Chapters "Princess Celestia?" a voice asked.
The mare in question stopped reading her book and turned towards her student; a little lavender filly with a pink star for cutie mark, looking at her from the right side of the bed. A small smile appeared in her lips.
While she normally didn't let ponies enter her private chambers, Twilight Sparkle was the exception, probably because she had the ability to avoid the guards. 'Such a ninja.'
"How does it feel to be inmortal?" the filly asked.
Celestia's eyebrows raised.
"Can you repeat what you said, Twilight?" Celestia questioned, still surprised.
"How does it feel to be inmortal?" the filly repeated, using her little hooves to climb the bed, a book enveloped in her magic.
Celestia, instead of answering Twilight's question, remained silent for a few seconds. Then, she spoke, "Twilight, do you know what 'inmortal' means?"
Twilight closed her eyes, thinking. "One who cannot die nor age." She opened her eyes and bounced on the bed. "Somepony like you!" she stopped jumping and came closer to her mentor's body. Like in other occasions, Twilight put herself under Celestia's wing and giggled, like if the wing was a shelter protecting her from the outside world.
Celestia couldn't help but smile.
"Then, how does it feel like?!" asked the excited filly, snuggling in the wing's embrace.
"Not dying?" Celestia could feel a knot in her throat, but she didn't let it affect her calm expression. How many times had that question reached her ears with her other students?
She didn't even know if she was 'inmortal' in its full definition, only ageless. But for a pony that had defeated foes as strong as Discord or Sombra, it didn't surprise her that little Twilight thought that she was inmortal.
"Yes, how does it feel?!" Twilight questioned again, her entusiasm making her oblivious of Celestia's sudden mood change. The wing around her tightened her small body against Celestia's, but she didn't notice.
Celestia sighed. "I'm going to say that... it is awesome at best."
"And how it is at its worst?" Twilight questioned, her eyes shining with innocence.
Celestia gulped and thought, for a second, in answering in a sarcasm tone 'Well, in its worst I see everything and everypony around me aging and dying, while I remain alive, making new friends that will die, too.'
She scolded herself at the idea of doing that.
"Twilight?"
"Hmm?"
"Do you want some cookies from my jar?" she said, completely derailing the subject.
Twilight's eyes became thin lines, as if studying the Princess' face.
"They are royal coookiiiesss."
Twilight's eyes opened and a big smile appeared in her mouth. "Okaaay!" exclaimed the filly, crawling from under the wing so she could jump to the floor and run towards the door.
Celestia laughed and got off the bed, following the little filly along the many hallways. But the question remained in her head, 'How does it feel to be inmortal?'
'How does it feel to be inmortal?' she asked herself.
H o w d o e s i t f e e l t o b e i n m o r t a l ?
"Twilight!"
Twilight groaned, the light blinding her. Her head felt like it was full of cotton and the voice sounded magnified by a bullhorn. She tried to move her foreleg to protect her eyes, but a sharp pain was the only response her body gave her. Clenching her teeth, she felt a pressure in her ribcage, like a anvil, obstructing her breathing.
But the worst was her horn, it felt like a hot nail was being hammered in her head.
"Twilight! Are you okay?" the voice said again, its words rumbling in her eardrums.
"Nnghhh-" she managed to say, blood coming out of her mouth. She blinked, reality taking shape in front of her; a cyan spot morphed into a well-known pegasus with a rainbow mane. Her horn, though still pulsating painfully, stopped feeling like an elepanth crushing her skull.
Finally, air entered her lungs and she coughed.
"Oh my gosh, Twilight!" Rainbow Dash yelled, coming closer to the mare. "A-are you okay?" she asked, helping Twilight to stand up.
Twilight, standing on legs that felt like sticks about to break, managed to said in a hoarse tone. "I-I d-don't think s-s...o," she fell on her legs, too weak to stand up again.
It seemed like a good time to take a nap. However, her gaze met the floor; a white floor. "What?"
She stood up again, finding forces that she didn't have before and gazed at the place around them. There was absolutely nothing in sight apart from her colorful friend and her.
It was in that moment that she noticed the look on Rainbow Dash's face, a worried one that was looking for answers.
"Do... do you know where are we, Twilight?" asked Rainbow, sitting on her haunches, ears dropped.
"I..." she looked around again, "I... I... just..."
"Do you even have an idea of where are we?"
A knot formed in Twilight's throat. She knew where they were, it was one of the risks of performing the spell, after all.
She sat next to her friend, Rainbow had probably been awake before her, she needed to hear the truth. Moving uncomfortable, Twilight prepared herself for what was coming next.
"Do you know?" asked Rainbow Dash. "A-are we d-d-dead, Twilight?" tears formed in the edge of her eyes, waiting to fall in any moment.
Twilight gulped. "N-no... we... we aren't d-dead."
"Then..." Rainbow trailed off, "where are we?"
"In..." Twilight said, not daring to say the place's name. Bitting her lip, she looked to her friend's eyes, full of terror. "We... we are in The White Void."
The words, somehow, echoed in the endless space.
"The.. the White what?" asked Rainbow, her ears lifted.
"The White Void."
"..." She frowned, "where did reality go?"
"It didn't go away... it is still here."
"Where?"
"It... it is here I'm sure," Twilight moved her hooves, trying to explain where everything had gone. Of course, she didn't have idea of what she was doing. "Well..." she growled, put her googles off her eyes and on her poll and continued, "it is hard to explain."
