princess Luna for doing her a favor. Just what favor she was doing Rarity hadn't a clue, but clearly she was if she had Luna's color on! Why, she'd have all the stallions courting her at once!

All of them. She'd make sure to send any mated ones back to their herds, of course, she wasn't greedy, but the rest were hers!

Dimly she was aware of the sounds of Spike making breakfast for himself and for Sweetie Belle. He was such a darling little dragon, so brave and so noble, so giving in spite of his very nature! Twilight had done a simply splendid job raising him, but Rarity just couldn't imagine giving him up now. Surely Twilight would agree that he belonged to her now!

With her! With her, of course.

***

Pinkie Pie woke up hugging Gummy in his bed. She felt cold and clammy and Gummy was totally grumpy that she'd woken him up in the night but it was okay he forgave her and he liked being hugged so she kept hugging him and she had a great idea so she bounced over to the window she'd finally got back to bouncing just last week because she'd been so totally tired and it wasn't like her but sometimes even Pinkie Pie got sick and Rarity threw her that great party when she got better and that was what she was going to do!

"ANON, PONYVILLAINS!" Pinkie boomed out of her opened window. "LET US COMMENCE WITH GREAT MERRIMENT!"

A passing stallion winced, put his hoof in his ear, rubbed around, blinked, and looked up. "What was that, Pinkie?"

Pinkie Pie blinked back. Huh. What was that? "WE MEANEST... UH... Hey, Ponyville! Let's have a PARTY!"

***

Applejack swayed on her hooves in front of a tree. She'd skipped breakfast. Eatin'd be takin' food away from ever'pony else, an' it'd be all her fault if Applebloom got all stunted, or Granny just plain shriveled up, or Big Mac turned into Just Mac. Her fault Sweet Apple Acres was always runnin' so low on bits. If she was as good a farmer as Ma and Pa, or as good as Granny, they'd be makin' it all year on the Zap Apple Jam alone. Or she'd be winnin' blue ribbons at the rodeos an' keepin' everything right that way.

As it was, she couldn't hardly even buck a tree right. Her hooves felt like she had an anvil tied to each one, an' they even looked it, with that dark blue fur now at the end of each leg. Jes' walking out of the house was a bigger challenge 'n the Runnin' of the Leaves, Rainbow Dash's shenanigans included. She tried, ain't nobody could say she didn't try, but she jes' couldn't get both hind legs into it. Could barely get one leg up to kick with, even. An' that was all her fault too, now even her sorry-flank job wasn't gonna get done.

Prob'ly have to set Applebloom to buckin' before she was ready now, Applejack's fault. Then her little sister'd never get her cutie mark, not stuck doin' a chore that shoulda been Applejack's if she didn't mess it all up so badly. An' Applebloom'd never forgive her for somethin' like that, an' she'd be darn right not to. Be jes' what she deserved for wreckin' the whole darn Apple family.

Ma and Pa were prob'ly regrettin' they'd ever had her in the first place. Applejack hadn't noticed when the tears started fallin' down her muzzle, but her hooves were jes' too darn heavy to lift 'em to wipe those tears off with. Her fault about Ma and Pa, too, if she thought about it, but that jes' hurt too much to think about jes' how it was her fault. She jes' knew it was. Couldn't hardly believe she'd never admitted it to herself before.

"Some Element of Honesty you are, AJ," she whispered to herself. "Can't even tell your own family you ruined ever'pony."

***

Twilight Sparkle sat in the hall between the dreams. She had no use for it, not when she sat alone, holding Luna's vigil there, but there was no reason to banish it either. She had so many other things to do. The worst things were the ones she didn't know about. They were out there, somewhere. They saw her and hated her for being there, but dared not attack. She knew, with the certainty of dreams, that if they attacked, she would know what they were and she would know one of Luna's other duties, and she might never return to the waking world. She knew that if they attacked then she would defeat them. She knew they knew it too.

There were just so many ponies dreaming, in the meantime. She couldn't see Celestia's dreams, nor Luna's, nor Lero's, nor those of her friends who had taken Luna's burden. But she could see Spike's, and of course he was dreaming of Rarity. There were so many ponies out in Appleloosa having such awful dreams, but the most frightening there were the simplest ones, the colorless dreams of nothing that taught her what she had dreamed when her mind was gone. She ached to reach out to them, but what could she do? The plague was on them, and it would pass in time, but they would have to endure until then.

A pony in Fillydelphia mourned her lost colt. She dreamed of digging into his grave with her bare hooves, digging and digging and digging forever, always knowing her son was buried somewhere below, that she just had to find him.

An elderly stallion in Seaddle lay in a hospital bed, dreaming of waking and being unable to move, unable to speak, hearing a sad song but unable to join in.

A set of twin filly foals lay against each other in a cabin in the far frozen north of the Crystal Empire, dreaming of Mommy being warm again and feeding them.

Honeydew was dreaming of a town of mares and humans, of screaming through the streets while they chased her, demanded she join the Overherd.

Her mother was dreaming of... her, and Shining Armor. Of them walking away while a grey-coated Star Sparkle mindlessly grazed grass until she died and fell unmourned and alone in a field.

A zebra colt was dreaming of her dreaming of him. Twilight felt unfamiliar magics around him. He smiled at her.

Too many would never dream again after tonight. Those were hidden from her. A part of Luna was with them.

She spoke into the empty hall as dreams flashed across her eyes.

"Dear Princess Celestia.

"Tonight I knew that I cannot help every pony in Equestria. Tonight I knew the hopes and dreams of every pony in Equestria. Tonight I knew how many ponies beg for somepony to save them from things that they must face on their own, no matter how terrible. Tonight I knew that I cannot save all the ponies who do need a savior, or even more than a few. Tonight I knew that I could not wake and know some of these things and still be Twilight Sparkle. Tonight I know that right now, I am not. In the morning I will know that I did more than I am able, and I will know that I will do it again, because somepony has to.

"Tonight I learned that there are some lessons whose teaching I could not endure. And so tonight I knew them instead of learning them, because dreams make all things possible. Tonight I learned a tiny fraction of what it is to be like you.

"Tonight I learned why Luna calls us all her little ponies. In the morning I may not know. But if I do, then I will always wear that title with the greatest pride and love possible.

"I seek and dread the day when I will learn why you call us the same.

"Your faithful student,

"Your little pony,

"Twilight Sparkle, Champion of Hidden Things."

***

Pinkie Pie hugged Gummy tightly to her chest. A conical paper hat sat atop her head. Her tent on the edge of town was empty. Three days. Three days of party and it had all been so great the whole time everypony was there and having so much fun and they were happy to be with her really they were but now they were just saying they were tired and they were going to go sleep and she wasn't going to be with them and she didn't have any more cakes ready and all the ice cream was gone too and even Madame LeFlour had made herself into a cake so she was totally all alone and even Gummy was asleep! Her mane had gone all straight again, too.

Oh! There went Rocky!

"WHERE DOST THOU THINK THOU ART GOING, BUSTER?" she demanded.

"THOU ART NAUGHT BUT A JACKANAPES!" Rocky told her. "NOPONY LIKES THY PARTIES AND THEY ONLY ATTEND THAT THEY MIGHT THUS ENJOY THE PLEASURE OF DEPARTING THEREAFTER!"

"'TIS A FOUL CALUMNY!" Pinkie insisted desperately. "WHAT BE-EST A CALUMNY?" She blinked hard and Rocky stopped being six or eight Rockies. "WE ARE HAVING SOME TROUBLE WITH THINE... YE... UM... THE TALKING THINGY-EST."

"THOU HAST NOT EVEN THE WIT TO BE DUBBED LACK-WIT, AS THUS WOULD IMPLY EXPECTATION OF WIT IN THE FIRST PLACE," Rocky firmly informed her. "NO PONY REALLY LIKES THOU."

Pinkie drooped even more as Rocky stopped talking to her. Then her hair perked up, just a bit, and her eyes widened. "WE KNOW-EST SOMEPONY WHO IS-EST NOT A PONY! CRANKY DOST NOT REALLY LIKE ANYPONY BUT MATILDA BUT HE IS-EST OUR FRIEND! CRANKY!"

The tent collapsed behind her as she left a pink blur through town. Rainbow Dash would have been proud of her.

Her hoof hammered on Cranky's door. "CRANKY! CRANKY DOODLE! WE ART GREATLY IN NEEDETH OF THY COUNSEL!" she boomed out.

A hoof tapped her on the back and she whirled and oh! There were Cranky and Matilda together and they had that expression on that usually meant somepony was going to talk slowly and evenly at her for a bit but of course Cranky wasn't a pony but she went over that already and he must be really really really fast if he'd gotten outside to talk with her before she even started knocking but maybe he had a secret donkey super power and the donkeys all had secret super powers and they were all superheroes when ponies weren't looking and he could be Dark Doodle and be able to draw things and make them real and that would be so amazing but he'd have to keep his identity a secret so she shouldn't let anyone know because telling a secret is the best way to lose a friend

"FOREVER!" she yelled. Oops, that was her own, of course she already knew that one but it wouldn't be fair to play favorites so she probably should say it a few more times later in case she'd forgotten some before but now Cranky had his really really cranky expression on but not the really really really really cranky expression so he was just a little annoyed and not actually going to yell at her and that was good because she didn't want Cranky to yell at her when nopony liked her and all hated her parties and wanted her to go away but Cranky wasn't a pony still so he could still like her, right?

"Pinkie, why are you standing outside my home and yelling?" he graveled out to her.

"WE HAVEST NO IDEA WHAT THOU ART TALKING ABOUT, GOOD CRANKY!" she told him. "WE ART BUT TALKING IN THE MANNER OF THE PERFECTLY NORMALEST!"

"Let's go inside, dear," Matilda suggested. "And Pinkie? Could you perhaps try to whisper? My ears must be getting a little sensitive."

"Oh! We are so sorry to hear that," Pinkie whispered, and Matilda and Cranky only flinched a little bit so they both must have sensitive ears because she couldn't talk much more quietly than that no way no how and Matilda smiled at her so that meant she did still like her and she wasn't all alone and going to have to go start up her own rock farm that wouldn't work because Rocky would tell all his friends and so she'd have a rock farm with rocks that hated her too and a rock farm with unfriendly rocks couldn't really farm anything at all! Anyway, they opened their door and went in and Pinkie went in with them.

"Pinkie dear, what ever is the matter?" Matilda asked gently, guiding Pinkie to a seat. She jerked her head over toward the oven, and Cranky put on a pot for some tea.

"NOPONY LIKEST US AND... and everypony thinkest our parties art-eth terrible and everypony leftesteth and we art ALL ALONE!" Pinkie threw herself against Matilda's chest and started sobbing outright.

The startled jenny hugged Pinkie and brushed a hoof over her mane. "Erm... there, there," she said.

Cranky sat down at the table and took Pinkie's hoof in his. "Pinkie," he said to her in a quiet voice. "Every pony in Ponyville is your friend, and they like you. Just because they went home after your party doesn't mean they don't like you anymore."

"Th... then what doeseth it meanest?" Pinkie sniffled.

"It means they need some time alone, Pinkie," he told her. "Some ponies need some peace and quiet. It doesn't mean they're not your friends. Some of my best friends, I haven't seen in years and years. I write letters to a dragon I once pulled carts for, and he takes naps for ten years at a time. That just makes it all the more special when I do hear back from him."

Pinkie sniffed again. Matilda presented her with a kerchief. Pinkie delicately blew into it. Matilda and Cranky exchanged a glance.

"So... It art like unto... not having a welcomest hometh party until after somepony hath gonest away for a while?" Pinkie whispered almost quietly enough to not talk over the shriek of the teapot reaching boiling.

"Something like that, dear," Matilda told her, and got up to pour the tea.

It wasn't a party. But it wasn't alone. And they let her stay with them that night so she wasn't alone then, either.

***

It wasn’t like a mostly-sunny day was supposed to be a challenge. Rainbow Dash could have probably taken care of the entire thing herself, even ‘pacing herself’ like she was supposed to. So she couldn’t see any bristle-chomping reason why it was taking the team so freaking long to get it done right! Snowflake was letting his nerves get to him and getting that cloud over there all raggedy while he positioned it, and Cloud Kicker had, sure enough, busted one apart that was supposed to be providing a nice shady patch over the market.

Yeah. She was in a bad mood. She was watching it. She’d given the team fair warning, even, and Cloud Kicker and Medley were keeping themselves on the brunt of it. They’d taken everything she’d dished out so far. It was a relief, in some ways, to know she had a solid pair of ponies like that to keep their teams in order.

In other ways it was a pain in the flank. Like when Thunderlane did that! She waited impatiently for Medley to get around to telling him to correct that obviously too-high one and get it puffy like it was supposed to be. Okay, maybe she was in a bad mood, but there was just no excuse for putting a cloud together that could turn itself into a thunderhead if it got just a bit too much extra rain on top of it!

She waited an impossibly long thirty entire seconds before she took off, with maybe just a little more force than she absolutely had to, but she’d barely been in the air enough all day to stretch her wings! And Thunderlane was tough. He could take a chewing-out. She’d probably given him a swelled head, with all that praise when she got back. He totally deserved some yelling and she was in just the mood to deliver!

***

“One regular and a quadruple espresso.”

“Have it ready before you can say... quadruple espresso!”

“Thanks, Joe.”

Lero carried both drinks back to the table. Twilight had her head down on the table. She wasn’t sleeping, not quite, but getting more than monosyllabic grunts out of her took all of Doughnut Joe’s not-inconsiderable coffee-making skills. Lero’d actually carried her from the castle this morning. Luna wasn’t responding at all during the day, but she visited freely during his dreams. It was a strange to see her in such different states.

For one thing, the dark alicorn’s body was cold. He had to bundle up outside the door to Luna’s room just to go in long enough to pile more wood on the fire. It probably wasn’t doing any more good than spraying water over Celestia had, but none of the ponies had a better idea. The windows stayed open and the pegasi were keeping the skies clear around the castle so Luna could get sunshine to help as much as possible.

He couldn’t stay in the room very long. That was something they hadn’t considered when getting the place ready for her. In the vast, high-ceilinged throne room, Celestia’s temperature had room to dissipate. In Luna’s cozier bedroom, the walls were going from ‘frosted’ to ‘ice-coated’ in a hurry. In another week or two, assuming she followed the same path as Celestia and Cadence, he ought to be able to keep watch during the day again.

But for now, Lero couldn’t stay by her side all day, and she was far too contagious for any of her loyal guards (or any other ponies) to attend to. So the guards kept watch on her through the windows and kept a chariot ready to swoop down and retrieve the tall, obvious-in-a-crowd biped if he was remotely needed, and Lero and Twilight had the days to themselves.

Lero did, anyhow, and as much of Twilight Sparkle as he could get to wake up. They’d walked right by another musical number on the way from the castle and she hadn’t so much as hummed. And she’d been needing more and more caffeine to get up in the mornings. He set the magic brew (the kind that transcended dimensions) in front of her nose. That was enough to get her eyes open, at least.

She sat up and stared at the cup. Then she groaned and rubbed her horn, then carefully picked up the quadruple espresso in both forehooves and drained it.

Lero took his first sip of his coffee. Black, which wasn’t how he usually preferred it, but somehow adding anything to Doughnut Joe’s blend felt vaguely sacriligeous. “Bad one today?” he asked, not that he had any doubt about the answer.

She groaned. “I’m debating whether it might be better to just go up and give Luna a hug so I can spend another month brainless.” She slumped back in her chair. “I think I’m learning something, at least.”

“Oh?” asked Lero, and took another sip.

Twilight smiled weakly. “Dear Viceroy Lero, today I learned that Princess Luna deserves a raise. Your faceplanting student, Twilight Sparkle.”

“I think Celestia’s giving her one every day,” Lero said, deadpan.

Twilight blinked owlishly at him, then facehoofed. “It’s way too early for puns, Lero. What time is it, anyhow?”

He checked the clock on the wall. “Almost eleven. You seemed to need the extra sleep.”

Her eyes widened. “Eleven o’clock? But now we’re never going to get to everything! I had the whole day planned! Where’s my schedule?”

