Unraveling a Rainbow

A tempest of emotions swathed over Luna as she tried to find her bearings within Heartthrob’s unstable imagination. In place of her ebony sea was a dark, raging typhoon, formless and without direction, a chaotic storm of mental energy of illogical reasoning. A changeling’s mind proved to be a different beast than what she usually tamed, overflowing with visions and memories of intermingled thoughts, ideas, aspirations, and fears. For all of the princess’s efforts, she found it nearly impossible to make a sense of the nonsense around her.

“Changeling! You must focus upon one instance, do not let your mind shift focus from that image for a single second!” she called out into the darkness, hoping for a drop of steadiness in the swirling chaos. As she looked for any sign of the changeling, a familiar white figure came into view. It was only then did Luna noticed Celestia’s less than graceful entrance into the Dreamscape.

“She has a name!” Celestia shouted with a Doppler effect coming and going around the tempest like a cow caught in a tornado. She flailed around trying find up or down in the raging sea of spectral images.

Seeing her elder sister’s plight, coupled with her ungracious spiraling in the formless vortex sweeping her to and fro, brought a smile to Luna’s face. She watched the absurd spectacle of a hopeless alabaster alicorn streaking across the void like a flailing star struggling to maintain her place in the imaginary realm. Luna had often pondered why Celestia had been so pushy for her to resume her nightly duties once her proper alicorn magic had been restored. Apparently the extra thousand years reigning alone had not made Celestia any better when dealing with the workings of the dreamscape's unreality.

Refocusing on the task at hand, she felt a steadying presence within the madness. It was a single voice calling out to her among the myriad of memories which she grasped onto like a rope towing a lost vessel to shore. Feeling a sense of control seep into her hooves, Luna steadied her footing before tapping into the powers around her.

Instantly, the storm was quelled as a featureless sea of sand emerged from below Luna, or formed above Celestia from the sun princess’s upside-down perspective. Heartthrob appeared before the princess of the night in her original changeling form as the rapidly setting sun princess gracelessly hurtled towards the ground like an errant airborne piano before crashing muzzle-first into a nearby sand dune. A plume of silt and dirt bellowed in her wake.

“Wha… where,” the disoriented changeling babbled as she whisked her head around until she caught a sunny flank sticking out of the sand. Recognizing the limp legs and ethereal tail sticking out like a flag of a sandcastle, the nurse ran to the aid of the royal rump. “Y-your highness!”

‘Truer words have never been spoken by a shape-shifter,’ Luna thought as she chuckled at the rump.

Princess Celestia erupted from the sandy dune, falling to her back while coughing and hacking as she tried to spit out the gritty hot silt between in her teeth. She quickly brushed her tongue and teeth with a cleansing spell before looking up with a tinge of hot embarrassment and frustration seeing the former bearer of laughter nonchalantly admiring her rather shiny silver horseshoes. Tia nearly burst into sisterly rage until she remembered their literal head hostess’ presence. Princess Celestia adjusted her regalia while clearing her throat of the last bit of debris.

“You have quite outdone yourself, Luna,” she lauded with forced warmth behind her lustrous smile, “it is no small feat to replicate the bitter taste of sand so well. Shall we see what Heartthrob wishes to show us?”

Luna simply replied with a curt nod as she suppressed the urge to laugh. “Now, changeling, you have set the stage for your play, now it is time to bring the characters center stage. Close your eyes and think back to the moment you wish to show us.” Luna waited a moment as she felt the changeling meditate, bringing the image to the forefront of her mind. “Good. Now, extend that thought to the world around us, let me into your mind and I shall do the rest.”

“Yes, your highness,” she droned as she let her subconscious flow.

Princess Luna felt around the vision as she began casting her magic in tune with the flow of Heartthrob’s memory. She had never tried to reach into the mind of a changeling to pull out a memory before, and to say it was jarring reaching through Heartthrob’s memories would drastically undersell the morose catacombs of the changeling’s psyche. There was a deep loneliness pervading about, a disconnect of something missing from the mare, something precious and stolen from her. Luna could almost perceive visions of the past, ghosts of her friends and family, but she could sense their long dead feelings scattered to the wind when approached. Seeing a flicker of life, Luna outstretched her hoof to see it, but withdrew, suddenly getting a new perspective of her space.

Among the blacks and grays of the vacant mind were Heartthrob’s memories taking up an infinitesimal space when compared to the vacancy of the grand corridors. Thinking it only a small grain of errant thought, the vision burst forth revealing Heartthrob’s entire being for Luna to see. The princess took a step back, feeling a new appreciation for the enormity of the place she found herself in. Gaining a sense of size for the first time in the labyrinth, she could measure the size of the walls and columns rising high and curving into a ceiling several stories tall. She looked back and forth down the intermingled hallways stretching out into the horizon like the grassy hills of Chromina’s dreams, realizing she and Heartthrob  were alone in a dead and abandoned city.