"Hard to explain, HARD TO EXPLAIN?!" Rainbow yelled, taking Twilight aback at the sudden outburst. Rainbow noticed this and sat in her haunches, trying to ease her mind. "Sorry, it just that... I thought we were dead and then... you have the explanation... and you don't want to say it to me."
Twilight's ears dropped. She sighed, "Imagine that reality is made of layers, like a cake, to put it easy. Some of those layers are all put over the main one -that contains us-, we can't touch what is in them and they can't touch us, however, they can see us. An example of a creature living in one of those layers could be a ghost that can't go to the Heavens and thus is lost, it can see us, but it can't touch us, because it don't belong in our reality.
The White Void, for the little that I know about it, is completely different. It isn't attached to our reality, as we call it, nor does form part of an alternate universe. It is like a... a crumb. It is a... reality in itself, it does not follow our rules of time and space. And it doesn't affect us.
Now, jumping back to our respective reality would take us a lot of magic, not only because isn't attached to it, but because it belongs in a different timeline and..."
Rainbow Dash's eyes slowly went different ways.
"And you're not paying attention, right?"
Rainbow shook her head. Her eyes glowed briefly.
"Cumoh socatod ha nos ginaronaic tu."
"Euh?" asked Twilight.
"Sacitog seuvort es seet," Rainbow continued. Out of sudden, her eyes returned to their normal state. "Guy, that was weird."
"Rainbow."
"Yes?"
"You... you were speaking the Ancient language. I didn't understand what you said bu-"
"What is that?" Rainbow questioned, "wait, what was with the cake and all? Aren't there supposed to be, like, multiverses or something?" she said, changing the subject.
"I think that, for that matter, this place belongs in all universes and at the same time in none of them. Nopony has studied reality deep enough and it's hard to find books about that that aren't plain dumb and that actually explain something that matters."
"Yeah, whatever. How do we get back to Ponyville?" asked Rainbow, waving her foreleg like nothing important happened.
She looked to the floor and, for the split of a second, Twilight could swear she saw something wrong in Rainbow Dash, something so obvious yet she couldn't tell what it was. "Uh, Equestria to egghead, how do we get back?" she asked again.
"Eh, uh, oh..." she shook her head, fog clouding her mind. "Oh, yeah. Well, you see, it took me an enormous amount of magic to cast the spell and it..." she gulped, "nearly killed me," she kicked the nonexistent dirt of the floor. "And... we... we can't..."
Rainbow's mood dropped instantly. "We... we can't come back?"
"What? No!" Twilight yelled, "of course we can go back, but that would require somepony strong enough to open our way back to Equestria. If I am correct, magic doesn't work there due to the lack of magical frequencies that unicorns use, but one could use magic if-"
"Twilight, look!" Rainbow pointed behind her.
Twilight, expecting by instict something dangerous, turned around to face whatever monstrosity could be there. Instead, she found a sign with the words "0 miles" written on it.
Rainbow Dash flew towards it. "Does this mean something?!" she asked, excitement written all over her face.
Twilight rubbed her temples, "I don't know..."
"Maybe we should follow it! Maybe it can lead us to an exit!"
"Wait, Rainbow!" Twilight screamed, watching as her friend disappeared in the distance. Seeing no other options, Twilight ran behind her, following the rainbow trail that her friend left.
But she knew, in the deepest of her mind, that something was wrong. 'Mal sebata otod'
Twilight turned around, only to find nothing to worry about.
'I swear I heard somebody...' she thought, before resuming her race to catch up with Rainbow again.
Rainbow dash stopped her flight and landed, stretching her cramped wings. She wiped off the sweat that was running down her forehead and took a mouthful of air.
Sitting, she looked upwards; a green sign with the words "2 miles" written on it greeting her. Rainbow smiled and proceeded to massage the muscles, some of her feathers even needing a little of preening after the mad race she pushed off to come to that point.
Her concentration only broke when a panting unicorn, stumbling, fell next to her.
"Lo... loyal p-p-ponies d... don't let friends... behind," she mumbled, tongue touching the floor. She licked her dry lips and closed her eyes, resting her head.
"Twilight? Are you okay?" Rainbow poked Twilight's body, her chest rising and falling, trying to catch all the possible air to soothe the pain present in her lungs.
"As a... scientist I c-can say that -" she coughed, nausa overcoming her "- I am pretty sure I am not in the best of situations concerning the state of my body."
"That means-"
"I feel bad, yes, now if you excuse me." Twilight got to her hooves, legs trembling. She reached the sign, and lowered her head, puking all the contents her stomach was holding. After finishing, she fell on her back and over the puddle of dirt, her limbs preferring to become completely numb instead of aching. Rainbow Dash ran to her side, eyes wide open.
"Twilight!"
Twilight opened her eyes, she looked at Rainbow Dash and murmured, "Yes, that is my name," before closing them again. Her throat felt hoarse, like a sandpaper had been rubbed in it. "They did teach me that breathing through my mouth was -" she trailed off "- a bad idea."
As by proving her comment, she felt something that could only be defined as ice spikes tearing apart the tissue of her throat. Although painful, she decided that that was best than feeling suffocated by only breathing for the nose.
"Crap, Twilight!" yelled Rainbow. She was the athlete, but she knew that it was common sense that breathing through the mouth was a bad idea, especially if one was running. Even more if you were a bookworm. "You just... YOU JUST DON'T DO THAT!"