Lero bent over the table and kissed her. “About four hours ago, it did a very nice job getting Luna’s fire restarted. You’re here to rest, recuperate, and relax. Playing tourists, remember? Not tour group.”

Twilight’s mane got a single hair rising out of place. Then she sagged onto the table and her mane flopped around her head. She pushed the cup over to Lero with a hoof. “I don’t even have the energy to worry about a schedule. I need another.”

“Can’t even float the cup over?” he asked sympathetically, and took it.

“Just because your hands work when you’re tired doesn’t mean the rest of us are so lucky,” she grumbled.

Lero laughed. “I bet Pinkie could give you some pointers on getting by without a horn,” he teased, and went to get her a refill.

Twilight rolled her eyes behind him. She couldn’t imagine what lessons from Pinkie Pie would be like when her horn wasn’t so sore she couldn’t make a spark. She’d been down to her hooves until midafternoon yesterday. She had a feeling she’d be lucky if she could lift her fork for dinner this time.

***

Rainbow Dash was getting seriously annoyed.

Sure, she'd been in a bad mood for a few days, and even that totally badflank helmet thingy from Luna wasn't cheering her up, but it was probably all the nightmares she must be having for Luna keeping her from sleeping well. She was handling it! She was getting in like twice as many naps as usual, she was doing Rolling Earth exercises until her hooves were falling off to wear herself out, she'd even started trying some of the lighter bits of Shattered Stone again even if she knew she couldn't really pull them off right. She'd gone out and got a seventeen on Twilight's wingpower thingy, even, so even Lyra had to admit she was okay again. She should be making everypony in town cheer for her, doing the most mega-awesome-amazingtacular stunts ever!

Instead she'd made two of her pegasi cry and Cloud Kicker and Medley both ganged up on her and told her to get her flank out of the clouds until she was Rainbow Dash again instead of whoever she'd turned into.

That was very, very not cool. Not of them. They were looking out for the weather team. That was like one of the gutsiest things she'd ever seen them do, even more than when they led the flanks redirecting that lightning storm that came in from Cloudsdale at twice the speed and six times the density it was supposed to. She had the best weather team anypony could ask for, and that included having assistant weather coordinators who'd tell their boss when she was screwing up.

It was so not cool of her to be making them do that. Her hooves still itched to go back and pound the two of them into little clouds of feathers. She could totally take them both at once and they knew it. They knew it so hard. She knew like a gazillion different ways to take them apart, and they stood their airspace and told her anyhow. She might be ticked off for no good reason, but she had to respect that kind of loyalty.

But that left her with nothing to do to get rid of her frustration. Solo workouts weren't cutting it. She needed something to hit. So she'd figured out a way to do that and not end up with the Guard chasing her down. Time to go learn a new style. The ancient farmpony art of Kick Stuff So Hard The Fruit Falls Off. And fortunately for her, she had a friend who'd probably be perfectly happy to teach her, and then she could spend the day kicking trees instead of ponies. She'd even put up with having to wear earth pony shoes for the day for that.

***

Applejack looked up. Well, that rainbow streak headed her way was familiar. Prob'ly comin' to tell her she'd ordered too much rain an' there wasn't any left for th' rest of th' year so she'd messed that up, too. She couldn't remember the last thing she'd done right. An' ever'pony was jes' too polite t' tell her. It was all her fault. Everythin'. An' with her hooves so dang heavy, she couldn't even run away proper so they'd at least stop havin' her wreck everythin'.

"Hey, AJ!" Rainbow Dash called, and hovered overhead. Didn't even want ta get her hooves on the same farm as her. Applejack didn't blame her for it.

"Look, I've been in a real mood for days now, and I could really use something to do where I kick stuff a lot and don't get arrested. I was kinda thinking maybe I could lend you a hoof today? Like, learn how to buck trees with you? I'm not saying you need help, I'm saying I need something to do, so I'm asking you for a favor, not offering to help, right?"

A pegasus sayin' she wanted to learn to buck trees. Rainbow Dash buckin' trees. Gal could probably fly around an' pick 'em all with her teeth faster'n Applejack could buck 'em anyhow. Now that was jes' mockin' her. She prob'ly deserved it. Runnin' the farm so bad even a pegasus could see it. But at least it meant she wasn't hidin' her true feelin's anymore. Meant Applejack could go ahead an' get herself what she deserved an' not worry about a friend gettin' hurt doin' it.

"Featherbrain," AJ told her, doin' everythin' she could to get her to jes' quit messin' around an' do it already. "Flyin' airhead ain't got what it takes ta buck a tree. If Ah wanted a pegasus to give that a try, Ah'd go t' Derpy first. At least she wouldn't get bored an' fly off 'fore th' first branch was done."

***

Rainbow Dash stared down at the farmpony. That came so far out of the stratosphere she had nothing ready for it. That wasn't just uncool. That was... that was just plain mean. That was Honeydew levels of racism, only not aimed at Lero. That was...

That was betraying everything their friendship was.

The yellow stripe on her cutie mark turned red.

***

"Y'all might as well jes' go on back to Cloudsdale anyhow!" Applejack pressed. Jes' a little more an' she'd do it, she knew that. Give her what she had comin' to her. Then it'd all be over an' done with an' ain't nopony would have to live with her mess-ups ever again. "Ponyville did jes' fine without you hangin' around, an' all you ever wanna do is leave anyhow, go join them stupid Wonderbolts an' spend yer life pretendin' y'all can fly!"

The first hoof hit her in the jaw and knocked her sideways. A bright streak of nothin' but red hung in the air, an' some sorta red mist was comin' out of Rainbow Dash's eyes. Applejack didn't care. Jes' somethin' else prob'ly her fault. "That all you got, filly? An' here Ah thought you were a fighter," she said.

Hooves and teeth came at her so fast she couldn't see 'em. Applejack got knocked up onto her hind legs, bounced backward offa a tree, an' then a red whirl was all around her, with hooves an' wings hittin' her every which way. She felt a kick hittin' her rear an' breakin' her tailbone. All four legs got hit. Real clean, too, three kicks an' a wing an' then four broken cannons. Bitten shoulders an' ears. Kicks in th' face, one right near her left eye an' she felt somethin' give around there that ain't supposed to move. Buncha ribs. Three kicks in a row that caught 'er square where a mare don't like to get kicked even more'n usual.

She hit th' ground. There were tears of pain comin' out her eyes, an' one eye not lookin' where it was supposed to, but it wasn't all she had comin' to her. Not by a long shot. A hoof came down on her right forehoof an' she felt that hoof split to the frog.

"Ap... Applejack?" came that raspy voice, mockin' her, pretending to be confused, hatin' her like she deserved, finally. "Applejack! You're hurt! What just happened?"

No. That wasn't the right voice. But Applejack knew just what truth she could say to get her to finish the job.

"Freak."

A blur of red light was the last thing she saw.

***

"APPLEJACK!" screamed Rainbow Dash. AJ was seriously messed up. Legs were not supposed to bend that way, sometimes Pinkie aside. There was blood and there was... there was...

Rainbow Dash thought as fast as she flew, sometimes. She thought how long it would take to get an ambulance from the hospital to Sweet Apple Acres. She thought how long it looked like Applejack was going to last after... after whoever had done this to her. The numbers didn't work out. She thought how long it'd take her to fly to the hospital and how bad she'd hurt AJ doing it, and how quickly the hospital could heal her of that extra damage.

She hooked her forelegs under AJ's barrel and took off as fast as her wings could fly her. Almost. She didn't think AJ would survive a Rainboom. That snap of air breaking was rough. But she came close.

She landed so hard her hooves left skidmarks on the ground, and she bucked the doors off their hinges racing inside, carrying her friend. "EMERGENCY! EMERGENCY! SOMEPONY HELP!" she screamed. There was a time for cool and there was a time for saving Applejack's life and she would wear black horn-rimmed glasses and a pocket protector for the rest of her life if that would help save Applejack's life.

Fortunately, it didn't come to that. The nurse at the desk took one look at Applejack and hit a button. There was a lot of yelling and a lot of rushing around, and while normally Rainbow Dash was good at those, medical yelling and rushing around somehow made it all a lot more intense. The last she saw of Applejack, the farm mare was on a gurney being wheeled into the operating room, with tubes going into her and doctors trying to hold her legs so they didn't move.

The nurse at the desk said something to Rainbow Dash and held out a clipboard, but Dash swatted her hoof away without listening. "No time. Gotta go find whoever did this," she said, and took off out of the room.

"I am gonna find whoever did this to you, AJ, and I am gonna leave her in so much hurt she's gonna wish she'd beat herself up instead of you, Applejack," she vowed through her furious tears.

Her trail turned red behind her.

***

Discord, utterly reformed Spirit of Chaos, friend to all things pony and non, sophisticated gentledracoequus of means, was behaving himself with perfect decorum, as of course he always did, a few minor misunderstandings between friends aside. He certainly wasn't doing anything that would remotely bother either of the joyless, humorless rulers of Equestria, and most certainly wouldn't cause anything but a warm, inviting smile to cross the face of that lovely little pony Fluttershy. He was helping, really! Not even in the long run. Just a year or so and they'd really appreciate the versatility of the new crops. Once they figured out how to pen them in properly and keep them fed.

At any rate, he had just finished revolutionising Equestrian agriculture, ensuring that all the hungry little fillies and colts and chicks and pups and whatever minotaurs chose to call their offspring, he thought it was probably calves but he couldn't be bothered to find out for sure, but at any rate ensuring a fine and well-fed future for all of them. And then he felt something that once upon a time when he had been in a particularly poor mood he might have taken some moderately antisocial amusement in feeling. While he of course felt nothing but compassion at the thought of a fight between two of the Bearers of those BLASTED ELEMENTS OF HARMONY, it naturally occurred to him that he ought to investigate the matter and see if he might not resolve any lingering bad feelings over what was sure to be a simple quarrel and certainly did not by any means have the distinctive piquancy of that rarest of rare things in this peaceful land, an outright equicidal rage.

It was with altogether surprise, then, that he found himself quite viciously and, for once, honestly, unprovokedly assaulted upon arrival in the skies over Ponyville! He saw one of his most absolute favorite of all pegasi approaching, one of unfailingly gentle and forgiving disposition suitable to be a fellow friend of Fluttershy, and summoned onto himself a top hat, white coat, and cane, and prepared to deliver a clever bon mot by way of greeting. He then suffered the indignity of several really well-done blows to the face, his hat yanked down over his head, the cane yanked from his grip and used to strike him with brutish force in the midsection, and a quite expertly-executed spinning back kick for a finale.

Discord then snapped the digits of his bear paw, and his uncouth assailant was neatly shrunk to the size of a fly and captured inside a jar, while Discord's own discomforts were promptly erased. He bore his new captive no ill-will whatsoever, being as mentioned not too long ago a friend to all things pony, and so rather than take some sort of cackling villainous revenge secure in the knowledge that RAINBOW DASH SERIOUSLY DESERVED TO FIND OUT WHY PONIES SHOULD KNOW BETTER THAN TO ATTACK A SPIRIT OF CHAOS WITH THEIR BARE HOOVES, he politely conversed with her instead.

"Why, my dear friend Rainbow Dash!" he said, while bunnies romped in the meadows below and all the rubbish of that sort. "You seem ever so perturbed! What could possibly be the matter?"

"Durrr, me mad," the eloquent little pegasus told him. "Some pony beat up apple pony! Me get revenge!"

This of course made Discord very sad, because ponies with lusts for revenge in their equine hearts was something a reformed Spirit of Chaos could never encourage. Particularly ones who could read back and find out exactly what had happened, and so knew that the angry little pony was herself the one who had caused such terrible hurts to her friend. And so he tried to encourage her to find a friend who could help her calm down.

"Oh, little Rainbow Dash," he told her, "It sounds very much to me like you should go see Lyra Heartstrings."

And before he could explain further, that furious little misguided pony let out a scream of rage and shattered the magical glass bottle that had thus far resisted all efforts at marking it, let alone escaping, and somehow restored herself to her usual size and strength, and flew off under the unfortunate assumption that Discord had meant that Lyra Heartstrings was responsible for the injuries to poor, sweet, dear little Applejack, not that Rainbow Dash should ask her herdmate for assistance in learning to control the alicorn rage she was so clearly bearing.

It really was quite a pity that Discord had a very important meeting unscheduled at some indeterminate other location, or he might have been able to catch up, explain further and prevent Rainbow Dash from getting her multicolored tail handed to her as she so richly, richly deserved by a pony who was much, much, much better than her at beating ponies into small whimpering piles of broken bones on the ground.

HA.

***

Unlike Discord, Lyra Heartstrings was prepared. She had, after all, been living with Rainbow Dash. A pegasus with limited flight was a grouchy pony at the best of times, Fluttershy aside. Rainbow Dash with limited flight was a stomping, irritable ball of anger. And that was before Luna did whatever it was Luna had done. Now she could fly, but she'd been snarling like a timberwolf constantly. Lyra had her suspicions about exactly what burdens Rainbow Dash was carrying for Luna, but so far her lead mare had done a surprisingly good job at keeping herself under control, for a pony who'd never been able to tolerate the simple meditation requirements of master ranks in any of her various schools.

Seeing Rainbow Dash flying at high speed from Sweet Apple Acres carrying a clearly demolished Applejack gave Lyra a very large clue as to what to do next. Her armor wasn't in town yet and probably wouldn't do her much good anyhow. She needed to find a place where she could take Rainbow Dash down without anypony else getting hurt. With that mare's speed and strength, any place with ponies around was going to have innocent bystanders. She knew just the place. Rainbow Dash might appreciate it too. The edge of the Everfree. Right around where Fluttershy found Lero.

How to get Rainbow Dash's attention was much easier than she'd expected. She'd thought she'd have to initiate the fight, blast her at range in midair. Having that bright red bolt in the air coming at her got rid of step one. The sky was still red behind her. A monochromatic Rainboom, powered by a thousand years' bottled-up fury, starting from a time of war to begin with. A Sonic Rageboom. And coming at her at those speeds.

Lyra settled into place. There was no point tensing, no point putting up a guard. If Dash came within ten feet of her, the backwash from her speed alone would be enough to send her into a tree, even if Lyra blocked. She had no intention of letting Rainbow Dash get within ten feet of her.

Anger is useful in a fight. It provides strength, determination and a certain numbness to pain. Anger is a hazard in a fight. It destroys stillness, erases subtlety, causes foolish mistakes. Rainbow Dash was coming at her in a straight line, not jinking, not twisting, not making herself anything but a target. Even at those speeds, Lyra could lead her easily. A simple sharp tweak to the left wing should break the bone and cause her to crash instantly. With any luck, Lyra could get her to a hospital in time to save her life and find out why she killed Applejack. And then explain to Applejack's family that their scion's murderer had a pre-emptive pardon from Princess Luna.

Lyra's spell vanished without effect into the maelstrom of pegasus magics surrounding Rainbow Dash's wings. She did not panic. She had prepared for that eventuality. She cast again, a simple sharp-edged yank driven directly into Rainbow Dash's nostrils. No pony could keep from reflexively turning her head under such a sudden, surprise pain, and that would cause Rainbow Dash to veer straight into the ground. Rainbow Dash's nostril tore open. Blood streamed back from the wound down her cheek. She did not deviate from her course at all.

Calm can make foolish mistakes sometimes too. Lyra barely had time to throw herself backward and put up her forelegs in front of her in a simple block that any yellow-belted novice could have matched.

Rainbow Dash's hooves crashed into her with horrific force. Lyra felt bones snap in both legs and her shoulders. Rainbow Dash's hooves struck through to her chest as well, and Lyra felt ribs break like twigs. She was flung backward into the trunk of a tree. She saw stars when her head hit, but did not lose consciousness. She fell forward and screamed when she hit her broken bones, and fell to her side.

She saw the red streak loop around. The next blow would kill her. She had no choice.

She hoped she was as good as Rainbow Dash thought she was.