Not wishing to linger any longer, Luna summoned forth the strongest image that Heartthrob was focusing upon. With a little force, she was able to pluck the necessary image from the spacious corridors of Heartthrob’s mind as she found herself back on the sands she had crafted. The picture grew clearly as the seconds slipped by. The cloudless sky spread across the horizon with a sun burning into view. In the distance, rocky spires and tall plateaus sprang from the sandy depths, creeping higher above the horizon to cast looming shadows. As their picture of the Badlands neared completion, silence lingered as darkness skulked through the arcane tides, casting the dream into deep shades of red, violet, and grey. A chaotic ebb of emotions contorting the memories into something less desirable as Luna felt the changeling lose control.

“I don’t like it here…” the changeling quavered, her id suppressing her thoughts as she tried to recall the event.

“Focus!” Luna barked at the shivering changeling. “Do not let your memories be clouded by irrational fear, you must keep your emotions in line!”

Celestia backed up from the channeling duo, feeling an ominous pressure rising from the two. She stepped back only to feel something grab her rear leg and begin pulling her into the sinking sands. Heartthrob began to hyperventilate as Luna felt her emotions soar from fear to terror. Luna gritted her teeth as she hadn’t expected a changeling’s memory to be so difficult to tame. This was a memory wishing not to be remembered.

“Luna, perhaps it would be best to try a different approach?” Celestia offered as the Badlands drifted deeper into a nightmare.

The vision became more muddled and chaotic as any sense of reality began slipping through their hooves. Spires began curving downwards like wilting blades of grass as entire mountains melted into piles of blackened sand and ash. The sun glowed a sickly violet as the vision quickly spiraled into a night terror. Celestia tried her best to regain control of herself as she took flight above the unfurling pandemonium, but black tendrils of a molten rock shot forth, entangled her wings, and forced her back down to the sinkhole forming below her.

“Luna,” the elder sister grunted as she felt her entire body seeping below, “now would be a very good time to end this!”

Luna forced her eyes open to see what the changeling’s mind had spiraled into. Seeing no way to calm the waves down, she breathed deeply as her eyes beamed with moonlight.

“BE STILL!”

There was a loud boom in reply from Heartthrob’s mind as the entire dream was forced to collapse in on itself. All three mares found themselves back on the formless sand dunes, bewildered from the breakdown. Luna stomped forwards toward the changeling as she forebodingly rose above her, narrowing her gaze and making sure to cast a long shadow over the offending shape-shifter.

“What folly is this?” Luna yelled as she grabbed Heartthrob with her magic. “How is reflecting upon traumatic memories easier than simply telling us?!”

“I don’t know,” Heartthrob sputtered as her eyes were transfixed on the angry blue eyes of the midnight princess. She tried averting her gaze until the angry moon snorted the changeling back to her full attention. “I tried remembering the moment I met Scruffy, but…” she trailed as she saw Luna’s irises had shifted to green.

“Oh no,” Heartthrob quickly blinked through a spectrum of color reflecting in Luna’s eyes, confirming her fears, “rainbows...”

Luna dropped the orange and black failure to the ground, staring off into the distance in disgust. She face-hooved as her ire began boiling again. “You mean to tell me that I, Luna, Princess of the Night, have been bested by a mere changeling’s block on your memory?!” Luna’s cheeks burned red at beholding such indignation.

“THE DREAMSCAPE IS OUR REALM! AS RULER OF THE DIMENSION OF DREAMS, WE SHALL NOT BE SO EASILY DEFEATED BY A SILVER-TONGUED SHAPESHIFTER’S SPELL!” the alicorn boomed as she rose higher into the sky, kicking up a tornado in her wake. “WE REFUSE TO BE DENIED OUR BIRTHRIGHT BY A MERE MORTAL! IF YOU CANNOT GIVE US WHAT WE SEEK, WE SHALL TAKE IT BY FORCE!”

“Luna, wait!” the elder sister cried out to no avail.

The Dreamscape swirled around as the ground flowed into a torrent of sand. Luna forced herself into Heartthrob’s memory, plucking out the closest fully formed memory within her grasp. Heartthrob reeled in pain at the royal’s sudden intrusion as the dream exploded with a blinding flash.

Topsy-turvy, upside-downy, sickly-spiny, wibbly-wobbly, and all other forms of nauseating vertigo flung Rainbow Dash around like a centrifuge for what seemed like an eternity. Bleary and blinded by lights around her, she tried focusing any senses on where she was. Her mind was a jumbled mess as she wasn’t sure when she had awoken or if she had been asleep at all. The only thing she could really perceive was taste, and it was sour. So incredibly sour like licking a lemon juice covered, acid leaking battery overcharged by a lightning bolt dipped in a rancid rainbow. She wasn’t sure if rainbows could be rancid or if they had expiration dates, but it was the only thing that came to mind.