"I was... I was following you," Twilight managed to say, "I didn't want to be left... alone."
Rainbow Dash's eyes widened as she finally realized what she had done. Consumed by guilt, she clenched her teeth and came closer to Twilight's body, her face a mixture of anger and regret. Putting her hooves on Twilight's chest, she said, "Just hold on."
"Hold on... I have heard those words many times this day..." she said, her chest stopped moving. "Did you know that... ponies can... c-can die of exhaustion?" Her eyelids felt heavier, the white space started to slowly vanish into nothing. "What a coincidence," she mumbled.
"Ju-just h-hold on," Rainbow said. Blinking, she noticed how watery her eyes had become. "I-I got this," she said, tears running down her cheeks.
Holding one of Twilight's hooves, she tried to warm it up. There was no objective in her mind, no reason. She was just trying to warm it up, to warm a cold hoof, a cold hoof that belonged to a body that didn't move.
Sobbing, Rainbow Dash rested her body next to her friend's, Twilight's cold hoof still in her grip.
"No, no, no, no," she repeated, "please don't go away, please don't leave me alone." She closed her eyes, crying her heart out. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, please come back."
She hugged her friend's body, noticing the vomit that soiled her mane.
'Sedese ocom.'
"Uh?" Rainbow's ears perked up.
She separated from her friend's body, got up in her hooves and frantically looked everywhere, but the result was the same as before; nothing. But there was that sensation, a feeling of being watched by someone.
However, her thoughts vanished when she heard and incoherent babbling in a familiar voice.
"Aghughghugh."
"T-Twilight?"
"How would..." she mumbled, "how would Luna's dirty messages look like?"
"Twilight!" Rainbow yelled, she ran towards her friend and hugged her in an asphyxiating embrace. "Ohmygoshohmygosh I thought you were dead!"
"Why would I?" Twilight asked, puzzled. Then she smiled and said, "Of course, they would be something like 'Thy beauty is beyond all earth's compare; Pray tell me, lover mine, what dost thou wear?'" She giggled at her own joke and got up, saying, in a serious tone, "The news of my death have been slightly exaggerated."
"What, uh, how... WHAT?!"
"It might have been a mere fainting, nothing to worry about."
'Erprapucoes uqe de anad.'
Both mares stopped, frozen.
"Did you hear...?"
"Yes, yes I did," answered Rainbow.
"This give me chills..." Twilight said, resting in her foreleg. "W-we better keep going." She pointed at the sign, "We can't be too far away from whatever this thing leads us."
"Y-yeah," Rainbow replied, sensing a strange change in the temperature. "We better keep going," she said with a nervous smile.
Twilight smiled and lead the walk, Rainbow following her.
With their mind occupied in other things, they didn't hear the menacing whisper of the creature that followed them. 'Memrosai motmaso osol.'
Walking was something Rainbow didn't like to do, not because of despise to the other races, but because it gave her time to think about things. Like the way she had acted when she saw the first green sign; flying straight forward, abandoning her friend. Or the mix of feelings when she thought Twilight was dead; anger, sadness, guilt...
'Wait a moment,' she thought, 'if she wasn't really dead...' She felt a cold hoof between her forelegs, but looking at them only informed her that she was walking. She shivered, even if Twilight hadn't died back in the '2 miles' zone, her fainting seemed too serious to be a simple reaction to exhaustion and the feeling Rainbow got when she touched her still hoof...
Rainbow shook her head. Trying to dissipate her thoughts, she looked at what was in front of her; a purple butt. Blushing awkwardly, she looked to her right, where there were no butts to distract her. She wasn't into mares, after all.
But being distracted from the only thing that wasn't white made her think about the events of before again; how motionless Twilight's body was, how she puked on the floor, how tired was she when she arrived... how tired...
Rainbow's eyes widened, they have been walking since Twilight got up, which was seconds after she fainted for overworking her body. How could she, a pony that didn't practice sports or similar, a pony that breathed with the mouth while doing exercise, recover so easily? Was that magic? But Twilight had said that magic couldn't work there because there was a lack of magical frequencies to use it, right?
With the gears in her brain working at 100 mph, Rainbow didn't notice that Twilight had stopped walking and collided with her, putting a stop to her thoughts.
"What the...?"
"There aren't any more signs, Rainbow," Twilight said, deadpanned.
"What?! You gotta' be lying, right?!" Dash yelled, rubbing her nose.
"No, there aren't signs."
"But that's impossible, we saw them appearing, there have to be more of 'em!"
"I have been counting the seconds, Rainbow. We have been walking for more than two hours, there AREN'T more signs..." Twilight said, turning around to face Rainbow Dash, tears staining her face. "The Void has tricked us."
Rainbow's jaw hung open, then, slowly, she closed it. "Oh, you got me with this one, Twi!" she said, laughing, "I thought you said that there... that there weren't more signs..." her voice lowered as she saw Twilight's sad expression, her laugh morphing into a nervous one. "Oh..." She lowered her head, face darkened by her colorful forelocks.
Twilight sat, ears dropped.
"Why would the Void do that?" asked Rainbow, catching Twilight's attention.
"I... I don't know," answered Twilight, grabbing her head with her hooves. "I just want to take a nap."
In a silent acceptance, Rainbow sat down next to her friend and hugged her. "Me too," she said, a tear running down her cheek. "I am tired." She smiled at her friend, who in return did the same. "Goodnight, Twi," she said, before closing her eyes and driving off into a dreamless sleep.