Two precision strikes to the carotid artery. Too little and she'd shrug it off and Lyra would be dead. Too much and she'd sever them, and Rainbow Dash would be dead. Just right and she'd be out like a light.

Rainbow Dash's limp form smashed through branches and leaves and still left a trail of torn earth behind her. Lyra couldn't tell if she was dead or just nearly so.

Lyra forced herself to turn her head, screaming twice from the pain, and then began sending magical flares into the air with all the power she could muster, until she passed out.

Author's Note

It should be noted that getting two spells off and still having time to put up a block is itself a well-nigh legendary feat, even if it didn't work. And being able to cast in that much pain is an impressive display as well. Lyra is a Grandmaster for a reason.

Chapter 3: Recovery

Lero was helplessly clinging to Luna's side, the two of them laughing so hard they were crying.

"And then!" gasped out Luna when she could find a breath. "And then I said to Tia, I said, 'Oh, that must have been the Alfalfa Monster!'"

Lero let out a fresh whoop and fell to the ground, slapping it with his palm. Luna fell over onto her back, hugging herself with her wings and wailing with laughter herself. It took ages for them to settle, both flopped on their backs.

"What did she do to get you back?" asked Lero, while Chancellor Puddinghead and Commander Hurricane walked by, arguing about Clause Seven of the Unification Protocols.

Luna waved a hoof. "Oh, she was always lacking in her creativity for pranks. Willing, but the true spark of genius was never hers. But she tried, and she had her confidants who gave her suggestions. She arranged to start a rumor that I was going into a once-in-a-hundred-years heat and sought some way to sate myself without the service of a stallion. This was long before the invention of the modern cooler, you understand. And so the Night Court was clogged with hopeful inventors with their bevy of devices of exceptionally personal nature." She giggled. "That did not last long. I told them, 'Fools! 'Tis not the moon that suffers from heat! To the Day Court with you!'" She giggled harder. "And she will never if she burns a trillion years admit it, Lero, but I do believe that Tia kept one!" And she broke down in hilarity again.

Lero was back to howling with laughter as well, and dream or not, his chest was hurting.

Luna nudged him with a hoof, mischief twinkling in her eyes. "I have not told her of your dream of her, of course."

Lero blinked away tears of laughter, then sat up. "My dream of her? I don't remember one."

Luna's smile grew wider. "Oh, you do not?"

Lero leaned away. "I'm guessing it's at least not a nightmare?"

Luna's teeth were very, very bright as she smiled. Lero wondered briefly if Luna might somehow be one of Pinkie Pie's ancestors. "Oh, no, Lero. Not a nightmare at all! I had no idea you thought of my sister that way!"

Lero's face fell. "You're kidding."

Luna could not possibly have been smiling that widely outside of a dream. "And such an exotic outfit, too!"

"An... outfit," Lero repeated. He put his hand to his face. "I probably don't want to know, but what was I wearing?"

He could feel her smiling. "Did I say it was your outfit?"

Lero attempted to dig a hole and hide in it. If Luna had allowed it, he probably could have. "What was she wearing, then?" he asked anyway.

"A home-made Daring Do outfit, of course!" Luna rolled onto her back again, clutching at her barrel. "Ink on her horn! Such an expression! Priceless! A prize beyond measure! I shall have it commissioned in glass and a thousand years from now have it secretly installed, and see how long it takes her to notice!"

Lero groaned and put his other hand to his face too. "Aren't there laws about dream privacy in this country?"

Luna pulled him against her side, still chortling. "Strangely enough, I have somehow never gotten around to making any," she cheerfully informed him.

***

Rarity concentrated carefully on her stitchwork. Every thread needle-pulled by horn for this particular dress; even her trusty sewing machine simply could not be given the charge of ensuring that everything was utterly perfect. This was the most important outfit she had ever designed. This was the outfit that any mare from Rainbow Dash to Fleur De Lis to Princess Celestia herself would beg to try on, and she would smile graciously at them and decline, and all of Canterlot society would be crawling at her hooves to beg her to attend all their noble functions, and she would pick and choose, and her dress would stand alone, sole owner of the very concept of fashion for all time to come! But, really, most important of all... it would be her dress.

The design alone had taken two days, and the stitching would take at the very least another week to do properly. Her customers would understand, she was sure. After all, the muse was upon her!

And this dress was for her. Surely they'd see.

"Rarity?"

They'd see if she ever could finish it, with all these interruptions.

"Your sister is working, Sweetie Belle," Rarity sang out to her, not taking her eye off of the stitching line.

"My brush is stuck, Rarity! Pleeeeease?"

Rarity sighed and set the needle down, then turned.

And promptly shrieked, pulled over her nearest fainting couch, and sprawled upon it. When she had gathered herself, she sat up and breathed, "Oh, Sweetie, what has happened to your mane?"

Her adorable little sister's pink and purple curls had turned themselves into something resembling a mix between Rainbow Dash's constantly windswept style, if style it could be called when really it was a deliberate lack of proper style in the name of 'coolness,' and Pinkie Pie's impossible tangles. Her brush was the least that was stuck in it; sticks and leaves and a straw were caught up in it as well.

"You said it was okay," Sweetie protested, and batted at the handle of her brush.

Rarity's eyes widened. "When did I ever say such a thing? And what happened?"

Sweetie came over to present the brush to Rarity. Rarity began carefully untangling her sister's hair from the brush, and feared she might have to employ her scissors. "Yesterday, when I came back from being Cutie Mark Crusaders Mane Stylists, you said it was just fine. Then this morning when I asked you to help me wash it, you said it looked stunning. You didn't even look!"

Rarity let go of the brush, and pulled Sweetie Belle up against her quietly. She looked at that hideous manestyle. She looked up at her dress.

"Sweetie, have I been acting strangely?"

"You let me do this," she pointed out. "And you told Spike he could have all the ice cream two days ago when he asked."

Rarity swallowed. "I am so, so sorry, Sweetie Belle. I... fear I have been paying you less attention than you deserve. I've simply had this... inspiration, and you do know how I am when that happens."

Sweetie leaned against Rarity's side. "It's okay, Rarity. I know you have lots to do for work." She turned to smile hopefully up at her sister's face. "When you finish it, can I have one like it?"

The word 'NO' with a great many exclamation points surged to Rarity's throat. She quashed it down with a tremendous lack of mercy.

"Of course you can, Sweetie," she promised. "I will always, always share everything with you."

Sweetie looked up higher. "Rarity? What happened to your horn?"

Rarity hugged her. "Princess Luna asked me to do something for her, Sweetie. It seems to have changed the color of my horn. Temporarily, I'm sure."

"No, no, you told me that," Sweetie said. "Just now. Look at it! It's all sparkly."

Rarity looked blankly down at her, then floated a mirror over. Instead of deep, inky blackness, it was a translucent deep blue, with tiny points of light that moved slowly within. She touched her horn with a hoof. Then she sent magic through it and really felt it, this time.

"I think perhaps you've helped me do something wonderful, Sweetie," she said softly. "Is Spike here?"

"He's upstairs, taking a hot bath," the little filly said. "Do you want me to get him?"

"If you would be so kind, dear," Rarity said.

"SPIIIIIIIIKE! RARITY WANTS YOU!" Sweetie Belle yelled at the top of her lungs.

There was a large amount of crashing and banging upstairs, and then a wet dragon with a towel wrapped around him came tumbling down the stairs, ending up on his back looking worshipfully up at Rarity. He scrambled to get to his feet, and with exceptionally belated efforts at suavity asked, "Is there anything I can do for you, ladies?"

Rarity smiled at him. He really was so very adorable, too. And so much stronger than he showed, when he had to stand on his own.

"Spike, did I tell you about my dream recently? The one where Luna asked Twilight and the rest of us to help her with something, and I woke up with my horn turned black?"

"And you made it look so good," he said dreamily, then blinked and gaped. "Wow! Did... did you polish it or something? That looks amazing!"

Rarity laughed and pulled Spike up onto her fainting couch with Sweetie, and hugged them both. "You always know just what to say, Spike. But I need to ask you for some advice."

"Anything for you," he breathed, still staring at her horn.

"I believe I have been... chosen to carry a portion of Luna's burden that you might be uniquely qualified to help with, Spike," she said softly. "Once upon a time, Princess Luna wanted, for reasons she thought were good enough at the time, distraught as she was, to have all Equestria and all its ponies be hers and hers alone."

"All of Equestria?" Spike said in a small voice.

"All of it," Rarity confirmed. "And that part of her, she feared might cause harm while she suffers the plague. I can feel her magic in me now, and if you and Sweetie will help me..." She trailed off and closed her eyes, trying to encapsulate the enormity of it all. "Spike... How do you deal with it? I know it's, well, somewhat of a sensitive subject, and I hate to bring it up, but the situation has become rather critical. Luna is counting on me to carry this for her, and I'm simply not sure I can. She wanted all of Equestria for her own. How can I resist that kind of greed?"

Spike looked down at the floor. His scaly little shoulders shook as he wrestled with some hidden demon. And then he looked back to her.

"By caring more about somepony else than you do about yourself."

She pulled him into a tight hug against herself. Tears ran down her cheeks, and she whispered, "Oh, Spike..."

***

Pinkie Pie sat in the kitchen of Sugarcube Corner curled up into a ball and whimpering to herself. Alone. All alone. All alone. The Cakes were getting groceries. They took the baby Cakes with them. Gummy was in his watery bed. She was all alone. Alone. All alone. Alone.

She couldn't wait ten years for Cranky's dragon friend to wake up and write her a letter. That was waaaaaaay too long. It was already the longest ten minutes of her entire life. And she was alone. All alone. Nopony was really her friend after all. Nopony liked her. She was by herself. Just herself.

Her head snapped up. By herself. Of course! She could be by herself and she knew she liked herself at least most of the time and if she had enough of herself then she'd never be lonely again and then everything would be one hundred percent okie-dokie-loki all the time and she knew just how to do it! She was in too much of a hurry for bouncing so she galloped instead and she'd totally make up for not opening the door first but the Cakes knew how that worked and Mrs. Cake had done it that one time too when she tried one of Pinkie's cupcakes with hot sauce so they kept a backup door in the basement for just such an occasion!

The Mirror Pool! Sure they weren't supposed to use it and Twilight put that big rock over it but Pinkie was an earth pony and even if she didn't work on a farm all day like Applejack she was still strong and she broke right through that door just fine so she should be able to shove a big rock out of the way or she could maybe dig around it or maybe she could get Rocky to talk him into moving for her or something even if Rocky didn't like her anymore either but she'd figure something out! She always figured something out like that time Fluttershy brought Parasprites into town and Pinkie had saved the day even though everypony was mad at her all day and yelling at her and didn't like her and she'd saved Ponyville all on her own anyhow because it was her town even if nopony liked her and she was a good pony who did things like that!

And then she was there already because she knew right where it was and she was going to have so many Pinkie friends to be with her forever and ever and ever and ever this time only her hooves hit the rock and bounced right off without moving it one little bit and she saw all the magic stuff Twilight had done to it and her mood went all the way from totally curly to saggystraight with nothing in the middle.

She couldn't move that rock. It wasn't just dropped into place. It was sealed in with magic, hard. It was anchoring all the ground around it so nothing could get around it either. She might not even have been able to get in even if half of Ponyville had been down there talking about secrets all at once. Maybe. Twilight was good. Really good.

She tried kicking the rock anyway because she had planned on moving it and she didn't have any other ideas yet and nothing else was coming to her mind except for sitting down and crying and she'd done that before and this time Cranky and Matilda weren't here and they'd left her all alone too so they didn't like her either they were just being polite because they were nice donkeys and she didn't tell anyone about their secret super powers because she was a good pony even if nobody liked her so maybe they weren't even being polite to be nice but because they thought she wasn't a good pony and might tell their secret and that made her sad and now she did sit down and cry.

Sitting down to cry helped for a little bit, and then at some point she got up and started to run even though she was still crying. She didn't know where she was running, but her legs wanted to run because there was something bad nearby and running was what ponies were supposed to do when bad things were nearby, even brave ponies who were heroes of Equestria that nopony liked anymore.

She stopped running and crying, but only because of the cockatrice.

She kept trying, only now she was trying to scream too.

***

Lero sat on the wooden bench staring blankly forward. Twilight was laying across his lap, her head down. Rarity's letter was barely staying in his hand.

Dear Bellerophon and Twilight Sparkle,

I do hope Canterlot is doing well, now that that dreadful plague has moved along. The few cases remaining in Ponyville are well on their way to recovery, and the town itself has come through swimmingly. Spike informs me that there was a brief moment of worry about the town's fiscal outlook, what with the unexpected expenses and all, but Princess Celestia has apparently paid off some long-forgotten debt owed to Town Hall and everything is looking positively rosy in that regard now.

I positively abhor being the bearer of bad news, but I fear I must, and isn't it better to hear these things from a friend? I'm terribly sorry to have to inform you, but both Lyra and Rainbow Dash are in Ponyville General Hospital, along with Applejack. Nopony knows quite what happened, but it seems Applejack suffered some sort of severe accident and was rescued by Rainbow Dash, gallantly flying her across town with her customary loyalty and skill. I'm afraid I was inattentive at the time, but Spike and Sweetie Belle tell me that there was an all-red Rainboom shortly thereafter, and then Lyra sent flares up from the edge of the Everfree.

The best guess anyone in town has offered thus far is perhaps somewhat worrisome, Lero. Mayor Mare has put in a request to Canterlot for an expanded Guard contingent. We really don't know, but the speculation at the moment is that, given where Rainbow Dash and Lyra were, well, perhaps the unknown assailants who were responsible for your own arrival in Equestria may have assaulted Applejack as well, and that the town's pre-eminent martial experts pursued the perpetrators and drove them off, suffering their own injuries in the process.

The good news is that everypony is expected to make a full recovery, in time. Naturally the hospital is not providing any further details on precisely what their injuries are.

I have some other news you may wish to share with Princess Luna as well. With the help of my darling sister and Spike, I have identified which portion of Luna's burden is mine to bear, and I believe I shall be able to endure with their ongoing aid. If to be an alicorn is to harbor such powerful passions and urges, my respect for our beloved princesses attains new heights.

I promise, I shall attend faithfully to our injured friends, as much so as the hospital will permit, and I shall send word when I have any more information for you. Lero, Twilight, they are going to be all right. You must attend to Princess Luna and to Princess Luna's duties, I am entirely sure of that. Be strong.

With love and friendship,

Rarity

***

Fluttershy happily pranced through the fringe of the Everfree. Oh, such a wonderful, brave, talented pegasus she was! Going so far out of her way into such a very dangerous place all to help her friends, who needed her, as of course they always did, but sometimes they recognized it moreso than others. Poor poor Applejack! The hospital still wouldn't say just what happened to her, but Dew Care, the hospital's potion expert, had asked Fluttershy if she had any cockatrice venom. That wasn't the sort of thing Fluttershy tended to keep around her cottage, where all of her perfect little animal friends might accidentally get into it and have all sorts of trouble. So off she went without a second thought to go fetch some!

And the only place to get it was the Everfree Forest, which wasn't really such a bad little forest, it just needed somepony to take care of it all properly. With a week or two of really buckling down and concentrating, she was sure she could have the entire place all cozy and happy. But first, the cockatrice. She knew just where she could find one, and he already knew her, so of course he knew what a wonderful pony she was and would be happy to help, the dear.

And there he was, right where she expected him! She really was so very, very good with animals. Being a cockatrice, of course, he couldn't completely be helpful, it simply wasn't in his nature. So with utterly sublime grace, she picked up a stick and smacked him just so on the back of the head. Not enough to knock him out, but more than enough to lay him flat on the ground where she could put a hoof on his back and Stare at him upside-down. It wasn't a terribly common bit of knowledge, but a cockatrice's adorable power to turn things to stone only worked right side up! But she knew that, of course, because she was Fluttershy, and she knew simply everything important there was to know about all her animal friends, even the grouchy ones like this particular cockatrice.

Milking his venom gland into a vial was no trouble at all, once she'd given him a good Stare, and she had far more than enough for whatever Dew Care might need, she was sure. So to make sure there were no hard feelings, because she couldn't leave such a cute little creature mad at her, she had a lovely conversation with the cockatrice when she was done.