Whatever she had done to deserve this, she was fairly certain of two things: one, it probably wasn’t her idea originally, two, Cloud Punch and Berrykicker were somehow involved. Blurred dancing lights slowly shaped into a spinning wicker ceiling fan gently wafting the scents of the sea into her nostrils. Letting out a painful groan as she stirred from her bewilderment, Rainbow lurched up from her daze taking in her new, tropical surroundings. Various potted plants decorated the room complimenting the floral wallpaper which met bamboo paneling halfway down the wall. The bamboo wove itself into a tubular floor molding sprouting into a sturdy bamboo trim which flowed along beautiful rows of polished wood flooring. Out a nearby window, she could see a white sandy beach meeting a serene ocean flowing into the endless horizon.

Rubbing a hoof against a spiked throb from her head, she felt the moist cloth of bandages on her brow. Carefully running a hoof around the area it was wrapped around, she rubbed a sensitive bump causing a wince and yelp of pain. Looking at the rest of her, she noted a rudimentary wooden splint fashioned upon her left wing. It was a strange sensation of déjà vu to say the least as she tried recalling where she was or how the hay she got there. A rumbling of frantic hooves shook her from her pondering as a vaguely familiar indigo pegasus skittered to a stop, nearly streaking clear past the room before catching the corner of the door with her wing to pull herself back.

“Rainbow!” the mare sputtered in disbelief, both shock and fear draped across her face.

“Uhh…” Dash flummoxed back.

“Oh, thank the sun, moon, stars, and whatever else is worth a hoof praising you’re awake!” The mystery mare barreled into the room with all the grace of a buffalo as she wrapped her forearms around the much confused Rainbow Dash. She meekly returned the gesture, finding respite in the familiar unfamiliarity. The two sat interlocked in a extensive hug that dragged on much longer than Rainbow was usually comfortable while the other found immense relief in the elongated embrace. The vibrant, red hibiscus flower bore a luxurious inland fragrance complimenting the sea breeze scent of the mare’s flowing mane bearing three beautiful shades of waning yellow, orange, and blue, a striking beauty reminiscent to the final moments of a summer sunset.

Finally breaking from the hug, the islander pegasus broke the hug with a sniffle and quick eye rub to recompose herself. “Geez Dash, for a moment, I thought we were in bigger trouble than I could handle,” the mystery mare sweetly sighed to Rainbow Dash as her scarlet eyes beamed upon seeing Rainbow rousing from her slumber.

“Wait, what? Whadya mean trouble? Where am I?”

“Where else but my esteemed personal little paradise island of… Paradisio,” she answered, stammering for a brief second, as Rainbow gave her a deadpan stare and brow raise. “Come on Dash, we already went through how bad I am with names when I bought the place. I didn’t hear you coming up with anything when I asked for your ideas.”

Silence settled as Rainbow continued to dart her eyes around the place, wondering what was going on. She put a hoof up to her head, feeling it wrapped like a mummy where a large bump had formed. Her mood sank when seeing pure confusion contorting around Rainbow Dash’s face.

“Wait, you remember who I am, don’t you?”

“Uhh…” Rainbow restated, nothing at all came to mind when seeing her. She looked over her features trying to come up with something. She was somewhat familiar, but she couldn’t pick it out. On her flank was an exploding flash of three circular rainbows forming around a center silver star, somewhat resembling her of her own Sonic Rainboom.

“I dunno, Spectral Flare?”

“Oh, thank goodness,” Flare lauded in relief, apparently Rainbow had gotten it right. She straightened up with a chastising fake glower, “You can’t pull the amnesia card on me after something like that! I told you to watch out for that coconut when you bucked that tree. You’re lucky you have such a thick head,” she sniggered as she flicked Rainbow’s nose with her hoof.

Of course, the coconut. Rainbow had completely forgotten about that little contest she had facing off her Flare to see which pegasus could buck the best. She swore her time with Applejack would have given her an edge, but she was bucked off of trees she had fallen asleep upon more often than actually lending a hoof to the apple family during harvest.

“Hey! Lay off Speck, I didn’t see you swoop down to catch it,” Dash remarked, crossing her hooves and rolling her eyes as she remembered the other mare’s nickname among a myriad of other little details throbbing into her head.

“Sorry for my terrible bedside manner,” Spectral Flare giggled as she wiggled her flank around. “After all, I don’t see a doctor cutie mark on my butt, sis.”