"Goodnight," said Twilight, her eyelids weighing more than before. Just as she drived off to the incredible imaginary landscape waiting for her, she caught a glimpse of a dark cloud of smoke far away in the distance.
She just hoped than when she woke up, she would find herself in her warm bed, in her library and with Spike preparing a mug of hot cocoa.
Oh, she hoped.
"Spike, wake up, Spike!" Apple Bloom, somehow, managed to shout and whisper.
"Nnnghnhgn," the dragon answered, turning around in the guest bed. "No... not the bees."
"Spike!" yelled the filly, this time, awakening the dragon. "Spike, look!" She pointed her hoof at the window, where a blinding purple pilar could be seen above the trees and fog, but due to the distance between the farm and the town, it seemed more like a thin bright line than a magical pilar of destruction. "Fireworks!"
"Fireworks, Spike!" repeated Scootaloo. "Fireworks!" She shook Spike with her hooves.
Spike, still sleepy, opened his eyes. Before him were three blurred spots, one white, one yellow and one orange; that took the shape of Sweetie Belle, Apple Bloom and Scootaloo after a few blinks.
Spike, having been defeated by the fillies, got out of bed and stumbled towards the window.
With his mind half asleep, he asked, "Since when is that there?"
"Dunno, Scootaloo heard a loud boom and woke me up," said Apple Bloom, sitting near Spike. "It has been there for, like, minutes!" she exclaimed.
Spike observed how the enormous 'firework' changes its form from a pilar to swirling lines of purple that joined together in the top.
"What kind of firework is that?" he asked to no one. He had never seen something like that, only small fireworks that always exploded in hundred of fragments, but that thing looked like it was being controlled.
Just as he started to notice how beautiful the thing -that has taken the shape of a spiral- was, the extreme of the top went down in a straight line, in a movement far too... strict , like it was being forced to do so.
"What the-?"
Seconds after the thing disappeared, the sound of something collapsing was heard in the distance, shaking the trees of the farm.
"Awww, it's gone," said Sweetie, disappointed.
"Back to sleep," said Spike, waving his claws. Just as he was getting in the sheets, Scootaloo went and pushed him, throwing him to the floor.
"We can't go to sleep!" she exclaimed, "they're throwing fireworks in Ponyville and I want to see it!"
With his face still on the floor, Spike said, "Sleepover, fog, Applejack is overprotective, sleep."
"But mah' sister isn't here! She is with Pinkie doin' crazy recipes!"
"Big Macintosh," Spike continued. "Sleep."
Apple Bloom scowled and tried to move the dragon, but Spike was already snoring.
"What was the reason ya' need me here, Pinks?" asked Applejack, watching as said mare ran through the entire kitchen, opening cupboards, carrying bags of flour, and pouring milk in some bowls. "Ya' seem doin' pretty well."
Pinkie, potentiated by the powerful miracle that was caffeine, stopped and said, "But you're the one who makes the best pies!"
"Ah' know, but-"
Applejack was suddenly interrupted by Pinkie's movements. She looked at her friend, whose tail was twitching, her eyes fluttering, her ears flopping and more. Applejack was speechless, knowing full well that that meant that the Pinkie Sense was at work.
"That was a big one!" Pinkie exclaimed after her body stopped its weird movements, "something unexpected is going to happen!"
"Somethin' like?" she asked, wondering what was that has caused the Pinkie Sense to went like that. It wasn't a matter of time until a loud explosion answered her question.
Pinkie's smile dropped. "It's something bad."
Twilight's body floated through the space, as opposed to The White Void and its... whiteness, the space which Twilight was dreaming was completely different; it was black, yes, but million of stars, galaxies and similar stuff gave her more comfort than all the green signs The White Void could hope to have.
She smiled, losing all the stress she had gained throughout the day. She felt like a filly again, under Celestia's warm wing, watching the night sky in all its beauty.
But like all good dreams, Twilight's had to come to an end.
"Twilight Sparkle," something hissed. "You really don't understand, do you?"
Twilight opened her eyes, her pupils of the size of peas. "Who is here?!" she yelled, trying to sound intimidating.
The thing, that was probably invisible, laughed.
"Oh, shh, Twilight," it said, like it was scolding her. "Though I appreciate that you didn't treat me as a 'what', I am not the one to blame."
Twilight, confused, looked everywhere in an attempt to find who was mocking her, but the space was the only thing that greeted her. "Show yourself!" she demanded.
The thing laughed, and as it was doing that, a suture opened in the space, like the later was just a canvas. Twilight, terrified by the blackness that seemed to emanate from the suture, tried to 'swim' in the space, moving her legs desesperately.
Though doing her best effort, the suture, acting like a black hole, sucked her and threw her in a place pitch black.
Scared, Twilight stuttered, "W-where are you?!" she yelled to the nothingness. There was not a single light and, when Twilight looked to the suture that had transported her to that place, she saw that it was closed.
She was alone.
"Oh, but I am right here," the blackness said. "You can see me now."
Twilight clenched her teeth. "Who are you?!"
The thing laughed and said, "Being the smart pony, I thought you would have inferred it by now, but if you want to know..." A pair of yellow eyes appeared just in front of Twilight, piercing her soul with their stare. "I am the Void." The yellow eyes disappeared, leaving a shivering Twilight behind.