He wasn't happy about being hit in the head, and Fluttershy completely forgave him for being so unreasonable, and suggested that perhaps if he was the teeniest bit friendlier to ponies, he might improve himself ever so slightly. She thought he was amenable to that idea, and of course he would be, because she was just the most diplomatic pony Equestria had ever seen. If only she weren't always so busy taking care of her animal friends, and all of Ponyville, really, why, she could probably have done a little diplomatic tour for Princess Celestia and resolved any little foreign policy issues that the princess hadn't been able to deal with on her own.

He warmed up to her after a little bit of coaxing, and she knew he would, and told her about a strange pink thing that ran into him just the day before. It was making all sorts of noise and running very quickly, and it had given it a very good stoning to make it very clear to any other fast noisy pink things not to bother cockatrices anymore.

Fluttershy was a very clever pony, and she knew Pinkie Pie was missing, so she asked the cockatrice to lead her back to the pink thing, and of course he obliged her very simple request. And sure enough, there was Pinkie Pie, turned to stone in full gallop. And that simply wouldn't do, so she politely asked him to turn her back, and he was so kind now that he knew her that he did. And then Pinkie was perfectly all right, and even suitably grateful for being saved!

"FLUTTERSHY!" she wailed out, much more loudly than she really needed to, but Fluttershy was used to ponies doing that all the time and wouldn't dream of commenting on it at all. "THOU HAST SAVEDEST US! THOU ART OUR FRIEND! PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE DON'T LEAVEST US!"

That must have been very scary for her, being held in stone like that! Fluttershy of course gave her an incredibly perfect hug and told her just what she needed to hear. "I'm here with you." She always knew just the right thing to say, even if her friends sometimes weren't bright enough to listen to her, but she always forgave them.

Pinkie hugged her very hard, too hard, really, but Fluttershy endured with her usual utter grace and stunning beauty. The pink pony was crying, and Fluttershy was far too humble to think for more than a moment that it was tears of sheer delight at being in her presence. No, no, those could come later. She was still so obviously traumatized and needed the sort of tender loving care that only Fluttershy could really provide.

So off they went to Fluttershy's cottage, and Pinkie joined all of Fluttershy's animal friends in being taken good care of. Pinkie was always so happy to have all of Fluttershy's animal friends around, and Fluttershy simply adored how well Pinkie had learned to listen, always nodding and agreeing so fervently with everything Fluttershy had to tell her about her most favorite subject in the world.

That being Fluttershy, of course. Nothing else could possibly compare.

***

Luna danced across the endless fields of ice. It was a dream, and it was her dream, and she didn't have to share with anypony, she didn't have to worry about tending to other dreams, or have any regrets at all about the ponies who needed help. She wasn't supposed to be taking care of all that right now, her sister's Faithful Student was doing it for her. Oh, she'd have to do something wonderful to thank Twilight later! A party, perhaps. Canterlot hadn't seen a proper party in far too long. Even the Gala was nothing but a boring ball these days, so depressing to see that Luna hadn't even bothered to attend, and once the Gala was her domain.

Her skates sang with her as she moved, a wordless, joyous, endless note of freedom. A long, sweeping curve, then a tight curl there, and she leaped to begin the next line. She could have flown, of course, and she had flown more in her dreams these last few weeks than in all the time since Twilight Sparkle and her friends had saved her from her own darkness the first time. And now they were relieving her of the last dregs of it, those lingering troubles that she was working through on her own, freeing her from herself once more. It was like being a filly again, carefree, happy, secure in the knowledge that she could do no wrong, that others were taking care of everything for her.

Most everything, at least. There were other duties, and she had parts of herself tending to those. The Field of Foals would not be truly empty for a long, long time, and she could not possibly have given up her compassion and her sorrow without breaking herself, but even that part of her was able now to play with them, not simply watch and weep. Beautiful things, even ones that never had a chance to dance beneath the moon, deserved to be celebrated for what they were. And there were the other duties.

But the core of her, the Luna that was at the heart of her, sweet star-dancing Moonshine, that was free. The night danced with her, shadows that comforted woes and cooled unbearable heat, concealed away worries and cared for wounds. She leaped again, a single tight curl and then out again, a series of stutter-steps with the blades below her hooves.

There. Now to see it.

She spread her wings and lifted into the sky above her private world of perfect ice, and looked down. Yes. It was just right.

There, she and her sister raised their heads together and led the united tribes in the true Song of Harmony, a song that had endured without ever really ending, even if the ponies only saw it now and then.

There, the sun and moon loved the world between them.

There, seven brave mares and their alien friend waved to her.

And the last. An abstract, almost, a stallion she almost but could not quite remember. But she knew his name. Sable Shield. She knew she loved him, but her dream did not remind her who he was. Only that he was important to her and she would remember later.

She hid that dream away in a secret special place with the precious few others she had chosen to keep. She was waxing now, still a sliver but waxing, but one day she would wane, and perhaps be darkened again, and then she would need those dreams once more.

***

Rainbow Dash looked up at the white ceiling tiles. She felt very distant. Her whole body felt sluggish. She could turn her head, so she did. Huh. That wasn't a normal hospital bed. She spent enough time in one last time to know what they looked like. This one was a lot heavier and had her legs cuffed to it. She gave a lazy tug and saw how her hooves didn't move at all. Wow, that was a weird bed.

There were a bunch of tubes in her, too. She must really be messed up. She didn't remember running into any mountains. She'd have to go find where she hit. There was probably like a crater ten feet deep. That'd be kind of awesome.

After a while her head started feeling a little less fuzzy. Not totally better, but not so off-floating-in-the-clouds sort of feeling. Enough to try harder to remember why she was in the hospital. Had to have been a crash. Or a fight? Maybe a fight. Had she ticked off Twilight really hard? No, she was in Canterlot. There weren't many ponies who could mess her up like this. Ganged up on? Jumped? Even then she probably could fly away. And that didn't explain why she was bound to the bed. Both left legs broken, yeah, maybe those needed to be held still, but why the right?

She found enough concentration to explore the room. She was sharing it with somepony. What the hay happened to Applejack?

Wait, she remembered that. She'd been going to Sweet Apple Acres and...

... and Applejack was there, hurt. So AJ was alive and getting healed. That was good. Looked like a lot of broken bones and a big patch over half of her face, and a bunch of hoofmarks on her, but the doctors were good with that kind of stuff. So she'd saved AJ. Good. And then... then she'd flown off to look for whoever beat up AJ, right? So... maybe she found them. And got pounded herself. That made sense. Yeah. That's the kind of thing Rainbow Dash would do. She was a good friend like that.

Some nurses and doctors and stuff came by, and they fussed over her, and she really didn't pay them all that much attention. She was still pretty fuzzy. Just not as fuzzy. But whatever was making her fuzzy was wearing off when the doctors left, so they maybe turned it down.

She was starting to feel more normal, if really really sore all over, when the door opened again.

"Hey, Lyra," Rainbow Dash croaked. Her aqua herdmate was in a wheelchair with a big thick cast from chin to waist on her. An orderly was pushing her. "Somepony got you too?"

"Privacy, please," Lyra said, and the orderly nodded and backed out, closing the door. "What do you remember, Rainbow Dash?" she asked, once they were alone with Applejack.

"I found AJ beat up and got her to the hospital, then went to go find who did it," Rainbow replied. "Then it's... just sort of hazy. Were you there too? Did we get 'em?"

"You could say that," Lyra said quietly. "Can you see Applejack from your bed?"

"Well, yeah," said Rainbow. "Somepony really beat her up bad. They knew what they were doing."

"You could say that," Lyra repeated. "All four legs, her tailbone, one eyesocket, broken ribs, crushed hoof, multiple internal injuries, and somepony decided she needed to spend her next heat asking somepony to be extremely gentle."

Rainbow Dash winced. "That's a hay of a beating."

"She's a tough pony," Lyra said neutrally. "Most unicorns and pegasi couldn't hit hard enough to hurt her that much."

"So she got beat up by another earth pony?" Rainbow Dash asked incredulously. "No way they could have done all that!"

"It does seem a lot for an earth pony style to inflict," Lyra commented. "And those aren't earth pony shoes."

Rainbow Dash peered over. Pegasus vision and hearing were very good. She could see what Lyra meant. The hoofmark bruises showing through AJ's coat were way too narrow to be heavy earth pony shoes.

Rainbow Dash's eyes widened. Her heart felt like it stopped. She turned her head to stare at Lyra.

"I only know one pony who uses pegasus styles but hits like an earth pony," Lyra agreed.

Rainbow Dash's mouth hung open. She couldn't breathe. No. No way. Not possible. She couldn't have.

Lyra waited.

Rainbow Dash didn't breathe. Couldn't breathe. She couldn't have done that to AJ. It wasn't possible. Beating another pony like that in a competition was one of her worst nightmares. This? This was beyond nightmare. This was... this wasn't even on the 'uncool' scale. This was ... this was something only a monster would do.

A freak.

Lyra's ears rang from the volume of Rainbow Dash's wail. A voice designed by nature to shout across thunderstorms and from cloud to ground had a lot of power behind it. One with that kind of inner horror and despair could outblast a hurricane. She locked the door and waited.

The screams of misery eventually quieted to deep, body-wracking sobs.

"It wasn't your fault, Rainbow," she said once her voice could be heard. "You have to know that you did it, or you won't heal. But it wasn't your fault. You're carrying Luna's rage. All that anger, everything the Princess of the Night was afraid of spilling out through the dreams of everypony in Equestria, that's in you. You were controlling it. I don't know what happened to make it break, but you were carrying the anger that made Nightmare Moon for days."

Sobs were all that responded to her.

Lyra sighed softly. "I'll tell you again when you can listen, Dashie." Her horn glowed, and her clarsach floated out of the pocket on the back of her wheelchair. She strummed the strings and began to sing one of the songs Lero brought with him. Slightly adjusted. But on her own, like he would sing, without Harmony behind her.

When I think of all the wrong I've done,
I can't believe it's me that I'm talking about.
I bet the same goes for you.

There is plenty of goodness in this world
I hope some day to find it all.
I hope the same goes for you.
I hope the same goes for you.

We all need forgiveness.
I don't know how else we could get along
Without forgiveness
Without forgiveness

Sometime while Lyra was singing, the sobs ended, but only because Rainbow Dash collapsed into unconsciousness.

When she woke up, Lyra was still there.

"Are you ready to learn, Rainbow Dash?" Lyra asked her.

"Learn what?" she asked miserably. "How to hurt my friends? I already know that, don't I?"

"How to be still," Lyra said. "You have a lot of control, Rainbow Dash. More than you get credit for."

"Not enough," she choked out.

"I see the way you move," Lyra said calmly. "You guide every step, every flap of your wings. You have more control and more sheer power than any pony I have ever met. You could reach master ranks in a number of styles if you had the patience. And then you would learn more control yet."

"I never could stand for all that meditating and stuff, though," Rainbow Dash reminded her, still slumped. "I'm... I'm just too dangerous..."

"You have lots of time to learn patience now," Lyra patiently continued. "As long as you wear that helmet, you are dangerous. But it will go, and you will remain. Be here now, and do what the moment allows."

Dash stayed slumped against the heavy cuffs holding her to the bed. "Okay," she said, in a very small voice. "Okay."

Lyra smiled. "Sometimes we have to fall to move forward," she said. "Close your eyes. We'll begin where all things begin. With the first breath."

***

Luna watched the clouds roll by. Not a single pegasus touched them. The wind carried them alone. The sun shone down on her with no magic to guide it. It would never be possible to move that sun. It would be like trying to squeeze the ocean. Bigger. Uncaring. Softer and harder at the same time than Equestria's sun. But still, it shared its warmth as though it cared.

"There are places like this on Equestria," she said idly. It was an idle dream. "Where the weather runs wild and if the sun is under Tia's command, it does not pay much attention to those places. No more than it notices the tops of the waves, for all it warms them too."

Lero sat next to her, his arms around his knees. He wasn't looking up at the clouds. He watched an endless wave of grains twisting in the breezes. "I should be with them," he said.

"Many a stallion has made that claim, Lero," she told him. "Few in modern times, but in other ages, stallions wept in the fields that their herds lay far from them in the tents of their armies, too soon to face battles, or returned wounded from others."

"I'm not a stallion," he said. He couldn't raise up any anger. It was an idle dream. "I should be with them."

"And instead you serve your country, as those mares did," she reminded him. "Beyond my appreciation, Lero, were you not tending to my body, I would be weaker yet than I am now. To raise and lower the moon, my sister may substitute for me in times of great need. But there are other tasks she could never take up, not and be the shining sun Equestria needs."

"Guarding the borders of the world from Cthulhu and the Great Old Ones, I'm sure," he suggested.

She was quiet for a moment, then said, "Your people are sometimes disturbing, Bellerophon. You did not know love, so you invented it. And you did not know horror, so you invented that too."

"Wait, you actually do something like that?" Lero asked. "I was joking."

"Tread lightly alongside the Princess of Dreams, Bellerophon," she said. "There are things the waking world can never know."

He looked out over the grain again. "I just want to know my girls will be all right."

She rolled over and brushed a wing against his shoulder. "They will be."

"How do you know?" he asked.

The ghost of a familiar smile rested on her face for him. "It could be called a hunch."

He looked at her smile, then up to her eyes.

"Tia and I once bore the Elements," she reminded him. "Some things leave their mark."

***

Applejack didn't want to open her eyes. She'd failed. Again. Couldn't even get that right. Now she was jes' addin' a big expensive hospital bill an' th' whole farm'd go under an' her whole family'd die an' ever'pony'd run out of food an' starve an' die next winter an' it was all her fault.

"You done feelin' sorry for yerself yet, Applejack?" she heard Granny Smith ask. "On accounta you jes' said all that out loud an' yer bein' a darn fool."

She opened her eyes. There was Granny Smith at her side. There was Big Mac next to her. There was Applebloom on Big Mac's back. And across the room, there was Rainbow Dash, lyin' in a hospital bed of her own. She couldn't see anything on the other side.

"Aw, no," Applejack groaned. "Ain't nopony s'posed to get hurt. I messed it all up again."

"Applejack, you didn't mess anything up!" Apple Bloom protested. "You're the best farmpony there ever was!"

"Ayup," agreed Big Mac.

Applejack let her eyes close rather than look at her family. Tryin' so hard to cheer her up like she didn't remotely deserve, pretendin' she wasn't a complete an' total failure at ever'thin' she'd ever done.

"Ya said that out loud again, Applejack," Granny Smith's voice said, more sharply this time.

"An' I wouldn't blame y'all if ya jes' go ahead an' disown me right now," Applejack mumbled. "Then at least y'all don't gotta pay for all this an' they can jes' toss me out."

Something warm pressed against the end of her nose. She opened her eyes. Granny Smith was bendin' over her bed, muzzle-to-muzzle with her. Fires were burnin' in dark red eyes.

"You. Tell. Me. That. Again," she demanded, bitin' off every word like it was a nail to chew on. "You tell me, Applejack, that you believe jes' one word of that hogwash. You tell me an Apple ain't worth her family. You tell me Sweet Apple Acres ain't the best farm in all Equestria. You. Just. Tell. Me."

Applejack looked into those eyes. The one she could see, at any rate. Her jaw worked.

"Ah'm sorry," she whispered. "Ah... Ah know it ain't true. Ah know it." She swallowed. She could feel tears runnin' down her face, and she could see them on her kin too. "Ah cain't stop. Ah cain't stop believin' it. Ah cain't stop thinkin' it. Ah cain't stop, Ah cain't stop..."

Granny bent down just a little further, and the fires were replaced by warmth. AJ felt jes' for a moment like she was back in th' kitchen, a little filly, her first time makin' an apple pie, an' she made a right mess of it, but Granny loved her anyhow, and helped her, an' the next one came out mighty fine.

"We'll be right here with you, then," she said. "Whatever princessy things you and your friends are doin', y'all don't got to do them alone. We're your family, Applejack. That ain't ever gonna change."