Rainbow couldn’t help but laugh at the silly spectacle her elder sister was putting on for her. She knew Speck was never one for shame or subtly having inherited their mother’s cruder sense of humor. Rainbow’s sniggering continued almost against her will as Flare shared in the fun with her infectious laughter and snorting. She was almost tempted to ask what their mother’s name was, almost.

“Ok, so did you get the coconut, Speck? I’m starving!”

“Well of course not, stupid! I was a bit more concerned with your concussion in the grand scheme of things. You’re lucky fixing your thick head is something I’ve gotten used to, Rainbow Crash.”

Why did Flare always know how the best ways to push Rainbow’s buttons to get her teeth grinding. Even if it was a stupid mistake, Speck wasn’t the one in bed. It was almost like she had known her all her life, which was a weird thought to Rainbow on a deeper level. Even though Speck, the best and coolest big sister in the world ever, was sitting right at her bedside as she always did, Rainbow couldn’t fathom why the name Spectral Flare meant nothing to her. Speaking of big…

“Hey Speck, have you always been so tall?” Rainbow asked, looking over her sister. She didn’t look so big coming in through the door or during the hug, but upon a second look the mare was massive to say the least. Not as tall as Queen Celestia, but probably a little bigger than Prince Macintosh for sure.

Speck blinked a couple of times before looking herself over. “Oh no, you don’t think I’ve gotten bigger, do you?” she quickly bounced out of her seat and stood straight against the door frame that bore little etchings marking her height Rainbow hadn’t noticed before. Speck glowered as she scrawled a mark on a preexisting line. “Now that’s a low blow, lil’ sis. You know how sensitive I am about my size!”

“You’re the one that brought up my flight school nickname. Besides, it’s not my fault you got dad’s bulk outta the lineage lottery, she-stallion.” Rainbow poked her sister’s big muzzle with a wily smirk.

“Well, you’re just saying that because you’ve always been jealous of your big sister’s big beautiful wingspan,” Spectral Flare huffed, grinning knowingly as she flashed her wings open. She displayed the full extent of her indigo feathers spreading gloriously across the small room. Even from sitting down, Flare had to be careful to not hit the ceiling when unfurling her spread.

“Pfft, yeah right. Big, beautiful, and slow. I’m the Wonderbolt material in the household, you’d fit in better at Sweetie Bell’s boutique with the rest of the Cutie Mark Creators,” Rainbow Dash bellowed loudly. “I bet Scoota Bloom and Appaloo would figure a great way to flaunt those giant feathers about.”

“Oh my, I don’t like the sound of that one bit,” the elder sister chuckled while patting her hoof atop Rainbow Dash’s muzzle. “Now give that little hot head of yours a rest up while I go grab us something to eat.”

The bed suddenly felt extremely comfortable to Dash as she gently lowered into the lovely feathers. She nearly turned over to go back to sleep as everything around her was demanding she go to sleep, but a feeling of going stir crazy quickly suppressed the nearly overwhelming urge to linger in bed.

“No way! I don’t get to see you often, sis. C’mon, let’s do something fun.” Rainbow hopped out of bed, placing her hooves firmly on the floor, feeling the refreshing solidity of wood on her hooves. She brimmed with confidence as she felt in control of herself for the first time in what felt like days.

Flare however was not amused in the slightest, rather she was flabbergasted to say the least. She was taken aback as her face was consumed by incredulity, her mouth hanging slack, eyes darting over Rainbow’s figure, and a cute, little brow twitch before she bit back her shock. “But Rainbow Dash, that was quite a bonk on the head, are you sure you’re okay?”

“Yup!” she gleefully replied. Rainbow went through her morning warm-up routine, a little ritual she had to rev herself up for a day of flying: clicking her hooves, flapping her wings… “Hey, my wing feels great!” she cheered as she ripped the splint off, giving her freed wing a victory flap as she took to the air.

“S-so you don’t feel tired?”

“Nope,” Rainbow answered, suppressing any further feelings of fatigue creeping into her.

“Sore?”

“Nuh uh,” she replied, feeling free of her headache as she unravelled her head bandage, the pain subsiding as she did so.

“Umm… stressed?”

“Stressed?” she questioned, dispelling any worries trying to gnaw at her in the back of her mind. “Why would I feel stressed?”

“No reason,” Flare replied sheepishly. “I just thought you might be a little more rattled by your impact… from the coconut.”

Rainbow thought about it for a bit, but shook her head upon further shallow introspection. “Not really, in fact, I’m more wondering why we had that bucking contest in the first place. We both hate coconuts.”

“You don’t say…” she trailed. “Well, don’t read much into it, sis. It was just a stupid competition. I’m just glad you’re alright.”