Once she recovered control over her body, Twilight looked to the space and said, determined, "What do you want?"
"Me?" it said with a tone of innocence, that changed to one of pure malice with its next phrase. "Nothing, I'm just watching the spectacle."
"What spectacle?" asked Twilight.
"The one you and your friend are pulling," it said, "everything you do is priceless! Especially the part where you died!"
Twilight felt her heart sank. "I didn't die!" she exclaimed, offended.
"Oh, you didn't?" the space asked, seemingly puzzled.
"No, I didn't!" Twilight reassured, "if I did, I wouldn't be here!" she exclaimed. Pointing at her, she signaled her entire body, "I am pretty real and definitely not dead."
"How sad," the space said, "you would prefer to be, though."
Just when Twilight was about to ask what it was referring to, she felt like the whole space was collapsing. A crack appeared in the blackness, followed by more and more cracks, until all of them fell apart in millions of small fragments with the sound of a broken glass.
Twilight fell.
Twilight screamed as loud as she could.
The black fragments were floating around her, -some of them still breaking in smaller parts-, accompaining her as she fell in the endless pit that her dream had become.
The background had drastically changed from its original color to a mix of dark red, purple, green and black, red being the prominent one, though the broken pieces that surrounded Twilight maintained their color.
It seemed like a weird dream while being high.
Coughing blood, Twilight looked to the black fragments that were around her. Part of them were spinning in their places, while the others just fell, graceless. Like her.
Was she still falling?
But there was one thing that Twilight was sure; the moment she would land on the ground, the moment her spine would break like a conch being smashed with a rock. Gulping of the idea, Twilight turned, so her legs would be sacrificed first.
'Wait, this is a dream, I am not supposed to feeEEEEEEEEEL-' her thought was cut short as her legs collided with the dark red floor. The bones were split apart, their jagged tops completely visible, while Twilight's ribs entered her body, piercing her organs.
A pool of blood started appearing below Twilight's broken body, as she forced air to enter her perfored lungs with raspy breaths, while trying not to scream of the newfound pain.
When she started to choke in her own blood, Twilight noticed that the black fragments of The Void were still surrounding her, making a dome around her body. Though she could still see through the cracks, the place were she was confined was nearly as black as The... Black Void, she supposed.
'I am confused,' she thought, the pain of her broken legs decreasing somehow. Twilight looked to her legs, only to be surprised by the sight of her purple legs in their normal shape, no bones broken. 'If The Void here is black, and The Void is the same creature as the White Void, then...'
A mocking, resonant, severe laugh was heard through the dome, making the black pieces -and Twilight- shake.
"You're still trying to deduce who am I, right?" it asked, waiting for the obvious response.
Twilight shot him -if it could be called as a him- a glare. The laugh was heard again.
"Shut up, Sombra," said Twilight, trying to make herself as imponent as possible. She didn't even know if The Void was really Sombra, but who could she blame apart from him? "Why are you doing this?"
"Sombra?" it asked, "it has been time that I didn't hear that name."
Something outside the dome covered the cracks, turning off the only light Twilight had. But as the dome went black, the pieces shone in order, reflecting Twilight's image.
"How-?"
"I think that I might know this Sombra you're talking about, said -" Twilight's reflection stopped showing in the black mirrors, and was instantly replaced by the image of a grey stallion with a black mane running, terrified of whatever followed him "- is the one who ran like a chicken and lost his mind when he couldn't bear what he saw?"
"What? No! It can't be the same-"
"Pretty rude of you to blast him apart, the poor stallion had just recovered his mind and then, boom!" A pair of gleaming eyes appeared in one of the biggest pieces that formed the mirror, locking eyes with Twilight. "I thought your species were pacifists."
"It is not the same Sombra! He was an evil tyrant who enslaved an entire empyre!" Twilight yelled, getting up. "He hurt thousand of ponies and used his magic to banish these ponies when he was punished for his crimes!" She stomped her hoof, as trying to remark her point.
"And he was locked up in his mind the whole time," the thing added, "maybe I helped in that part..."
"Wh-what?!" Twilight asked, lips quivering.
"Well, you see, I am really lonely sometimes, but I don't really like it when ponies just appear in my personal space, chatting the whole time. And crying and praying and dying and killing each other and-"
"K-killing each other?!"
"So I get bored and I decide to play with them," the thing said, not paying attention to Twilight's interruption. "I hope your friend is happy that you doomed her," it said, with an air of superiority.
"You... you're lying! Princess Celestia is going to get us out!" Twilight exclaimed, desesperated.
"And how long it will take her?"
"Probably a few days... a few weeks at its worst," she said, doubt in her words.
The thing's characteristic laugh was heard again. "A few days?!" it exclaimed, "a few days?!" it repeated. Its voice trailed off and silence was heard for long, awkward minutes. "To you, it will look like a millions of years, darling," it said, suddenly imitating Rarity's voice. "Goodbye, little one."
"Wait!" Twilight yelled, but the black pieces dissapared in puffs of smoke and she fell, again.
All the time, she could only hear the thing's laugh, accompained by ear-shattering screams that churned her stomach. Screams that ranged from Sombra's voice to mare's ones.
And screams that were of her own.
"Hey Dash, what is your favorite smell?" Twilight asked, said mare picking up orange leaves from the clouds to put them in a pile.
Rainbow turned her head around, the black sclera of her eyes resalting her red irises. "Tapasat las de le," she said in a deep voice.