"Ah'm sorry, Granny," AJ whispered. "Ah'm so sorry."

Big Mac looked down at her, and then he turned his head. Applejack couldn't see what he did, but after a moment she started feelin' maybe a mite less like her heart was breakin' for no good reason.

"That better?" he asked her.

"Much," she told him, and gave him as much of a smile as she could find in her mouth. Ever'thin' was better, an' gettin' even better. Maybe the lights were gettin' a little swimmery an' shimmery an' so on, but they could do that if they wanted to.

Granny looked into her eyes a mite longer, then pulled back. "Well, all right, then. Yer friends told us all about what happened, an' Rainbow Dash tells us she's gonna make it up to you, her fault or not. Ah don't know what kinda crazy magic things y'all got goin' on, but nopony's gonna go around disownin' or hatin' anypony. We're gonna get through this, an' anythin' else we get thrown at us."

Big Mac an' Apple Bloom didn't have anythin' to say after that, but Rainbow Dash did. She was clamped into that bed like a shoe gettin' pounded straight, no foolin'. "I'm sorry, Applejack," she said, and her voice was as miserable as could be. "I know I had like a zillion years of alicorn magic stuff in me, but I still did it. I'm gonna help with the bucking trees and all the other stuff I can until you say it's okay. First thing every day. Not even any practice until everything's totally done." A tiny bit of hope crawled into her voice. "Maybe I could teach you some stuff too? You could probably do Shattered Stone easy, but I don't know that one, but I could totally teach you Rolling Earth style."

Applejack giggled. Didn't sound like her usual laugh, but she just kept feelin' better. "Aw, sugarcube, you don't gotta do anythin' to make up for it. Ah was tellin' y'all all that stuff jes' so you'd do ezzactly what you did." Whoo, that bed was starting to rock or maybe sway something fierce under her, but it felt kinda funny. "Ah wouldn't hardly have said any of that if I wasn't tryin' to hurt you so's you'd hurt me," she happily reassured her friend. She didn't even notice the looks of shock on ever'pony's faces. "Ponyville needs you here, an' you're a great flyer, an' if you said you'd help buck trees, Ah know you'd help buck trees. But Ah ain't got time to go learnin' your fancy kickin' ways, so Ah'll jes' let you do 'em for me."

She closed her eyes again. Golllllee, but it felt good to make up for somethin' she'd screwed up. Gonna be a lot more where that one came from, but she knew her friends an' family were gonna put up with all her failures 'cause they loved her even though she didn't deserve any of it. She had the best darn friends and family anypony could ever hope for. An' she was gettin' mighty tired all the sudden. She could hear Big Mac's big comfortable voice sayin' somethin' to Rainbow Dash, talkin' about cockatrice venom an' painkillers an' somepony named Aunty Depress Ant only she didn't know any auntie by that name but it didn't hardly matter none.

***

Dear Princess Celestia,

As Princess Luna's duly appointed viceroy for the Town of Ponyville, I do hereby pardon unconditionally the pegasus Rainbow Dash for her crimes against your subject, Applejack of Sweet Apple Acres. This pardon is granted on the grounds that the perpetrator was non compos mentis at the time of the deed, subject to magical influences beyond her control. Said magical influences were willingly accepted by the perpetrator without foreknowledge of their nature in an effort to protect all Equestria. As the perpetrator remains under these magical influences, she has accepted the need for ongoing physical restraint, which shall be considered to constitute personal protection rather than any form of arrest.

As Princess Luna's duly appointed viceroy for the Town of Ponyville, I do hereby pardon unconditionally the earth pony Applejack for attempted suicide. This pardon is granted on the grounds that the perpetrator was non compos mentis at the time of the deed, subject to magical influences beyond her control. Said magical influences were willingly accepted by the perpetrator without foreknowledge of their nature in an effort to protect all Equestria. The perpetrator is under heavy medical supervision and is being kept partially sedated until said magical influence has receded to the point where she can withstand its effects on her own.

As Princess Luna's duly appointed viceroy for the Town of Ponyville, I do hereby assume on behalf of the Night Court any expenses incurred in the hospitalization and subsequent care of Rainbow Dash, Lyra Heartstrings and Applejack, as their injuries were sustained in the service of the Night Court. Such expenses shall include medical care, such counseling or therapy as may be needed after the conclusion of medical costs, costs to Sweet Apple Acres in retaining temporary assistance, costs to the Town of Ponyville in temporarily replacing the town's weather coordinator, lost wages to Rainbow Dash resulting from her hospitalization, and any costs resulting from the inevitable celebration coordinated by Pinkie Pie when everyone is all right again.

As Princess Luna's duly appointed viceroy for the Town of Ponyville, I do hereby assume on behalf of the Night Court the expenses incurred by Sugarcube Corner resultant from the uncompensated consumption of their stock in trade, damage to their premises, and loss of assistance resultant from the extended absence of their employee, the earth pony Pinkie Pie. Further, any lost wages to Pinkie Pie are also assumed by the Night Court, as are any costs of tenancy imposed by her temporary host, the pegasus Fluttershy. This assumption is made on the grounds that said employee was non compos mentis at the time of the deed, subject to magical influences beyond her control. Said magical influences were willingly accepted by the perpetrator without foreknowledge of their nature in an effort to protect all Equestria. Pinkie Pie has found a stable location in which her magical condition can be kept under her control, with the assistance of Fluttershy.

Finally, as Princess Luna's duly appointed viceroy for the Town of Ponyville, I do hereby place an order with the Carousel Boutique for one dress, to the specifications and tailoring of the unicorn Rarity's choice, at such rate as she shall find fair compensation. I further declare that Rarity shall be named Hostess of the Night Court at this year's Grand Galloping Gala, and in such capacity she is to display said dress to its greatest potential, as she sees fit.

Your loyal subject,

Lyra Heartstrings,
Viceroy for the Night Court, Ponyville

***

Once Luna could walk again, the end of the plague was nigh, at least in Canterlot. It was still spreading through the buffalo tribes, and beyond Equestria's borders, but the sun and the moon were safe, commanded by their proper guides. Reclaiming her sorrows from her friends was like taking up a heavy load she had almost forgotten she put down, but she took it gladly. It was lighter than it had been. Something of it was tamed and something of it was nearly defeated.

For the first time in a long while, Princess Luna could look out from her balcony and really, truly know that she did not want all she saw; they were their own, as she should have always known.

She did not, in her heart of hearts, rage at a society that had left her behind. There were frustrations, yes, no doubt some things she had missed and would never understand until they passed away and were replaced. But those were her own, bound within herself.

She felt proud that she was becoming a better princess, becoming the Luna she ought to be. But she had a long way yet to go. But she was working on it.

She looked down at the ponies in the streets, and knew that even if they slept through her nights, even if they were not always with her in body, they were still there. She knew there were ponies who might not be with her at her Court, but whose absence would make their reunions all the sweeter.

She put the moon down on her own, and she watched the sun rise, and she knew her sister had long forgiven her for her crimes. Even if she did not, could not deserve forgiveness, she had her sister, she had her new friends, who forgave her anyhow.

Lero left on the first train from Canterlot once she assured him she was well enough, and after a brave servant had come to prove that she was no longer contagious. Twilight Sparkle left with him, and if the waking world could not endure the memories she had made, taking on a duty no mortal should ever have to bear, there was that within her that would never quite forget the dreams of Equestria.

She kept two guards at her sides - and she kept quiet her personal amusement at Celestia's tradition being transferred to her as well, of a personal guard comprised solely of the most attractive of stallions - and made her way to the Grand Throne Room, the one with the Thrones of Day and Night, instead of the separate rooms for the courts. She would see her sister, for the first time in months, and together they would reassure their ponies that everything was perfectly fine.

The doors opened, and her eyes widened. The ranks of guards were gone; the milling herd of nobles anxious to see and be seen at a grand affair of the court were nowhere.

Her sharp eyes could read the cards hung on the walls, dangling from streamers from above. "Get well soon, Princess Luna!" exhorted one, and "Please feel better!" another, and "Thank you, Princess Luna" many more. Moons and stars and dark-barreled bodies were drawn in pencils and crayons across this colorful paper stocks. And their artists came charging from the throne room to swarm about her legs, their little bodies bouncing in glee at getting to surprise a princess, their sweet voices welcoming her back, thanking her for keeping the sun going while Princess Celestia was away, thanking her for dreaming with them, some few exclaiming in surprise at how large her wings were.

She dropped to her knees, tears running down her face, and hugged the nearest four, three fillies and a colt, against her. "Thank you," she said. "Thank you."

Before the Throne of the Sun, her sister sat, and there, sitting next to her, in her spot, in front of the Throne of the Moon, sat her darling Pipsqueak, wearing the most adorable tie and jacket. The crowd of foals danced around her, cheering their welcome to her, and she had to walk slowly to avoid stepping on any little tails. Pip moved aside to let her take her seat, and then hugged her flank with all his might.

"I'm glad you're back, Princess!" he told her, and pressed his face against her side. She felt wetness, and stroked a wingtip down his back.

Her sister smiled at her, then, her usual propriety and reserve set aside, pulled her into a hug with all the strength she had. "Welcome back again, little sister," she said.

"Thank you," Luna whispered again.

And then she raised her head, and addressed her youngest of subjects.

"Thank you all! Now! Let us have FUN!"

***

Rainbow Dash, in defiance of all her usual distaste for public displays of affection, was snuggled right up to Lero's side, and Twilight was on the other. Applejack, Fluttershy, Rarity, Pinkie Pie, Spike and Lyra were all seated with them. Sugarcube Corner didn't have a table big enough for them all to sit together, but they crowded together anyhow. Pinkie's platter of cupcakes occupied the entire table anyhow; there wasn't room for any other dishes. Chocolate cupcakes with dark blue frosting and a sugar moon atop each one. They tasted, well, dreamy.

"I'm so glad everypony's back together," Pinkie said happily, then gave Fluttershy a surprise hug, which not unexpectedly brought a squeak and an attempt to hide in her own wings from the yellow pegasus. "No offense, Fluttershy, but all your squirrels and your bunnies and your beavers and your kitties and your doggies and your bear and your birds and your chipmunks and your other bunnies and your aardvark and your chickens and your..." She stuck her hoof in her mouth, then pulled it out. "Hey, that works here too! Anyway! They're just not very much into parties and jokes, even if they are good at keeping company."

"I'm sorry," Fluttershy apologized, blushing. "I know I wasn't a very good hostess for you. I just can't believe I was being so rude. You couldn't get a word in edgewise. I won't do it again."

Everyone else at the table naturally discounted Fluttershy's apology to 'Fluttershy probably asked Pinkie to pass the salt once.' Town gossip said she'd put up a much better show at the market with her bargaining for a while, but even by Ponyville standards that wasn't much of a rumor. Her taking in Pinkie when the town's party pony was flipping out more than usual wasn't exactly unexpected, nor was it too much of a surprise that Pinkie got back to... if not normal, then at least back to being Pinkie again, after being in Fluttershy's care.

"Don't you worry about a thing, Fluttershy!" Pinkie happily told her, and let go of the hug so Fluttershy could uncringe. "Now I've got a whole new project! I can find a way to make a party that your animal friends will like, to thank them!"

Mental images around the table of what that might entail varied, but the pony consensus involved swollen-bellied forest creatures sprawled around town wearing party hats. Unusually enough, Lero was the only one to envision a musical number. It was set to Hakuna Matata.

"I'm sure we'll all do what we can to help, Pinkie," Rarity said, nibbling daintily on the edge of one of the cupcakes. "Speaking of which, I have been meaning to ask and simply haven't found a moment. Did I do all right with your party? I wouldn't dream of stepping on your tail like that normally, but you weren't in shape to throw it yourself at the time."

Pinkie thought about it at lightning speed and how there weren't enough balloons but there were never enough balloons even when she threw the party herself because then there wouldn't be room for the guests and the streamers were all tucked up instead of dangling where they could remind everypony they were there by brushing on your mane when you went by and the cake was superspledaroonies but should have had swirls and loops and extra cupcakes on top instead of being all fancy around the edges and the whole darn thing was just a little too restrained instead of being a total explosion of fun the whole way around. And then she threw all of that out because that was a Pinkie Pie Party and this was a Rarity Party For Pinkie Pie and that meant way more than anything about being decorated properly. "It was the most perfectest party I ever partied!" Pinkie declared, and bounded over the table to give Rarity a hug too. Rarity laughed and hugged her back, even, instead of being all respectable and society!

"It was a heckuva shindig," Applejack agreed. She still had one hoof in a cast and an eyepatch on, and didn't have to take no more of that cockatrice-venom potion th' hospital'd had her on. Comin' off had been a bad couple'a days, but nothin' like the way she'd been when she needed the stuff. Soon as she got back to the farm, she'd sent a package on up to Canterlot for Princess Luna. Long letter with it, too. Kinda private what it said, but the general gist of it was an invitation to come on over to Sweet Apple Acres sometime and bake a pie together. An' if it went wrong the first time, then they could keep goin' an' make it right.

"Yeah, it was," Rainbow Dash agreed. Everyone waited for more. None was forthcoming.

Rarity disentangled herself from Pinkie Pie enough to sit up again. "Rainbow, darling, are you feeling all right?"

"Never better," the cyan pegasus gladly declared. "Why?"

"Well, it's just that it was rather unlike the sort of soiree I do normally prefer to host," Rarity said. "And I suppose I expected some sort of... ribbing, on that account?"

Rainbow Dash chuckled. "Maybe later. I'm in way too good a mood right now. Lero's back, everypony's okay again, and with all this meditation stuff Lyra's been teaching me I'm kinda feeling mellow." Then she stuck out her tongue. "I can go put on a stunt display and start pranking you any time you want if 'mellow' isn't working for you though."

Rarity laughed, and the table developed into a spontaneous group hug. Spike ended up in the middle of it, suspended by pony squeezes (and one set of human arms) over the cupcakes. Twilight's magic tugged him to safety on the side when the hug split up.

"You've been quiet today, Twilight," the little dragon mentioned.

Twilight smiled at him and gave him another hug. "I must be a little tired, I guess," she admitted. "I don't remember what it was like or what I did, being Luna's stand-in for a little while, but it took a lot out of me. It's a lot to ask a unicorn, taking on even a little bit of being an alicorn. I need a while to just be Twilight Sparkle." She kissed him on the forehead. "And that includes you. And Lero, and Rainbow Dash, and Lyra, and everypony. I need all my friends and family to be me."
There was another group hug. Twilight was in the middle this time. And she had everything she needed.

Chapter 1: Infection

The sky over Ponyville was not, as Rainbow Dash had feared, one big fogbank from the ground to Cloudsdale. The cloudwork was on the messy side and the humidity was definitely higher than it was supposed to be, but there were a lot of towns around Equestria that had worse weather service. She was actually pretty happy with how her team had performed in her absence. Happy enough she only thought two or three times about pretending to be mad for a prank. Too easy, anyway. They'd totally be expecting it.

So it was a smiling Rainbow Dash who had her weather team lined up for a review, and a lot of puffed chests and happy faces from the pegasi she was inspecting. Most towns didn't go in for formal inspections. Most cities didn't go in for formal inspections. Most pegasi thought they were archaic shows that belonged to the Guard or the Wonderbolts, not weather teams.

Most towns and cities were still trying to get their weather back in order. Ponyville had the Everfree, the single nastiest zone of wild weather in all Equestria, on its border, and they were still one of the first towns to get the skies back on track. There wasn't a pony in the sky that day who'd trade Rainbow Dash's eccentric mix of impossible standards, casual indifference, and disdain for paperwork for any other weather team. She could do everypony's job better than they could, she could do the entire job herself if she had to, and she expected everypony else to reach for her standard - and somehow, ponies did.

She'd made Snowflake learn to assemble a perfect rainbow, and he'd gone on to apply for Wonderbolts Academy, small wings and all. She'd inspired Fluttershy, of all ponies, to join in that tornado. She'd given Star Hunter the night team, and nopony ever gave a stallion the dangerous job of flying around in the dark, let alone put him in charge. She'd inspired Princess Luna herself to pull the old ‘Bolt Surprise’ prank on her on Nightmare Night, and she wasn't even trying that time!