“Are you kidding me? It takes a little more than a stupid vegetable to keep Rainbow ‘Sparkle’ Dash down!” she rasped back to the sunset pegasus. Before Flare could utter a reply, Dash bolted from the room, speeding off into the main area. For the most part, it was a sparsely decorated beach house with floral patterned furniture and stereotypical islander decorum spreading around the area among the potted plants. It felt like a cozy little dream house Rainbow had always wanted to have for a getaway destination. Her sister’s job… of…

…

…

… Publishing?

Right! How could she forget Spectral Flare was a super-awesome, critically acclaimed Manehattan Press best-selling author? The bits she brought in from her books had afforded her the private little island the two had always wanted. Flare loved writing and reading enough to make a little career out of it, her books littering the… floor below the bookshelves. Somehow, Rainbow hadn’t noticed the giant wall of bookshelves behind her sister’s enlarge working when fluttering to landing in the room. Her writing area definitely stood out like a sore hoof among the rest of the beach-themed room. It was like a hurricane had blown through, ripping all the books from the shelves which had to have been painstakingly sorted knowing Flare’s flair for organization. Though a good number of the books were in their places, there were gaps everywhere in the hard-covered mess.

“Yeah, you caught me while I was reshelving them,” Flare commented as she trotted in behind her little sister.

“Geez, sis. Looks like something I would do when blasting into Spike’s library. That dragon is unforgiving when you mess up his and Rarity’s tidy collection.”

“Sounds dangerous,” Flare tepidly replied. “I was hoping I could get this done while you were asleep, you know. I REALLY didn’t want you seeing this big, embarrassing mess.”

“How did it happen anyway?”

Spectral Flare paused for a moment, biting her lip while digging for an appropriate answer in her head. “Let’s just say I needed to find a Daring Do book rather quickly.”

Rainbow begrudgingly resolved to leave it at that, knowing “let’s just say” was Flare’s kind way of saying, “Don’t ever bring it up again” whenever she had something to hide. Despite how bad of a liar her big sister was, she was an expert about keeping her secrets from everypony. She was an impenetrable vault of stupidity sometimes. “Well, let me help you put these books back at least, Speck. After all the times Spike has made me shelve books after botched stunts, I’m pretty good at it.”

“I guess you can, as long as you don’t try reading the…”

“‘I wasn’t about to let my friend win against me during our sudden Iron Pony competition without a fight. Since she was using that incredible earth pony strength to her advantage, I decided to use my natural wing talents to compete against her. It almost felt like cheating, but I hate losing and nopony stops—’” Speck ripped the book Rainbow was quoting from her hooves, and promptly slammed it shut on the nearby desk. “Hey! You could’ve asked!”

“Don’t. Read. The books. Dash!” the disgruntled pegasus snarled back. “You can either help put them away or you can go back to bed!”

Rainbow glowered at her irritable wingless sister. Speck could be such a stick in the mud when it came to invading her privacy. Rainbow chalked it up to what was known as “the privacy of her creative process,” not wanting anypony to even glance at an unfinished work. That’s at least what Rainbow was assuming since her sister had reacted so harshly to her peep. It was strange that Dash found the story vaguely familiar, but she figured it was probably based off of a squabble they had as fillies, probably making Rainbow out to be the bad guy in it all from the sound of it. Stupid, self-serving, she-stallion.

Rainbow started grabbing books and thrusting them onto the shelves, shoving them in their proper order without a second thought. Hearing the loud thwacking of hard covers on wood, Spectral Flare sighed and looked back at her angry little sister. “I’m sorry Dash. I didn’t mean to explode like that, I’ve been under a lot of stress recently. This whole mess is my fault anyway, why don’t you go out for a quick flight around the shoreline? It’s got to be more fun than being stuck shelving next to your big, dumb sister.”

“You’re right, it would,” Rainbow spiked back, “but I’m not gonna let my big, dumb sister have an excuse to call me a lazy freeloader. Besides, we never see each other.”

Spectral Flare bellowed a hearty laugh, one Rainbow hadn’t heard in a very long time. “I can be such a recluse, can’t I?”

Rainbow joined with a few raspy chuckles. “Yeah, you really should get out more.” Flare let her laughter die down as she seemed to chew on their exchange for a moment. She sighed as she enveloped Dash in her big wings. Dash wasn’t usually the sentimental type, but knew one thing for sure, Speck’s wings made for the best warm hugs ever. Rainbow Dash closed her eyes and nestled under the protective, motherly feathers “I love you, sis.”

Spectral Flare took a second to savor the moment. She could almost taste the younger pegasus’s genuine love for her as the fabricated feelings graced her tongue. She let what little grip she had on the situation slip away as she tightened her wing around her precious mare. “I’ll always be right here for you, Rainbow Dash.”