Twilight smiled, it made sense, everything made sense. Of course her friend's favorite smell would be the one of potatoes, after all, her name wasn't Brown Harvest for nothing.
Rainbow returned to her task, cleaning the clouds from their leaves. Twilight, without any fear of snapping her horn, hit a tree using her head, causing fishes to fall on the pink grass.
"Hey, Sparkle," Rainbow said, her four wings fluttering as she landed in the ground, a saddlebag full of leaves on her back. "How cool is it to have horns?" she asked, stroking her colorless mane; which morphed into a small version of the night sky as Rainbow finished triggering it.
Twilight stopped hitting trees, her goat-like horns completely fine. Cautiously turning around, she looked at her brown friend. "Really cool," she said, trying to not stomp in the rainbow-colored eels. Unfortunately, she stepped in one and her coat turned inmediately pink, while her mane turned purple with white stripes.
Rainbow laughed at her, some of the orange leaves falling.
"This is not funny, Rainbow!" Twilight yelled. "I could get the eel fever!" Rainbow's laugh decreased, as a look of horror replaced her mocking expression. Twilight could have smiled, but prefer to not do so due to the possibility of acquiring said fever. "Now we gotta' go to Carrotville to see if Nurse Blueliver has a shot for it."
Rainbow's mouth fell once the realization set in. "You mean you didn't get a shot when you were a shrimp?" Twilight nodded, "that is downright crazy! Who do you believe you are, Queen Golden Sun?!"
Twilight, taken aback by the sudden accusation, growled, then stood up in her back legs, using her scorpion-like tail for balance. "I challenge you to a duel!" she screamed, her tail moving dangerously.
Rainbow woke up, a bad taste in her mouth. Looking to her side, she saw her friend; foam coming out her mouth while her eyes and legs twitched spasmodically. "Holy crap!" she yelled, surprised.
Coming closer to her friend, she poked her chest; a rainbow circle appeared in where she had touched, only to disappear a few seconds later. "What in Tartarus?" Rainbow asked to no one. She continued poking, always with the same effects. "Twilight," she said, agitating her friend with her hooves, "Twilight," she repeated, growing anxious.
'Shit, shit, shit,' Rainbow thought as she stopped agitating Twilight. Hooves in temples, she thought, 'What did that thing of first aids say about epileptic attacks?! Think, Rainbow, think!'
"W-what?" asked Rainbow, dumbfounded. "A-a duel?!"
"Yes," replied Twilight. "Are you going to accept, or are you a coward?"
Rainbow growled, her four wings extended in all their splendor. "Nopony calls Blue Winds a coward!" she yelled, levitating.
"You still don't have the sixth Element! The spark didn't work!" Twilight screamed, her black coat illuminated by her flaming mane. She extended her wings, her horn becoming red as she took power from the red sun outside.
"But it did! A different kind of spark. I felt it the very moment I realized how brave were my friends. The spark ignited inside me when I realized that you all... are heros!" she said, her friends levitating behind her, smiling. "You see, Blazing Sun, when those Elements are ignited by the... the spark, that resides in the heart of us all, it creates the sixth element: the element of... power!" the blue unicorn exclaimed, a crown appearing atop her head, accompained by an entire set of armor. "And with those; the Elements of Armery, we shall defeat you!"
"No..." Twilight mumbled, stepping back in fear. The Elements, activated by their respective holders' traits, shone like the sun, forming a magical rainbow of energy that shot towards Twilight. "Noooo!" Twilight screamed as the powerful rainbow attacked her.
The blinding light that originated from the Elements was all she could see before being overwhelmed by the pain.
"Ohmygosh!" Twilight cried out, tears in her eyes.
"Twilight!"
"Drugs!" Twilight screamed, "somepony put drugs in my cereal, Rainbow!"
"Whatdusu?" Rainbow said, trying to form a coherent question as she saw her friend speaking nonsense; her blue mane disheveled. For all that Rainbow knew, a disheveled mane meant that Twilight was coming closer to another 'lesson zero' episode.
"There was this weird change of scenarios and..." Twilight was kindly silenced with a cyan hoof in her mouth. She looked to her friend, who was smiling sadly.
Retreating her hoof, Rainbow let Twilight continue, this time, more calm. "It just... it was just the weirder dream ever, Rainbow."
"Wanna talk about it?" Rainbow asked.
Twilight wondered for a second if Rainbow had taken any psychologist lessons before answering, "No."
"Good," Rainbow said, extending her hoof.
Twilight, smiling, took Rainbow's hoof with her shaky one and got up.
"Now let's going to get out of here!" Rainbow yelled, joy present in her words. She flew a few feet over the ground and pointed towards a green sign that said '6 miles'.
Twilight was preparing herself to run when Rainbow landed softly next to her. "But let's going to do this together ," she added, locking eyes with her friend.
"Together?" Twilight asked.
Rainbow grinned.
"Yes, together," she reassured.
Nothing but the sound of hoofsteps interrupted the silence that reigned in The Void. Absolutely nothing.
It was driving Rainbow nuts.
Rainbow, bored by the predictability of what she would see in the fantastic and colorful landscape that was The Void, lost herself in her thoughts.
However, when trying to recall the situation when she woke up, her brain reacted with a sudden wave of pain. Groaning, Rainbow fell to the floor, her forelegs holding her head. It felt like an invisible drill was perforating her skull.