She also picked a monthly Most Valuable Pegasus for whoever went furthest above and beyond the call of duty that month, and the MVP award came with a certificate for a free massage from that weird mate of hers, and rumor had it that Princess Celestia couldn't get her hooves on one of those, with his waiting list.

There were a lot of reasons the Ponyville weather team was getting noticed by other weather coordinators. But getting noticed by other weather coordinators didn't compare to getting noticed by their weather coordinator.

"Medley!" Rainbow Dash called, hovering in front of her neatly-formed team. "Cloud Kicker! Front and center!"

The two assistant coordinators zipped forward, going up and over everypony else, and saluted. Rainbow Dash gave them an enthusiastic salute back. Then a tight hug, while the weather teams cheered.

Even so, the two hugged mares gave each other a look of concern. Not that Rainbow Dash hadn't ever hugged anypony before, of course she had. She was a physical pony and she got excited often enough. But everypony knew how strong she was, an earth pony in the sky. A hug from Rainbow Dash could leave a pony's ribs aching for days. This was just a hug. Everypony in Ponyville had seen how Pinkie Pie was still walking around instead of bouncing, and how the other Bearers of the Elements had taken the plague hard too. Their job wasn't done yet.

"You all did awesome," Rainbow Dash said, and let them go. "Seriously. I am so amazingly proud of everypony here. You are the single most completely dedicated, talented, loyal weather team Equestria has. If I needed ponies to set up a sky, I would be proud to fly with all of you against anypony else, up to and including the Wonderbolts."

There was a collective gasp. Rainbow Dash's fixation on the Wonderbolts was almost as much of a living legend as her Rainboom. Or her heroics, taking on manticores, Nightmare Moon, Discord, anything that got in her way. There was a growing interest in pegasus martial arts and their military history among the foals of the sky, all because of her. Ponyville wasn't the only town with a Rainbow Dash fan club among the fillies and colts. Just the only one on the ground. Debates raged at Flight Schools about whether she could personally take on the Wonderbolts.

Of course, some of those debates also claimed that she could turn into a giant dragon, that she burst into flames when she was mad, that she could fly so fast she went backward in time, and that she was secretly in charge of the weather for the entire country and that was why she wasn't already in the Wonderbolts. Debates at Flight School were not particularly well rooted in provable facts. There had once been a lively debate about whether Princess Luna or Princess Celestia would win a race, and that one at least had some solid estimates on wingspans and body size, but still had partisans taking both sides. Right up until somepony had gone so far as to get a Court appearance just to ask, and Princess Celestia said Luna would win. That still didn't settle the debate, but it added in the question of whether the princess was just being nice to her younger sister.

"Medley, Cloud Kicker, you know I hate these, but I'm gonna need reports on everything," Rainbow Dash said. "So try to make them interesting, okay? I mean, I don't expect Daring Do, but I'll fall asleep if it's all blah blah blah partly cloudy blah blah fog."

Medley rolled her eyes. "Trust me, boss, it was interesting."

"The same way juggling thunderheads is interesting," Cloud Kicker agreed. "Just let one thing slip and you're getting banged every which way at once."

"Great," said Rainbow Dash. Then she sighed theatrically. She'd gotten a lot better at those since she started hanging out with Rarity. "In the meantime, I'm still not allowed to go out and get my hooves wet on pain of getting my flank handed to me on my own wings, so I'm going to be stuck in the office." Her next sigh was much more heartfelt. "So if anypony can find an emergency all-hooves-on-flight-deck situation that I just have to come help with, I won't complain one teeny bit."

There was a chuckle from the ranks. She gave them a chuckle back. "So, anyway. Seriously, I am one hundred and twenty percent impressed with how all of you did keeping Ponyville's skies going." They cheered. Rainbow Dash gave them a large smile. "Which means next time you're going to be aiming for one hundred and forty percent impressed, right?"

The next cheer was at least one hundred and forty percent louder.

***

The palace was in a far better state for Luna's convalescence than it had been for Celestia's. For one thing, Luna wasn't actually sick yet, so the staff could take time to get her apartment set up for her to be conveniently cared for, instead of having her laid out in the throne room. For another, the kitchen staff was fully recovered, and the laundry had already been expanded to handle contaminated clothes. And for a third, Princess Celestia was personally running her court again in the middle of Canterlot, rather than Princess Luna's still-unfamiliar rule at a distance. Relief and even celebration were the mood of the city.

Even Luna's tower was relatively close to cheerful. A few days without having to command both the sun and the moon, and Princess Luna's exhaustion receded. More courtiers came to her in those few days than in the half-year prior. She found time to visit Lero and Twilight anyhow.

"It is truly amazing how quickly ponies rush to show their dedication the moment they realize that a single illness is all that stands between them and a complete shift in court politics," she drily noted over tea. Twilight had to be propped up, and Lero had to lift her cup for her, but at least Twilight was merely exhausted, not miserable.

"Maybe that's not a bad idea," Lero commented. "If you and Celestia can do each other's jobs, why not take time off every now and then?"

Luna looked down into her teacup and slowly shook her head. "If only it were that simple, Lero. Do you remember what I told you when you sought a solution to my sister's rise in temperature? It would be a very unwise thing for either of us to interfere with the other's bond." She set the cup down. "When I was sealed into the moon, I was connected to it more deeply than simply raising and lowering it, and so Celestia could guide that aspect. And when Celestia was channeling the sun's strength into herself, the same was likewise true for me to guide her charge. For either of us to simply take over the other's duty while we both are well..." She shook her head again. "It would be very, very unwise. It is dangerous enough for us to do so under these conditions, when there is no other choice."

"Dangerous?" asked Twilight. "Is there something we can do to help?"

Luna smiled at her sister's pupil. "Only what Lero has already volunteered to do. Tending to my physical body while I ail will free me to tend to my other responsibilities."

"Dreams?" asked Lero.

"Dreams and other things," Luna agreed. "There are duties that even Nightmare Moon did not dare shirk, bound and crazed as I was." She met his eyes. "If ever you learn of those duties, Lero, Twilight, they will become yours as well. Knowledge changes destinies."

Twilight sighed and leaned back into the pillows around her. More than she already was. "Princess Luna, if you want to recruit me for something, you should really wait until I have enough energy back to get insatiably curious."

Luna laughed and set her teacup down. "Twilight Sparkle, if ever I have need to recruit you for such duties, I will you tell you of them outright." She grew serious again. "Thus you would not bear the burden of having chosen to accept them."

***

Rainbow Dash glowered at the anemometer. Spike had got Twilight's gadget set up for her, and she was checking her wingpower to find out just how far off her mark she was.

"Seven?" she spluttered, and whacked the device with a hoof. "That can't be right!"

"You were very, very sick," Lyra reminded her. "You probably shouldn't even be flying right now."

Rainbow Dash glared at her. "You are not tying me up again. Fluttershy can fly when she's at a half-wingpower, I'm not going to strain anything staying in the air when I can still pull a seven."

Lyra smiled easily at her. "I wouldn't dream of it. It's your choice. If it takes you longer to recover, or you pull something flying before you're really ready, I'm sure you know best."

Rainbow Dash glared again, then sighed and dropped to her hooves. "I'm not gonna stay grounded all day, you know," she grumbled. "I'd go stir-crazy if I couldn't get some altitude. At least in the castle Twilight's suite was high enough up I could see some clouds!"

Lyra looked up, then back at Rainbow.

Rainbow rolled her eyes. "You know what I mean."

"They look different from above?" Lyra asked. "I never noticed anything when you spun one, but I'm not a pegasus."

"Of course they look different from above," Dash said. "From above, they've got the ground behind them."

Lyra smiled. Rainbow Dash waited for her to say something, then frowned. "You're waiting for me to realize I said something profound, aren't you? Or is this a Still Way conversational martial arts thing?"

Lyra smiled. Rainbow Dash groaned. "Okay, okay! Yes, the clouds are the same, it's not about the clouds, it's about where I am, and stuff like that. It still means I want to be in the air! I'm not talking about doing a Sonic Rainboom! I'm not even talking about bucking a raincloud! Just being up in the air!"

Lyra smiled. Rainbow Dash sighed and flopped down on the ground. "I at least have to go up to give out weather assignments and check on everypony, and I'm not gonna find out if I'm better if I don't test on Twilight's wingpower thingy!"

Lyra smiled. Rainbow Dash put her face in her hooves. "Okay! Okay! I get it! I can fly if I have to but if I push myself even a little then I might hurt myself and then it'd be ages before I could fly and if I did some permanent damage then I might never get into the Wonderbolts, I get it! Would you please stop smiling at me!"

Lyra kept smiling anyway, but she came over to nuzzle Rainbow Dash's cheek. "If you need something to think about, why not visit Fluttershy?" she suggested. "Like you said, she can stay in the air at a half wingpower. Maybe a little slow-flight practice would be a challenge that won't strain anything."

Rainbow Dash paused, then sighed. "Slow-flight practice is even more boring than distance training. Buuuut... I guess it's better than nothing. Just don't come watch, okay? Every little gust bobbles you around when you're at like two wingbeats a minute and only Fluttershy knows how to make that look graceful."

***

It didn't take long for Luna to succumb, just a few more days, and the courtiers and the guardponies were banished from her tower. Once more, only Lero could tend to one of Equestria's princesses. This time, though, they'd had time to set the place up. Her bed had been insulated in case she went hot too, plumbing had been installed so he didn't have to haul water in a cart at a time, a rigging of straps and pulleys set up so Lero could reposition her, and a shower set up at the tower's entrance. And he'd quietly acquired a brand new horse-sized feeding tube.

"I wud righd," Luna said, head down on a pillow. "I ab debinidely looging forward do beig idsedsate ady dime dow." She lifted a handkerchief with her magic and blew her nose vigorously.

Lero set a hand on the side of her neck. Her dark coat felt cool. "There's a long way to go, I'm afraid," he told her. "But you should have a few days before you're to that point. I'll be here the whole time."

She smiled at him. "I abbrediade dhat, Lero," she told him. "Id's nod so bad do go away if you know subpody is waiding for you do come back."

He hugged her. "There's going to be lots of someones waiting to welcome you back this time, Luna," he promised.

She pressed her head into his hug. She wasn't so weak she couldn't stand, not yet, but far from fit already. "I have nod by sisder's aggolades frob our liddle podies, bud I hab by loyal Nighd Guard and I hab some friends," she agreed. "Id will be a joyful dime."

He ran his hand carefully through her mane. It had lost its ethereal shimmers; there was nothing there but the same softness that the other alicorns' manes had. Even softer than Twilight's, and she took diligent care of hers. Rainbow Dash and Lyra, they were a bit more utilitarian about their manes. "You don't think there aren't ponies out there who noticed who led Equestria through a two month crisis?"

She chuckled ruefully. "Podies id a padic are nod bery good ad payig addendion, Lero. Igcludig me. Has Dwilighd nod dold you aboud by ill-faded redurn to Nighdmare Nighd? Id's wordse whed you hab dhe power do really mage a meds ob dhings."

"It worked out in the end, didn't it?" Lero pointed out, and began to really give her neck a proper rubdown. "And you can make Nightmare Night work for you. Being in charge of Halloween could make for a good thing. It's already associated with candy and fun."

"Halloweed?" Luna asked. "Dwilighd has wridden of your world's dendency doward silly names, bud I do nod regognide dhat one. ... Also, you are very good ad dhat."

"Halloween. All Hallow's Eve." Lero said. Careful of the lower neck and upper back, he moved to her side, fingers working over a somewhat larger area than he was used to. "It's more or less the same thing as Nightmare Night. Children dress up in costumes and go around getting candy. Or used to. Some places stopped it. The old tradition, or at least one interpretation of the old tradition, was that it was the night when the barriers between the real world and the spirit world were thinnest, and children dressed up as monsters so the magical creatures wouldn't recognize them."

"Dhere mighd be good reasods for dhad dradidion," Luna murmured. "Why was id sdopped?"

Lero couldn't really argue about the possibility of ghoulies and ghosties sneaking into the real world to kidnap children. Not when he was rubbing tension out of the muscles of the flying magical unicorn in charge of the moon, who was also the local equivalent of Jack Skellington. "People started being worried it wasn't safe. Too easy for kids to go missing when they're all wearing masks."

"Worrisome, do be sure, bud easily gleared ub soon enough, cerdainly?" Luna asked. "A parend remobes dhe mask and redurns dhe child do her prober home. No harm done."

"Not getting mixed up," Lero said quietly, working along her ribs. "There are some very bad people out there."

Luna lifted her head to look at him. Then put her head down and closed her eyes. "Dhere are. Few doday, here. By sisder has done well in dhad regard. Bud led us nod speak of sadnesses. How would you mage Nighdmare Nighd... worg for me?"

"Same way any politician does," Lero said, and started working on her leg. "Offer up a tax cut."

Luna sighed loudly. "Dhe dags gode is carebully balanced and nod do be modified od a whim," she started to recite.

"The Nightmare Night tax rate," Lero interjected quickly. "The candy?"

She opened her eyes and cleared her throat. Then blew her nose again. "You are aware dhad ids nod an agdual dax, Lero?"

Lero laughed. "It's still yours! Hmmm." He thought about it for a moment.

Luna came up with an idea first. "Since Nighdmare Moon was defeaded by the power of friendship, id is no longer needed do appease her widh candy," she said. "Insdead, fillies and colds are do show dheir friendship by givig dheir besd piece of candy do... Whidgh would be bedder? Do dheir besd friend, or do a new friend?"

"New friend," Lero said.

"Id shall be done," Luna proclaimed. Then blew her nose again.

***

"... And, finally, Sofas And Quills is due two thousand thirteen bits for Emergency Substitute Hospital Beds and keeping Ponyville supplied with writing implements throughout the plague," Spike finished, wrapping up the end of the long, long scroll he'd written down.

Mayor Mare put her head down on her desk. Her pink mane spilled across its surface. Mane dye hadn't been on the list of 'vital necessities' to be delivered around town, and somehow the Ponyville stocks had dried out. "What's that all add up to, Spike?" she groaned.

Spike tapped on the parchment with a claw, mentally double-checking his figures. "... A lot," he finally said.

Mayor Mare kept her face down on the desk's surface. Spike was glad she wasn't a head-pounder. It always seemed so dramatic. So much better to just swoon onto a couch, like Rarity. Of course, everything would be better done like Rarity.

"And how much is left in the Ponyville Emergency Fund?" she asked.

"A big pile of IOUs and bills," Spike said, without needing to check. "The Royal Emergency Fund should have fixed that a month ago, but Canterlot has non-critical-right-this-instant fund requests on hold until everything's settled. Cloudsdale is still half-empty, and Appleloosa's in the middle of the plague. They're gonna have to help the buffalo a lot too, and they're so spread out they'll be having pockets of plague for months and months."

"Can we tap the Twilight Sparkle Restoration Fund?" she tried next. "She's not here, after all. We won't be needing it until she comes back."

Spike shook his head. "That's under Royal Command, not to be used except specifically to fix stuff related to Twi doing her magic and experiments and stuff, except in immediate life or death emergency."

Mayor Mare groaned again. "The Hydra Defense Fund?"

"Fluttershy tapped it to buy supplies to nurse the hydra back to health. It got the plague too."

"To nurse the... Of course she did. The Nightmare Night budget?"

"What budget? Pinkie does all the decorations and everypony puts up the games on their own."

"The library budget."

"Twi is gonna disown me, but I gave that up weeks ago. There's not gonna be any new books until after Hearth's Warming Eve."

"My salary."

"Not letting you do that."

Mayor Mare smiled. But without lifting her face from the desk. "You really are a grade-A, number-one assistant, Spike. Twilight's lucky to have you. A loan from Filthy Rich?"

"Who do you think most of those IOUs are to?"

"Selling the office supplies on a street corner?"

"Wouldn't cover the cost of the salespony."

"Declare bankruptcy and run away before anypony finds out?"