Luna hopped from her haunches to find herself in an alienating cavern. The surrounding was a sparsely decorated literal hole-in-the-wall room, adorned with strange luminous mushrooms emitting low blue light. To her left, Heartthrob lay sleeping half submerged in a gelatinous orange mattress next to a translucent amber nightstand. The foot of the jelly bed was adjacent to an ellipsoid membrane stretching the circumference of a small corridor barring entrance. Across from that sat a small desk and chair attached to a bookshelf dotted with books, tomes, and tiny knickknacks adding the smallest bit of personality to the otherwise bland room. Luna felt little comfort in the warm, stale air of the changeling’s former bedroom. She eyed the spines of the books, spotting several Equestrian titles, stolen no doubt. Other books bore no titles, which upon skimming their interiors, contained blank pages. The memory was incomplete, but it was more than enough to suffice.

Her plan was pure and simple memory synchronization. She would live the fragmented moments of Heartthrob’s life leading up to that sealed memory to gain access to its secrets the silver upstart was obfuscating from view. The method was sure-fire therapeutic, albeit slow way to break through the mental lock to glean the fullness of a suppressed memory. Luna didn’t care if the revelation would be helpful or not, she was determined to not lose to Chromina.

More concerning to the dreamwalking princess was the fact her hostess was asleep, yet still perceived changes in the world around her. Approaching the orange seal on the room, she could hear the humming wings of changelings, smell the fresh air breezing in through the gooey ventilation systems, see the shadows dancing across the opaque entrance of the room. Even if the host had picture-perfect memory, the surrounding area should be an imperceptive void when unconscious.

Seeking answers, Luna risked another peek into Heartthrob’s mind. All at once, her mind was assaulted by numerous distorted voices buzzing through her head. The princess reeled back, disconnecting herself from the changeling’s indiscernible thoughts. Curious about the reaction, Luna again reached to connect to the sleeping shape-shifter, this time slowly immersing herself in her thoughts as she focused to pick out one among the dozens in her head.

“… parsley and finally a hint of honeysuckle nectar,” a deeper voiced listed methodically. “There! That should be perfect for Bo Barrel’s lunch.” The voice paused for a moment with Luna perceiving a slight ringing to her left. She shifted focus as another mare’s words suddenly came into being.”

“…on’t see why you’re still following that big lug around,” a feminine tone replied indifferently. “That uncaring muttonhead doesn’t even give you the time of day. Maybe you’re just not his type.”

Luna leaned her head back to the right to hear the response. “What? No way,” the stallion buzzed deeply. Suddenly, a weird flow of his imagination caught Luna off guard as the stallion suddenly rose several octaves and lost its lower hum. “With a body like this, how could he think I’m a guy? I. Hit. Every. Right. Button!” she/he punctuated with a sensual murmur.

Luna leaned back in time to catch the tail end of the other’s laughter “All except your pheromones, Clicker,” the other guffawed at the other’s disguise.” No wonder you can’t get a drop of love off of him, you smell like the butt of a dead vulture!”

“What?! But this is exactly how Daisy Fair smells arou—” Luna ducked out of her eavesdropping realizing she was listening in on a conversation between two changelings linked in Heartthrob’s memory. Luna hazarded a fuller immersion as she sank into the resounding thoughts and conversations of the others in the colony.

She once again found herself in the large corridors of Heartthrob’s mind, but instead of a deathly tomb was a thriving community of changelings. Though Heartthrob was the only living mind Luna was channeling, the memories of the entire brood were being recalled through her head, while she was still asleep. Luna tried to make sense of it all, hearing too many sounds, thoughts, conversations, and emotions to get a read on anything. It felt like dream magic, functioned like it too, but it was written in a strange, befuddling language all its own.

 Among the disarray, once voice became clearer and crisper as the mind drew closer. It was repeating something, “…driste… Aud…st…?”

A sudden knocking roused Luna out of the collective thoughts and back into the room as Heartthrob finally started moving. An orange changeling wearing reddish amber armor rapped on the now translucent membrane separating the bedroom from a large, central chamber covered with similar doorways splotched up and down several stories, presumably being other sleeping quarters. The changeling huffed in annoyance as he pushed through the membrane into bedroom, which barely garnered the attention of the sleepy Heartthrob in bed.

“Oie, Audriste! Get up!” the armored changeling hollered. “I swear, not even the queen herself could wake you without smacking you upside the head.”

Heartthrob tossed in her bed, smacking her lips together and licking her fangs contently. “Just five more minutes, Rylota…”

Rylota grabbed a marred train whistle from the top of the bookcase, resounding it loudly as Heartthrob flew out of bed. She gripped the cave ceiling like a startled cat, hanging upside down with her bright orange eyes flared wide open in shock. Luna stifled a playful snigger with her hoof as she sat on the side lines to watch the spectacle play out in front of her. One thing she always loved about watching another pony’s memories, or changeling’s in this case, was that she could sit back as the day to day happenings played out while she kept to herself.