After a few seconds, the pain decreased and Rainbow was able to get up again, but not before catching a glimpse of a shadow running away from her sight.
"What in..." She had repeated too much that phrase lately; enough to make her shut up before finishing it.
Silence reigned again.
Nothing made a sound.
Absolutely nothing.
Rubbing her eyes in disbelief, Rainbow looked in front of her, and then at her surroundings.
Twilight Sparkle wasn't there.
"Twilight?" Rainbow asked, hoping to see her friend.
Instead of the mare with a purple butt, a pink gas appeared out of thin air, just a few meters away from where she stood. Seemingly controlled, the gas moved towards Rainbow.
Creeped out by the gas, Rainbow took flight.
She watched at the gas stopped its movements, but was taken aback when the gas... started talking.
"Erppucose te no," it said in a raspy voice. Rainbow felt shills going down her spine just by hearing it. "Jemro rahmeso te."
Rainbow laughed nervously. "O-okay Twi, you c-can stop now ," Rainbow said, putting emphasis in the last word.
The gas... growled and started forming a spiral. Upwards. To reach her .
It was a bad time to remember that her friend had said that, in The Void, an unicorn couldn't cast magic. Unfortunately for Rainbow, making illusions was considered as a part of 'magic'.
Shrieking in terror, but not loud enough to affect her awesomeness, Rainbow flew high. As she did so, the pink spiral shot upwards at breakneck speed, catching the pegasus and forcing her down.
Adrenaline and desesperation helping her, Rainbow's brain was unable to process how inefficient were her attempts to escape. It wasn't until the only thing she could see was pink that she stopped fighting, just to faint the next second as the gas encapsulated her.
"Celestia help us," Applejack said as she looked down at the hole where the library was supposed to be. Next to her, Pinkie Pie stared wide-eyed.
A group of ponies had gathered around the crater when they heard the explosion, and it had been quite the hard task to come closer to the place. But after a quick glance, Applejack wanted to not have come at all.
She looked at Pinkie, and was quickly tackled by her.
"Pinkie!" Applejack yelled. "What do you bel-?"
"Look," Pinkie cut her off, pointing at the place Applejack was a second ago. "You were going to fall." Like Pinkie stated, the scorched ground rumbled and fell to the darkness below.
Applejack stared speechless. Some of the ponies retreated, watching from a safe distance.
Pinkie, smiling sadly, moved away from Applejack. Her spongy mane was deflating and, if Applejack's eyes weren't cheating her, Pinkie's coat looked more dull.
Accompaining her change of appearance, a sob escaped Pinkie's lips. Applejack's heart ached.
"Girls!" somepony yelled in the public. After a few seconds, a white mare with a purple mane made her way towards the two ponies.
Wiping away the sweat from her forehead, she got up in her hindlegs and screamed, "GET AS FAR AWAY AS POSSIBLE! DARK MAGICAL RESIDUES ARE STILL PRESENT AND CAN BE DANGEROUS!" Waving her forelegs like a mad mare, the ponies retreated even more and some of them ran without direction, it didn't take long until all of them were running towards their houses.
Just like the mare expected.
"Rarity," Applejack said, grabbing her hoof to get up. "What are ya' doin'?" she asked, accomodating her hat.
"Cleaning the place," she replied. "We need to send a letter to Princess Celestia as quickly as possible." She turned around and started walking towards Sweet Apple Acres. "Spike was with you, right?"
"Wait!" Pinkie yelled, appearing in front of the more. "We need to see what happened down there!"
Rarity bit her lip. "Pinkie, I know this from experience. There is residual magic in the air and I don't recommend getting down there."
"But what about Twilight?!" Pinkie continued, "the library is completely destroyed!"
"Well-"
"What if she died?! Do you know if she died?!"
"Pinkie-"
"We need to get down there, Rares!" Pinkie screamed in her face, shaking Rarity by her shoulders. "W-we need to m-make sure..." she trailed off, her once-spongy mane hanging straight, her pink coat becoming grayer than before.
A tear made its way down Pinkie's eye, followed by more.
Rarity put a hoof on her friend's shoulder in a sign of support. "I know you want to see, dear. But Twilight casted something powerful, something very powerful. And I am sure that approaching the scene will do no thing to help."
She wiped away a tear of her friend's eye and continued, "The quicker we get Celestia here, the quicker this is all solved."
"Will we g-get Twilight b-back?"
Rarity smiled, though a tear rolled down her cheek. "I don't know, Pinkie. I don't know."
Pinkie snorted, crying.
"Don't cry, Pinkie."
Pinkie, sobbing uncontrollaby, pointed behind Rarity. "It... it's just that... that Applejack went down while we were t-talking."
"What?!"
The unicorn licked her lips, a few beads of sweat running down her temples, only to stop when reaching the goggles' bands that covered her eyes.
Illuminated by the weak light of a pair of candles, she levitated a book nearby and gave a quick glance to the page explaining the spell. Looking to the circle drawn underneath her hooves, with every trace made with imported magical chalk, she made sure to have done it in the right way; no residues of chalk, no shaky lines that could disrupt the fluency of the magic.
Smiling at her hard work, she put down the book and levitated five scrolls -all of them written by her- and floated them over, reading in her mind their contents.
It had taken weeks to perfect the spell: She had had stressing days studying the worn out papers written by Star Swirl the Bearded, just to infer something that could be a clue or a phrase taken completely out of context.