"Applejack chased you down and hauled you back when you tried that yesterday."

Mayor Mare finally pushed herself off of the desk to slump back in her official chair instead. "Any options I've missed?"

Spike scratched his head, thinking. "We already tried getting a loan from a dragon, but I don't have a hoard and that other guy wanted five ponies a year in interest, minimum ten year payoff period, and we're not that desperate. Ummm... The Diamond Dogs?"

Mayor Mare put a hoof against her face. "Are we that desperate?"

Spike glumly looked at the long, long list of outstanding expenses the plague had left Ponyville with. "I kinda think we are."

"What would we even offer them?"

"Does anypony other than Rarity or Twi know a gem-finding spell?" Spike asked.

Mayor Mare shook her head. "It's a cutie-mark specialization spell," she said with a sigh. "I've asked Twilight Sparkle about that. Four hours later what I got out of the explanation is that Rarity can do it naturally, Twilight Sparkle can do it by convincing her horn that she's Rarity or something, and there aren't any other unicorns in Ponyville who know enough magical theory to copy that spell."

Spike looked down at his scroll. A very large number was still sitting there in red ink. He couldn't say what had to come next. She was so generous, of course she'd offer to help, she'd walk right down to the Diamond Dogs and let them get their dirty paws on her beautiful, glorious, perfect, pristine white coat, and... No. He couldn't.

His head jerked up when Mayor Mare said, "Rarity would do it, but I couldn't ask that of her. And I know you couldn't." She smiled at him. He blushed. She went on. "Desperate times call for desperate measures, then." She took a deep breath, then let it out. "Time to go commit political suicide and possibly something like treason. Spike, take a letter."

Spike stared at her. But had a quill and paper in his claws anyhow.

"Dear Princess Celestia," Mayor Mare began. "In a financial crisis, it is sometimes necessary for a governmental body to collect on past debts, even ones it had no intention of ever claiming. Ponyville is officially tasked with securing and monitoring the Everfree Forest, which includes the archaeological site known as the Castle of the Royal Pony Sisters."

Spike's eyes went huge. He committed the cardinal sin of the transcriptionist. He interrupted her. "Mayor Mare! Please tell me you're not..."

She held up a hoof, took another deep breath, and continued. "It has come to my attention as Mayor of Ponyville that certain valuable artifacts were removed from Ponyville's jurisdiction in the Everfree Forest. Accordingly, we are levying a civil fine against the responsible parties, in this case the Day Court, for the improper seizure of the artifacts known as the Elements of Harmony. Please please please I'm desperate don't banish me to Tartarus on fire on the moon. Sincerely yours, Mayor Mare. P.S. The bill is attached. I am so so so so so so so so so sorry."

***

Luna smiled at Lero, too weak today to lift her head. Celestia had lowered the moon for her this morning. Now they could hear her laughter all the way from Luna's tower about something.

Her nose had dried up, letting her voice return to clarity, though with a rasp to it. "It is good... to know that laughter still finds a home in the Day Throne," she said. She breathed hard after speaking.

Lero was massaging her neck again. She was still cool to the touch, not feverish at all. "Celestia enjoys a good joke, I hear," he said neutrally.

Luna closed her eyes. "Is it cruel of me to be glad you do not love her, Lero?"

Lero winced. But he kept his fingers working along the strong cords of muscle under her dark coat. "Human nature, I suppose. If that applied."

"I have that much of a human in my nature, then," Luna said quietly. "Perhaps it came to me when humans walked upon their moon. Stranger things have happened."

Lero kept the massage going, but he couldn't think of anything to say to that.

"I am weaker than I judged, Lero," she said. "My sister has taken the moon's weight from me, but I may yet fail in other duties."

Lero could only think of Men in Black. About to have some grand secret of the cosmos revealed, drawn into it, never to return to a normal life. Or as normal as his life could be considered. Maybe never to return to Twilight Sparkle, to Lyra, to Ponyville. To Rainbow Dash.

Luna felt something from him, because she went on. "Dreams, Lero." She coughed several times, hard, then repeated. "Dreams. Those at least are linked to my body, if tenuously. The night does have its terrors. I may have to summon my heroes to aid me."

Lero set his hand against her cutie mark. It felt different from Rainbow Dash's, or Twilight's, or Lyra's, or any pony whose mark he touched at the spa. To his fingers, yes, it was nothing but fur, the image upon it not registering any differently. But on Princess Luna, he could feel something... underneath. Something other than the muscles of an earth pony. There was a vastness there. Cold and almost empty, pinpricked with hope. Rainbow Dash had mentioned that the cutie mark was a reflection of the soul. If that was so, Luna's soul was...

He felt her eyes on him. "Do not linger there, Lero," she said quietly. "Thou art still mortal."

He moved his hand away. She lost consciousness not long after.

***

Something was wrong with the rainbow. The colors were flowing into each other at the edges, and no matter how hard Rainbow Dash flew after it, she never got any closer. It was like the crazy thing was running away from her. She looked behind herself. Her own rainbow trail was going just right, neatly separated bands in a straight line behind her mane. The weird rainbow must have been something different. Maybe something Pinkie did.

Rainbow Dash flew faster at the idea of Pinkie Pie making rainbows. It flew away from her just as fast.

A hand patted her on the rump. "Off chasing rainbows?" Lero asked her.

She whirled around. He was there too, flying right beside her. No wings, no magic spells around him, not falling, just casually flying right next to her like it was the most natural thing in the world. He had a cape on for some reason, but no trail.

She grabbed him so he wouldn't fall. "Lero! What are you doing up here?"

He kissed her. "Dreaming, I think."

She kissed him back, of course. Priorities, priorities. Then added a few more after the first one. His teeth sure felt real against her tongue, those little sharp edges that still made her feel all quivery just for a second. She could deal with dreams like this one. Oh, she knew just what to do with dreams like this one.

There was a discreet cough from the side. Rainbow Dash's eyes flew open and she looked over. Princess Luna was flying with them too, a dark, starry trail behind her.

"My apologies for the intrusion, Rainbow Dash. I hoped to prevail upon Lero to see more of his world, and thought that his mares might wish it as well," she said. She looked curiously at Lero. "Indeed, Lero, I had thought to meet Rainbow Dash alone in your sky. It is rare indeed for a wingless pony to dream gladly of being without the ground below her hooves." She considered. "The only one I know off-hoof is Pinkie Pie, and I cannot imagine anything of which she would not gladly dream."

Lero bowed to her, still hugging Rainbow Dash, all of them still racing along at Rainboom speeds. Somehow it worked. "Humans dream of flight, Luna," he told her. "Not everyone, not all the time, but dreaming of flying has been with us a long time."

"Awesomer and awesomer," declared the cyan pegasus.

"So it is said, so it must be," Luna consented. "In any case. Let us repair to the ground, where your other beloveds await us."

And as quickly as that, there they were, on the ground. Still moving very rapidly, as it turned out. Rainbow Dash and Lero were sitting in the backseat, which somehow fit them both despite seeming to have two inches of legroom. Luna was in the passenger seat. Twilight Sparkle was in the driver's seat, wearing a familiar pair of black sunglasses usually seen on Rainbow Dash's muzzle.

"What the hay is going on?" asked Rainbow Dash.

"I have no idea!" squealed Twilight Sparkle. "But this is fun!"

The red sports car whipped around a curve as Twilight's hoof brushed the wheel, tilted up on two wheels to go between a pair of trucks, and dodged an oil slick from the car in front of them.

"I may have slightly unrealistic dreams about cars," Lero apologized. "Too many action movies."

Luna was somehow remaining perfectly calm in the passenger seat. Rainbow Dash was trying to figure out how to get her seatbelt off so she could fly Lero to safety before Twilight killed them all, dream or not. Lero hugged her again.

"Would you mind stopping so we can pick up Lyra?" Luna asked, while Twilight took the car through the Lincoln Tunnel and drove on the roof with the aid of some conveniently-manifesting rocket boosters. Lero had been thinking of that movie earlier, after all.

"Sure!" agreed Twilight happily. Her hoof slammed on the brakes, the car spun twice around, then came up neatly in front of Lyra, who was sitting on a bench watching the whole thing. Lyra put a hoof on the door and hopped in next to Lero and Rainbow Dash. She somehow fit.

Twilight took off again. They'd somehow ended up on a racetrack and she was blowing the doors off of the other cars.

"Is there any place you might particularly like to visit, Lero?" Luna calmly asked. "Anything you can dream."

The world spun dizzily around them, and not due to anything Twilight did this time. It settled in front of a simple white suburban house. The car did a neat one-eighty and parked in front.

"I think the most important thing I'd like to do, then, is let you meet my parents," Lero said.

***

Pinkie Pie happily bounced along the streets of Ponyville. Finally! It had been such a totally weird feeling having her legs be all not-bouncy like that for days and days and days and days and even eating three whole batches of triple-chocolatey cupcakes with double frosting and extra sugar on top still didn’t make her feel any better and she couldn’t remember that ever happening before, but now she was completely one hundred percent better unless it was measured from how she was when she felt really bad and then she might be something like sixteen thousand percent better compared to that! She’d had to wait all that time to get back to the really super-duper important stuff like reminding ponies about secrets and Derpy did such a great job and everypony liked her so it worked out pretty good even if her timing was way off ‘cause that just made it even funnier. For the short term. It wouldn’t make a good running gag because then it’d get harder to remember the glowy red eyes and growling and all the reverb and things because Derpy was just so friendly that she did happy reminders instead and that just wasn’t sustainable!

Pinkie poked her head into the library, and she hadn’t noticed when she got to the library but she must have been going there because that’s where she ended up! The door was open and that was how it always used to be before Twilight came to town or at least how it had been for months and months and months since Mrs. Hush retired and the library had just been open with nopony really taking care of it other than volunteers dropping by to put books on the shelves every so often but now it was all organized and everything and Spike left it unlocked even though he had a key and even though all his stuff was in there because he said that Twilight would want it that way and Pinkie thought he was right because Twilight would say things about civic institutions and tell a history lesson about famous librarians keeping the library open and then she’d go on until somepony interrupted her and maybe even longer depending on how hard the interruption was!

It was quiet inside the library but not the library kind of quiet where Twilight would be reading and you didn’t want to interrupt her even though Pinkie sometimes did because she had something fun to share. It was the kind of quiet that was the Lyra sitting alone by her rocks kind of quiet where nothing was happening but it wasn’t supposed to be happening and it was all peaceful and there was nopony inside anyway so she didn’t have anypony to talk to. So she sat down for a few minutes to have fun with the library the way the library liked to have fun and Twilight was so good at having with it even if she didn’t know she was, but Pinkie was noooooooowhere near the kind of library fun pony Twilight was, so she could only keep it up for a few minutes before she bounced up and told the empty library, “Bye!”

***

The room was cold. Lero had a fire going in the fireplace with as much wood as he could stuff inside and still have any decent airflow, but Princess Luna’s body seemed to suck up all the heat. Once he’d felt her getting colder it hadn’t been a surprise that the trend continued; he’d put in an order for a heavy coat, hat, and mittens. Fancy Pants didn’t have any insulated pants available, and the only gloves he’d been able to find were made for minoturs - four-fingered and surprisingly small, and all imported. Dutiful Servant promised to find a tailor who could make a custom order in a hurry. But for now Lero could bear the chill.

For all that Luna was perfectly fine in dreams, her physical body wasn’t bearing up any better than Celestia or Cadence had managed. She wasn’t waking with the dawn or the sunset; a relatively short while reclaiming her duty over the moon hadn’t formed the same depth of habit that Celestia had. Her semi-lucid moments came at random intervals, and featured a great deal of Old High Equestrian. He’d made a discovery, though. By talking back to her, she sometimes would switch to modern language, even as her mind ranged through a long and surprisingly bloody history.

“Menske chigal,” she muttered, her eyes shut. “Abir hit.”

“Luna,” he said to her. “You need to have some water.” It wasn’t going to be long before she’d freeze anything she tried to drink, and it was as useful as anything else he could think of to do. Neither of the other alicorns could give him any better suggestions either.

“Lots of water now,” she mumbled back at him. “Cloudage will no more hoard it all. Lots for all pegasi. So tired. How many starbursts? Dozens. Nothing left. Sowed their sky with stars.”

Lero ran his hand down her neck. Briefly. It was like petting a snowbank. “Drink, Luna,” he urged, and held a straw to her lips.

She took only a sip, then moaned. “Dry Skies, we have him. We have him now. Draw the brass blades sharp, he’ll need neither wings nor mark again now.”

Lero blinked. Well. She was alive during some very bloody periods. Twilight would probably love to interview her. He didn’t think Luna would appreciate getting famed for cutting off wings and cutie marks from her captured enemies, though. It’d probably be years before she’d be comfortable enough with her public image to talk about it, if ever.

Her eyes opened, and she glared at him. “Look at you now, Dry Skies” she rasped. “No wings, no mark, no tongue, no balls, hardly a pony left. Certainly no stallion, certainly no pegasus. So much for conquering Cloudsdale, eh?” She snorted weakly, and snowflakes danced in her breath.

Lero couldn’t debate the first two points. As long as she was still talking in modern language, he could keep his mouth shut. And for the last, well, she probably wasn’t used to seeing anyone in pants.

“So much for a ‘fat-flanked filly,’ now, Dry Skies,” she snarled at him. “I’ll hang you in the sky for all to remember for all time. They’ll see your corpse shine forever. Flying wingless and shamed.”

Lero’s eyes widened. That was... very much the inverse of the usual reason for placing someone into the sky. He made a mental note to very delicately ask Twilight if she’d ever seen any ‘stars’ with hooves still attached.

Her mind was wandering again. “Forron ahisthe mec?” she moaned.

This time he couldn’t get her back to anything he understood.

***

Froggy Bottom Bog was a lovely place for Fluttershy’s more waterlogged friends. They couldn’t all be soft and fuzzy and cuddly-wuddly, but they were all so adorable. Nature was just so wonderful in all the different ways it found to make delightful new kinds of animals. Fluttershy thought she could spend days and days and days in the bog sometimes, and meet new little wriggly friends every day.

Her tail flicked sharply and she fanned herself with her wings. Not that everything in Froggy Bottom Bog was nice. She could very easily do without all the mosquitos. They were too small to get a good look at, for one, and always liked to chase after her, and then she got such itchy bumps afterward. Like teeny parasprites trying to eat ponies. If she spent days and days around them, she’d end up skinnier than Rainbow Dash!

Oh, that wasn’t very nice, was it? Rainbow Dash didn’t want to be skinny, except she exercised all the time to keep herself skinny, so Fluttershy was never entirely sure which way her very best friend wanted it. And so she never mentioned it out loud, not even if Rainbow Dash wasn’t around. It wasn’t important what she looked like, just that she was happy. But Rainbow Dash never seemed to really agree when she said that.

Fluttershy didn’t like to mention her own build either. That whole fiasco with being a model when she didn’t want to be one and Rarity didn’t want her to be one, that had just convinced her that she should never let anypony bring up her looks again, and even if she had to be just the teensiest bit rude about changing the subject she should. Of course she was curvy, she didn’t like to run or fly and she spent lots of time holding very still to help new little friends learn to trust her. She wasn’t trying to be. Maybe when she started looking for a herd she’d really try, but she wasn’t quite ready for that step just yet.

She blushed thinking about just what steps she had been very very ready for in her last heat. But that didn’t count. And she mostly could push those ideas out of her head by thinking about her work.

Like now! She could be friends with bears and humans easily enough, but they were only a bit taller than her, not ten times her height and actively interested in eating her. The hydra was a much more challenging friend. No matter how much she helped him, his stomach always got the better of him, at least at first. But she knew just how to deal with him.

First, step out into his line of sight at a good distance away. Not too far or he wouldn’t see her in enough detail, not too close or he might get her first, but just the right distance so she could see all four heads at once and they could see her. Perfect!

Second, a good firm Stare to let him know she wasn’t going to put up with any silliness today! First one head, then another, then the last two at once dropped. Just like that! And now he was all ready to be looked after.