“And who are you supposed to be, Miss Twinkleshoes?” Rylota asked the midnight mare in the corner. It took a moment for Luna to register the impossible, the changeling from was addressing her.

“RYLOTA!” Heartthrob screamed as she dove for the armored changeling. “I told you not touch that whistle! It’s an antique!” The two fell to the floor as they formed a chitin covered wheel careening and crashing into the wall.

Heartthrob fumed as Rylota laughed, trying to hover the whistle to his mouth blow its blaringly loud tone again. “If you’re so against it, why do you leave it out for me to grab every day?” he joked back as she elbowed him in the barrel to stop his squirming.

“You’re impossible,” she grunted, placing the aged whistle back on display.

“What are little brothers for?” he chided back with a fang-filled grin. The two gathered themselves up off the floor, brushing the loose dust off their black flanks, a sneak of a smile crossing Heartthrob’s muzzle she tried so hard to suppress. “So Audrey, I didn’t know you were into role play. Got something for mystical alicorns?”

“Role play?” she questioned, furrowing her brow quizzically as she perplexed at her brother’s question. She looked over her shoulder to see the royal mare in question. Reality suddenly dawned itself back onto Heartthrob as her usual countenance returned to her, losing all the mirth she had when squabbling with her brother.

“By pony standards, she’s quite the looker,” his gaze falling upon the princess of the night. “Almost looks like Princess Celestia with all the regalia and her mane flowing like that, but the color's all wrong. Are you supposed to be some kind of perverted shadow mare or some—OWW!” Heartthrob interrupted with a quick hoof to the unarmored frills of his neck.

“It doesn’t matter. I’m up and you’re still on duty, now get back to work before someling sees you’re away from your post,” she ordered melancholically to her brother.

“Sis, are you alright?”

“I'm fine, just get going, you big lunkhead, before you get in trouble,” she offered, straightening up, holding her nose high, and smirking with faux-regality. “Now go, your elder commands it!”

“Aye aye, my queen-by-proxy,” he saluted with his tongue-in-cheek manner, buzzing out the door merrily. He poked his head back pointing a holey hoof back in reply, “Oh, and remember, you’re on water duty today!”

She watched somberly as he flew away, the webbing closing behind as she drew away from the door. “That was the last time I saw him, but it happened a little differently than that,” she said as she approached Princess Luna with a bow. “Even though he’s long dead, I hope you can forgive his informality, your highness.”

“This… this should be no more than a mere slideshow,” the princess said as she walked towards the door, motioning it open like the changelings had done before to see a veritable swarm of changelings fluttering about busily carrying on their lives. “This is not my doing, nor is it yours, is it?”

“I don’t know. I guess maybe it’s both?” she offered as a lukewarm answer.

“I sifted through your memories and there were no others. You were alone.”

Heartthrob heaved a morbid sigh as she stared down upon the other forms below her. “Yes, I am alone, but a changeling’s capacity for memory is only limited by the number of minds linked to its own. As more changelings are added to the hive mind, once you grow accustomed to its presence, the brain starts automatically cataloging their memories and experiences. It’s not something I can draw upon myself so easily, but the space in my head always lingers there, and it feels so empty when the space lingers unoccupied.”

The nurse cantered over to the doorway, looking out at all the familiar faces as they buzzed about the memory, continuing their little lives just as they had remembered them. “It is a strange feeling, being alone in your head. Even if you ponies have friends and family you whisper your innermost secrets with, they still pale in comparison to the shared experiences of our collective mindscape. Within the hive mind, we are never alone as we share so much with our fellow drones and never realize it. We leave almost nothing entirely forgotten, even if we wish to not remember it. Once someling has gotten into your head, they never leave, even after they've passed on.”

Luna realized for the first time the task she was up against. She was not simply going through a slideshow of events to be played out for her, she had forced open a floodgate of information, recreating an interactive microcosm of memories from Heartthrob’s head. It was a blurring of changeling magic and Luna’s dream magic, fabricating an entire community of changeling minds reconstituted into dreams from Heartthrob’s memory. She was brought out of her ruminating as Heartthrob chuckled longingly while looking around her old room.

“For a moment, I thought I was back home, hearing all of their welcoming voices singing to me in my head. I bet if you were to dig deep enough into my imagination right now, you’d find yourself talking to another changeling. We were never designed to be true individuals after all,” Heartthrob fell back on her bed, looking up at brown ceiling, hued slightly bluer from her room’s luminous vegetation. “I wish I could forget their song, it’d make the unbearable silence of Equestria so much easier to live with.”