But in that moment, she wasn't going to utter a single thing about those days of looking after ancient -and lost- books; only after finishing the spell would she let those memories break her concentration.
She inhaled sharply, the smell of detergents and cleaning products filling her nostrils, along with the almost indetectable smell that all basements have.
Twilight Sparkle was ready.
The night, that time were ponies were asleep and safe in their warm homes. That time when Rainbow Dash had to explain, for third time, to a group of newbies what was the schedule to follow and what they didn't have to do.
"No, no, no!" she exclaimed, breathing like a bull. She closed her eyes, counted to ten and looked to the team that was assigned to her; all of them horrified by her actitude. 'Don't be too hard with them, they're just newbies...' Rainbow reminded herself. "You just... don't try to use spectra to make the mist look colorful, okay?"
An off-white stallion with a gray mane hid an empty bucket behind his back, whistling.
"And you don't use spectra to MAKE mist..."
A blue stallion with a white mane hid his dirty hooves behind his back, looking everywhere but Rainbow. 'How did they get spectra in the first place?' Rainbow thought.
Sighing in annoyance, Rainbow continued speaking. "Tonight we need mist in the town's territories, not too thick and not higher than three foot," she looked to the two stallions. "And specially not colorful," she said, the rest of the team giggling.
Rainbow continued. "Since there hasn't been a single rain in some of the town's farms, the owners had asked specifically for a fog." She pointed to the two stallions that had made all the disaster. "Prism Glider, Milky Way, you get to make the fog. You can take it from the Everfree -" their eyes widened "- or you can place hot air over cold air, whatever fits you two."
The two stallions nodded and flew. Rainbow looked to the rest of the team.
"All of you get to make the mist, I will make sure to maintain the paths clear and keep in line the fog. We don't want pegasi falling from the skies or another incident like the past week , don't we?" The pegasi left gulped. "Thought so."
The team parted and Rainbow, having said it all, flew towards the town's main paths, the night's cold air passing over her cyan fur with its fresh touch.
She smiled and flew upwards, stopped and fell, only to open her wings in the last moment. She flew parallel to the ground, dodging buildings that seemed spots at the speed she was flying. Her colorful hair waving in the wind. In her excitation, she made a few stunts, a rainbow trail following all her movements.
For a moment, she forgot about the schedule and its strict rules. The sensation of being free present in her mind.
But then there was a loud sound, like a bomb exploiting. She turned around and saw something that sent chills to her spine.
An enormous, destructive and bright white pilar of magic coming from her friend's house.
Wrong.
Everything was wrong.
From the inkwell flying to the wind that was making it fly.
Twilight Sparkle covered her face with her forelegs. Her eyes were glowing in the same way they had done so many years ago, when she earned her cutie mark. Twilight hadn't known of something at that time, and that was the threat that a magical outburst represented. She was lucky that the outburst didn't kill her when she was a filly.
But now, fate wasn't in her side. And she would need much luck to end with nothing but a broken horn.
'I don't want to die I don't want to die I don't want to die' Twilight repeated in her mind like a mantra to hold into. If she was going to die, at least she would keep her sanity, or so she thought.
Her body, floating in the center of the circle due to the strong winds, twitched uncontrollably. Twilight let out a groan, pain taking over her head.
She could feel the magic taking physical form, but her fears were only confirmed when she heard wood breaking and small pieces of stone falling to the basement.
'Ev-evv... ever-everypony wi-will s-SEE IT!' Twilight thought. Crying, she tried to gather all the magic back, even if that meant that her organs could end up dispersed in the basement, or her horn imploding, dooming her to never use magic again.
But the safety of the other ponies was before hers. After all, she was the one who thought that casting an incomplete spell -and completed by her- in a foreign language was a good idea. It had nothing to do with the fact that doing a small sacrifice could save the entire town from desintegrating into ashes. Nothing to do with that.
Nothing at all.
Her horn felt like a balloon that was going to explode at any moment, sending waves of pain towards her brain. A high pitched beep piercing her eardrums, only interrupted with the sound of an object smashing another. She closed her eyes, screaming, trying to stop the pain that was crushing her head.
"Hold on!"
She recognized that voice.
And she wanted it as far away as possible.
"R-R-Rainbow do-do... DON'T COME CLOSER!" she yelled. Opening her eyes, she could hardly see Rainbow Dash, her vision ruined by the bright ball of magic in which she was trapped. However, her plan seemed to work, as proved by the lines of energy that were being recolected in the tip of her horn, forming a spiral of purple lines over it.
Rainbow covered her face with a foreleg, but continued to step forward to save her. Seemed unaffected by the strong winds that were making everything fly.
'Didn't she hear me?! Why doesn't she stop?!'
Rainbow extended a foreleg, she was too close. 'No no no no no no NO NO NO NO!'
"RAINBOW, NO!!"
Her hoof touched the ball, disrupting the already unstable energy and liberating the magic gathered by Twilight's horn, unleashing it. The whole basement was engulfed in light for a few seconds, and when it disappeared, nothing but a big black spot was left where once two ponies were.
The ceiling of the basement, weakened by the magic beam, collapsed over the scene with a loud sound. A cloud of dust rising above the pieces of broken wood and concrete. Different scientific instruments scattered all over the place.
Accompained by the sound of hooves, ponies -awakened by the explosion- came rushing; only to be surprised with the sight of what was once the Golden Oak Library.