“And how are we feeling today?” she asked him, trotting up into the bog. His stomach rumbled and he had the good grace to look embarrassed. She laughed gently and patted his side. “Aww, there, there. There’s lots of fish in ths bog and in the rivers, and I’m sure you’ll catch plenty of them for lunch. You wouldn’t want to eat me, would you?”

Two heads blushed. The other two quickly shook side to side. She gave all four of him a big friendly smile. “I knew you wouldn’t! You’re a big old softie when you aren’t being all grumpy, really. You’re not feeling tired anymore?”

Four heads shook this time. Fluttershy patted his side again. “And not having those dreams about some big nasty scary monster cutting you into parts, right?”

Four denials again, these ones much more relieved. The copy of Holding Off Hydras at the library had been the only reference Fluttershy could find about how to deal with hydras, so she mostly used her own feelings, trusting her Cutie Mark, but the book did have some really interesting reading about hydra heads having an innate fear of being separated from each other. That had led to some nice long talks while he was still too weak to move and she was feeding him as many fish as she could carry into the bog, and so she’d found out about his bad dreams.

“Good! Then I think I can give you a clean bill of health,” she happily told him.

The four heads turned to look at each other. Necks twisted, eyes narrowed, mouths hissed. Then they turned back to her. Hydras couldn’t talk, of course, not nearly so much as Angel Bunny or even Winona, but Fluttershy knew what he meant. It was just sort of a casual, nonchalant, carefully distant bit of body language, but she could understand him just as much as if he’d said it out loud.

“Of course I’ll come and visit you sometimes! Poor thing, you’re all alone!” She giggled. “Well, sort of. But of course I’ll visit! And I’ll keep my ears open for any word of a lady hydra or even another male hydra you could meet, all right.”

The four heads twisted, looking all around the bog. One ducked under the filthy water’s surface; another scanned the clouds. Then fast as lightning he whirled all four necks around the little yellow pegasus and gave her a squeeze, then set her back down, backed away, and gave an overly-loud defiant roar. Everything in Froggy Bottom Bog cringed away from the sound of an infuriated hydra, but Fluttershy merrily pranced away through the knee-high water.

***

Twilight Sparkle was finally able to walk steadily, so she and Lero started exploring Canterlot in the afternoons. Luna was still getting colder and colder, and Lero could only stand to be in the room for so long. She would have been showing him around if she had known more of the city herself, but her prior life as a studious recluse emerged to bite her in that regard. Beyond the castle, the libraries, her family’s place and Pony Joe's, she didn't know the city.

She know about Canterlot, of course. Centuries of history, famous landmarks, et cetera, et cetera. What she didn't know was how to get anywhere, or what modern attractions there were to offer. So they wandered.

"Everything's supposed to be smaller when you come back to it after growing up," Twilight said, looking down a crowded street. "Am I doing it wrong? Canterlot was never this big before."

"Did it look like a book before?" Lero pointed out.

"Oh, har har har," Twilight grumbled. "I am perfectly aware that I was unhealthily socially self-isolated before coming to Ponyville and that I still have strong introvert tendencies to the point that I need external assistance from my herd and my friends to remind me to participate in real life. It's still weird to come back to the place you thought of as home for years and realize you don't know it at all."

"Sometimes all you need is a change of perspective," Lero said, and his hands caught Twilight under the forelegs. She eeped as he picked her up onto his back. "There! Now you've got a perfect excuse."

Her hoof tapped on his shoulder. Tap. Tap-tap tap. Tap. Tap-tap tap. She hummed a couple of bars.

Lero got ready to let her go if she started to pull away. Ponyville had plenty of songs break out, but he'd never been holding Twilight, Rainbow Dash, or Lyra when they started one. He'd been caught in the middle of a couple, even, but the crowd had left him plenty of room.

It's a new perspective when you come back again,
You don't know where you are until you know where you've been,
Two steps forward and then Lero please spin,
It's not home anymore, but it's the city we're in!

Lero wanted to break out laughing. She was putting stage directions into the lyrics? But he obeyed. Two steps forward and then a slow spin in place while she flung her hooves upward. The other ponies on the street were abandoning their transactions and starting to line up.

I was a curious filly with my nose in a book
If it wasn't written down it wasn't worth a look
Hold up your hands and take the rose from that nook
Now I'm back in Canterlot and I might get hooked!

Sure enough, there was a vase sitting in a crevice next to Lero's hand when he reached up. He plucked it out and tilted it toward Twilight. The other ponies were starting to add a percussion section, flicking their hooves against the cobblestones as they danced along.

By another name, a rose smells as sweet
And there's something to be said for a city street
Bring it a little closer and I'll nibble that treat
Then walk straight forward and let me leap!

Lero was having a tremendous amount of trouble keeping from dropping to his knees laughing. He offered up the rose to Twilight, and she indeed nibbled on the edge, then took it from his fingers with her magic and tucked it behind her ear. Lero got his feet moving again, and then brought his hands down to put under Twilight's hooves. She gave him a kiss atop the head, perfectly in time with the music he couldn't hear, and then she jumped from his back, somehow performing a picture-perfect backflip and landing in the middle of the street, at the head of a marching wedge of ponies. Lero hurried to get out of the way.

The march went on for a little while, followed by a whirl down the street, each shop owner singing out the praises of her own establishment, and Lero took the time to double over, laughing. A minute or so later, the procession came back his way.

So I think I'll enjoy finding everything I missed
Not from a book or even making a list
Together we'll have fun just being tourists,
So get back here and we'll end with a kiss!

Canterlot ponies might not have been as accepting as the citizens of Ponyville, but they weren't going to let a musical-ending dip-smooch like that one go un-cheered.

***

Every new direction was a new reality. Forward, backward, left, right, up, down, those were still there. But there were so many other directions. Lero couldn't make sense of them all. Rainbow Dash, Twilight, and Lyra were pressed to his sides, their eyes as wild as his felt, trying to look every which way at once, protecting their stallion from... anything that might be there. Fluttershy was curled up on the ground with her tail pulled over her face whimpering. Applejack was staggering around, looking everywhere at once. Pinkie kept sticking her head in those new directions and saying "Hi!"

Luna cleared her throat. Lero realized Luna was there. "Pinkie," she said calmly, "Please stay with us." The ground took form, a stone floor under Lero's feet. The other directions collapsed into paintings hanging on the walls. Moonlight and starlight shone through tall arch-topped windows. Every painting was lit from within. Statues between the paintings smiled into the wide stone hallway. Banners from the rafters were embroidered with Luna's mark.

"Luna?" asked Twilight, still pressing her flank against Lero's side. "Where are we?"

"Oooh! Oooh! Are we mrmmmph!" Pinkie put a hoof in her own mouth this time. She blinked, looked down, tugged on her hoof, tugged again, then looked up at Luna.

Luna smiled at Pinkie, but neither the broad happy smiles she usually received, nor the patient, tolerating ones she sometimes got instead. This was a sad smile. "You are between the dreams, my friends. This is my realm as much as others you know more prominently. And one I fear I am losing."

Pinkie tugged at her hoof, but it remained resolutely lodged in her mouth. Lero set one hand on Lyra's head and the other on Twilight's; Rainbow Dash was against his back. "It's good to see you anyhow," he told the princess.

She gave him the sad smile next. "I will see you again soon enough, Lero. Thank you for tending to my body through this plague. It seems I must conscript your herd and your friends to aid me further.'

Pinkie finally got her hoof out of her mouth. "Is it because you're losing control of yourself while your magic gets gobbled down and you need to ask us to take on your super-heavy burdens and take care of everypony's dreams until you're better again?" she asked eagerly. Then looked down at her hoof. "And why was my hoof stuck in my mouth? Usually Applejack or Rainbow Dash or Twilight Sparkle or Rarity does that, not me! Mrmmmph!" Her hoof went back in her mouth.

Luna laughed, but only briefly. "The place between dreams is closer to the subconscious than most others, Pinkie Pie. If you are quieting yourself, it is because you want or expect to be."

Pinkie's hoof came out of her mouth again. "I guess it would have been super un-dramatic if I stepped all over your big reveal," she agreed.

Applejack was still shaking her head and blinking rapidly, her tail twitching. Fluttershy was peeking out from under her tail, at least. Twilight cautiously stepped away from Lero, though.

"This is... between the dreams? These are all the dreams of every pony in Equestria?" she asked, looking down the long, long hallway. "This place is..."

"A fiction, Twilight Sparkle," Luna said. "Something easier for your friends to accept. Applejack, calm yourself."

The apple farmer's eye was rapidly developing a tic. "It all ain't true! Whole darn thing is jes'... jes' ain't true!"

"Dreams hide truths without sense," Luna told her. "Here, where dreams all meet, the truths are left to their dreamers. You must find your own truth."

Fluttershy let go of her tail and hugged onto Applejack. "I'm here," she said. "That's true, isn't it? And you're here, and our friends are all here. We're all friends, and that's a true thing too."

Applejack squeezed Fluttershy hard enough to wring a squeak out of the yellow pegasus, and she let out a sigh of relief. "Thanks, sugarcube. Ah needed that."

"Princess," Twilight asked, "If you're losing this place, who's taking it? It seems to be doing fine for now."

Luna bowed her head. "Simply by being, I prevent dreams from entering each other. That I am here, in this space, holds dreams apart. If I lose too much of myself, then the ponies of Equestria will begin to dream each other's dreams." She lifted her head and looked down the long hallway. "And one dreamer's truth can all too quickly become another's nightmare."

Rainbow Dash's eyes lit up and she zipped away from Lero's back to hover in front of Luna, air-boxing an invisible opponent. "So we're gonna be your Secret Dream Soldiers and fight off bad dreams in here so they don't get out of control? Awesome!"

Luna laughed again, more fully this time. "No, Rainbow Dash, if I lose too much strength to keep the dreams apart, I will lose too much strength to bring all of you here as well." She grew serious again. "Only one of you will come here again. Hers will in many ways be the easiest task, but the one best-suited to it."

The princess looked down at a lavender unicorn. "Will you accept? Only you, Twilight Sparkle, have the magical power and control to take on my power of the dream. It is not an easy task, nor one often remembered in the light of dawn by those it benefits, but I would not leave my little ponies unguarded."

Twilight swallowed. "What do I have to do, Luna?" she asked.

Luna bowed her head. The tip of her horn touched Twilight's. A flash of darkness swirled around that spot, then vanished. Twilight's eyes widened. Dreams were dancing in her pupils. A black crown sat atop her head, matching Luna's own.

"Help them," Luna said. "Find those in true need and aid them. But above all... be here. Even should they never see you, they will know you are here, and that alone will give many the strength they need. My Champion of Hidden Things."

Twilight's eyes were still flashing from one dream to the next. Her voice was half-stunned, half-wondering, as she said, "I will."

Luna lifted her head again and looked to the rest of them. "Lero. Your task is in the physical world. You are here that you may bear witness in Canterlot and understand. Lyra Heartstrings, you shall bear witness in Ponyville, and ensure that my friends do not suffer mortal ills." Lyra nodded a single time back at her, impassively.

The alicorn's eyes ran over the other five. "And you... You I must ask the most difficult task. One I have failed at on my own many times already. If I... return to what I was, I could run rampant, here, Twilight Sparkle or not. I fear I will, as my control over my own thoughts wanes with my body's strength. So I must ask you to bear my burdens for me, for a time."

"Just what is it you want us to do?" asked Rainbow Dash suspiciously.

"Take from me the things that would harm my little ponies," Luna said quietly. "The night is not to be feared, but sometimes the darkness is. I do not know if you can bear these things, but if you cannot, no others can."

"We'll do it," Fluttershy said. Then shrank down. "Or, um, I will? If you don't want to that's fine..."

"No way I'm leaving you to do it all by yourself, Shy," Rainbow Dash indignantly declared. "Everypony else in?"

"Yep."

"I wouldn't dream of leaving Princess Luna in need."

"Okie-dokie-lokie!"

Rarity ahemed. "Pinkie, darling, if you'd let the rest of us give our own answers? It's yes, of course, but still."

Applejack shrugged. "She said what Ah was gonna say anyhow. We'll do it, Princess. This gonna come with new necklaces an' th' like?"

Princess Luna shook her head. "I fear the only thing you will have from this is sorrow, Applejack. But less than if I were to spread that sorrow across defenseless dreaming minds. I cannot control what form this will take; I can only release unto you my inner demons. Please, my friends, I beg you, do not hate me." She closed her eyes, and her body began to grow black. Not the darkness of Nightmare Moon; it was as though the space where Luna had been filled from the inside out with a vast, starless void.

The darkness flew from her. The five vanished.

***

Rainbow Dash jerked out of bed, spinning in the air, nostrils flaring, hooves lifted. "What was that?" she snapped out, staring all around.

***

Fluttershy's eyes opened. She smiled at the sight of Angel Bunny sleeping in his little bed next to hers. "Aren't you just the best bunny in the whole wide world, yes you are," she cooed, and closed her eyes again.

***

Rarity barely opened her eyes, but she pulled the pillows and sheets from her bed all into a bundle in her forelegs, squeezing them tightly to herself.

***

Pinkie Pie's eyes snapped open and she stared frantically around the room. She saw Gummy in his little watery bed in the corner and jumped to hug him tight, and closed her eyes, ignoring the water soaking her coat.

***

Applejack stared up at the ceiling. "Ah... Ah... Ah'm so sorry," she whispered.

***

"Where'd they go?" asked Lero, spinning around, looking through the hallway. "Rainbow Dash!"

"They woke up," Twilight said, then pointed off in a direction that wasn't there. "See? Fluttershy and Rarity are already dreaming again."

Luna tossed her head. Her mane was alight with glittering stardust, nebulas and galaxies dancing with every movement she made. "Oh!" she exclaimed. "I have not felt this good in a long, long time!" She bounced to their side and pulled Lero, Twilight, and Lyra into a gleeful hug. "Oh, thank you, thank you all! Bless this plague, bless everything!"

"P... princess? Are you all right?" Twilight asked, startled out of her rapt exploration of her new powers.

Luna kissed her, then laughed again. "Oh, I am so much better than all right!" Had they not been dreaming, her hug would have crushed bone. "I shall carry my woes again, never fear, but I shall enjoy their absence while I can!" Her eyes shone the moon, a brilliant silver disc.

"What happened to them, Princess?" asked Lyra, patting Luna's side.

"You will have to find out!" Luna happily told her. "I could not guide what happened, nor can I see my own ills to judge them without your help. Make sure our friends have everything they need to bear them for me! Indeed, I so decree it! Lyra Heartstrings, your command shall be as my own if it so be needed to ease the burdens of those five wonderful ponies! And Lero, I never revoked my delegation to you as well, but now I expand it! As you must do to ensure Twilight Sparkle's task is as gentle as it can be upon her, you may do with my full authority!"

Celestia suddenly appeared in the hallway. Her eyes widened for a moment, then she composed herself. Her mane was pink and she was smaller than usual, but still clearly Celestia. The same size as Luna, in fact. Luna bounded to her and nuzzled her. "Sister! Forgive my impertinence to summon you thus, but I would share this moment with you as well!"

Celestia looked at her sister, then nuzzled her back. "It is good to see you as you have been and will be, my sister," she said gently. "But is this wise?"

"Wise or not, it is done!" Luna happily told her. "Lyra Heartstrings and Bellerophon Michaelides are to be my viceroys for Ponyville and Canterlot while it goes. Please let everypony know!"

Celestia nodded her head. "For you, Luna. Be well soon. No matter how long I have you back, I will always miss you when you go."

Luna hugged the alabaster alicorn tightly. "You are the most wonderful sister in any world, Celestia!"

Celestia hugged Luna back. "Only excluding yourself, Luna," she said warmly. "Now, if I may go? You tire yourself to bring me here, and I must rise all too soon."

Luna nuzzled her. "Of course! I will see you soon, sister!"

And Celestia was gone.

"Oh, this is going to be so much FUN!" Luna sang out.

Author's Note

And so we return to the Blank Plague. With the castle operating smoothly and Celestia perfectly comfortable ruling alone, Lero's having a much easier time of it now. Relatively.