Refocusing, Princess Luna pushed herself to ignore the changeling’s somber tone. This one was a prisoner withholding valuable information, not something she was to find relatable or pitiable. The mission was to uncover the truth that the treacherous bug was hiding from Celestia and herself. She did not require a lesson in changeling psychology, only the answers hidden away in the its lonely mind. However, she did find the absence of her elder sister curious, but she could worry about her later.

“Your brother called you Audriste, I assume that is your true name?” the changeling nodded hollowly. “Good, I was growing tired of using your stolen identity. Come Audriste, we do not have time to idle away in your past." The princess reassumed her cold distance from her prisoner, holding her head high and motioning towards the portal, "Lead on.”

The changeling offered a respectful bow and led the princess out of her room. She gave one last look into her former abode before shutting the seal to proceed with reliving the worst day of her life.

Shining Armor stood watch outside the Royal Inquisition chambers, a place usually reserved for initiation pranks on newly promoted captains. Shining couldn’t remember the last time it had been used for its true purpose, mostly because he hadn’t been alive over three hundred years ago to see it. He had requested personally to be present for the questioning of their special prisoner, but with both princesses setting time aside to question the changeling, he was regulated to guard detail being one of the few ponies who were aware of any royal prisoners at all. Keeping this a secret from anypony curious enough to ask was a matter of national security. If even a word of a prisoner was uttered, it could be easily deduced there was a captive changeling, which would spark an incident for sure.

The past two days had been tiring to say the least. The couple had postponed their honeymoon with Shining taking part of the changeling proceedings even though he was still recovering from emotion deprivation. Maintaining a semblance of control over his feelings and the shaky populace was more than a full-time job, especially with both princesses keeping odd hours. Suspicion was around every corner with more and more accusations of changeling infiltration popping up around Canterlot and spreading through Equestria like wildfire. If he was honest with himself, he wanted to lead that emblazoned charge against this new menace, taking the fight to the shape-shifters who had almost seized the capital. His guarded temperament barely hid his anger from those around him, Cadence being the only pony who knew the extent of his hatred. Inside, he was seething knowing there was a rotten shifter just beyond the shielded doors. He was right on board with the other nobles seeking to develop shifter counter-measures, but the strict orders from Princess Celestia forced staying his vengeful hoof.

He maintained a constant shielding spell upon the surrounding area as he was not allowed to let anypony in without a royal sanction from one of the princesses. Luckily, the detail had proven to be rather uneventful with the castle dungeon being a rarely cantered corner of the castle. Not many ponies were even aware of the dungeon outside of those employed by the two royal sisters. Crimes warranting royal imprisonment were not common enough for anypony to pay any attention to the nearly forgotten areas. It gave him time to think, or stew in his case until there was a knock from the other side of the door.

Shining dispelled the shield and opened the door with his magic, meeting the eyes of one very fatigued sun princess who was not amused in the slightest. Celestia trudged out into the hallway looking drained, her usually flowing ethereal mane hung idly without a single sparkle to her side as her magenta eyes sank low from a trying test of her patience, which had clearly reached its end. The captain wasn’t sure how to respond, never seeing the princess so visibly upset.

“Your highness?”

“Yes,” she replied, the icy tone nearly cleaving Armor’s controlled demeanor in two.

“Is there anything I can do for you?”

The princess sighed as she massaged her horn, indicating it was sore. “I’m afraid not, captain. It seems Princess Luna was a bit… forceful during the interrogation. She and Heartthrob are fine, but I must say, the experience turned out to be a bit much for me.”

“Would you have me take over for you in questioning?” Shining inquired, barely containing his desire to have a few choice words with the changeling himself. His rumination ground to a halt when Celestia leaned down with an irritated scowl.

“No, captain. You will do no such thing. Continue to guard this door like your life depended on it. No one is to go in or out aside from Princess Luna and myself,” she bitterly ordered with fury hiding behind each word. “Do I make myself clear?”

“C-crystal, your highness!”

“Very good,” the princess sighed as she began to slowly walk away. She turned back around to the frightened guard, “I’m sorry for my short temperament today, captain. I’m afraid this whole ordeal has been quite taxing on us all.”

Shining Armor straightened his stance as he recast the shielding spell on the door, “I understand, princess. It’s just seeing you so forward is a new thing for me. I guess I’ll have to get used to that with marrying Cadence and all.”

Princess Celestia blinked a few times as realization sank in. Unable to completely suppress a sudden red flash of embarrassment, she smiled sweetly as she regained control of her emotional outbursts. “Of course, Prince Shining Armor. We both have to look our best to not rouse suspicion, even if it feels my mind is in a million places right now.” Celestia and Shining exchanged smiles and bows as the princess made her way to the end of the corridor. She looked around, chuckling to herself as she turned to Armor again. “Umm… I must be more tired than I thought,” the princess added as she cast a furtive glance to the side while motioning directions with her wing.

“Tell me, is the medical wing to the left or right?”