Dreamscape

After a few more minutes of what seemed like aimless wandering, the unicorn duo traversing the transparent maze had become so turned around that they would both be hopelessly lost if it weren’t for Lucidity’s hoof following the nearest wall and Luna’s castle continually towering over them in the distance showing them which way to go. There was an awkward silence permeating the atmosphere of Dream Limbo as the two mares walked that was punctuated by the regular rhythm of their nearly silent hoofsteps echoing against the invisible Dreamscape floor below them.

This was eventually broken by a curious voice keen on both interrupting her own boredom and learning some new information. “So, what exactly is the Subconscious Plane? How does it even work?”

Lucidity stopped her muffled gait to shrug in response. “I’m not all that sure, actually. All we’ve read about it is that the ancient Romanes used to access it with a torturing spell they would cast on their prisoners, forcing them to spill their secrets and confess to their crimes, but Princess Celestia banned the spell’s use as a truth detector centuries ago. More recently, it’s been breached by mediums attempting to divulge a pony’s deepest desires. But how it works and what exactly it is or does is beyond me.”

“But what was it like, being there?” Lucidity pressed, determined to learn more about this mysterious realm.

“I don’t really remember, in all honesty. At the time, I was basically a bodiless consciousness—less than that, actually, since I didn’t exactly have a mind of my own or do much actual thinking there,” she responded, raising her hoof in an air quotes gesture. “As a subconscious, I tended to pay more attention to your experiences and help you respond to them than I did my own surroundings. Anyway, I’m not even sure that the Subconscious Plane is a physical location you can actually be in so much as it is a mental construct where the concept of a pony’s subconscious resides. But enough about me, we still need to come up with a plan to defeat Luna so that you can duel her and escape Dream Limbo.”

“I know, I know. But what can we do? She’s too powerful! I mean, am I supposed to just throw up a bunch of shields and hope that I have enough aural stamina to wear her out to the point where I can easily beat her?”

“Well, we would’ve had more time to prepare if you hadn’t just randomly decided to teleport us both straight to her castle out of the blue like that,” Lucidity fired back.

“Hey, that wasn’t my fault!” the grey mare protested. “I was still all hopped up on energy from that large influx of magic the wall let off when it destabilized. I wasn’t myself, remember? I couldn’t even think straight. And besides, if that hadn’t happened, I’d still be running on practically no magic and we’d be in an even worse situation than we are right now.”

“Yeah, I guess so,” Lucidity said as she stopped to investigate another intersection. There was a moment of silence as the unicorn subconscious sized up the barrier before her with a free hoof before she called out over her shoulder, “C’mon, it’s this way.” Turning to her left so that she was now facing their fortress destination, Lucidity marched forward, keeping one of her hooves planted firmly against the invisible wall at her side as she went along their unmarked path.

“We’re getting close,” Lucidity remarked as she stared at the stone monolith looming over them and seeming to grow ever larger and nearer with every step she took.

“Looks like it,” her subconscious agreed, trying to eyeball the distance left between them and the castle’s entryway. “Let’s just hope that it’s a straight shot from here to the door, instead of there being some crazy, roundabout way of getting there.”

The two unicorns walked on in silence, the remainder of their journey going by in a slow blur—each passing second somehow seeming both rushed and dragged out at the same time. With her nerves beginning to act up again and her heart beating loudly in her chest, Lucidity tried her best to brace herself for what was soon to come. She beheld the spectacle before her wearily, cautiously awaiting a sign that their anticipated arrival might hold some still-unseen surprises. As she looked on, it seemed to her that the fortress’ entrance was even farther away than it had seemed to be previously, but, attributing this to nerves, Lucidity pressed on and attempted to dispel the queasy sensation now rolling around in her stomach.

Arriving at their destination’s front steps after what seemed like an eternity later, both subconscious and consciousness stopped and stared at the sight of Luna’s stronghold—a standing testament to her goddess-like power and skill and a symbol of the nigh-impossible task set before the unicorn pair. Lucidity eventually broke the nervous tension surrounding them, saying with an air of false cheer, “Well, there’s no time like the present.” Pushing past the already ajar door, she crossed into the dangerous and almost-certainly deadly unknown that lay in wait just beyond the arched entrance, leaving Lucidity to hesitate at the threshold for just a moment longer before she quickly, albeit reluctantly, bounded in after her subconscious lest their shared anxiety get the better of her.

Upon entering Luna’s fortress, Lucidity found herself in a large, dark atrium framed by a few dim torches set up along the sides of the otherwise-empty chamber. As she watched, the torches’ light seemed to flicker in a nonexistent breeze, the flames’ soft movements causing the various shadows contained within the desolate hall to slowly and eerily dance around the frightened mare until it seemed to her that they were tightly closing in from all sides.

Just when Lucidity thought that she couldn’t take any more of the room’s tricks, the fire’s hauntingly hypnotic spell was broken by an excited voice shouting from the opposite end of the atrium. “Lucy, over here! I think I see some bright lights just past this hallway.” Quickly rushing towards the friendly sound, the unicorn found her subconscious pointing down an abandoned corridor—the end of which, sure enough, was bathed in a bright, pearly white glow that attracted Lucidity as if she were a moth.

Desperate to be rid of their shadowed surroundings, both ponies briskly trotted through the passage, finding that they needed to shield their eyes once they had made it to the other side as their pupils readjusted to the new lighting. “Are you kidding me?!” Lucidity exclaimed soon after recovering her eyesight, her previous timidity with the new terrain quickly replaced by anger. She stared on in disbelief at the hundreds of ponies looking back at her, all of them with the same, familiar blue eyes, blond mane, grey coat, and triple-Z cutiemark. They were all exact lookalikes of herself created by Luna’s next obstacle: a second maze, this one composed entirely of mirrors. “You know what? No. I’m done. I am not about to go through another one of these things.” She walked up to the nearest mirror, building up a sizable magical charge as she did so.

“Um, Lucy?” Lucidity called out after her consciousness. “I don’t think—” She was interrupted by the sound of a spell rebounding against the large mirror and firing directly back into the caster’s horn. “Are you okay?” she asked frantically.

Lucidity took a moment to catch her breath before standing back up and glaring at the offending reflection. “Fine, we’ll do the stupid maze, but I’m not happy about it!”

“Didn’t you realize it wasn’t going to be that easy?”

“Well, it was worth a shot. But deep down, I think there was some part of me that knew it wouldn’t work.”

“Like your subconscious, maybe?” Lucidity said wryly, smirking at the other unicorn.

“Yeah,” Lucidity said with a laugh. “I guess so. Alright, let’s do this. We can just use the right-hoof rule again, right?”

“I don’t see why not,” came her subconscious’ reply. “Although we probably don’t need to actually place our hooves on the walls this time, since we can see where they are now.”

“Yeah, but all these similar-looking reflections are bound to disorient us at some point if we’re not careful. We might want to keep pretty close to the walls at the very least.”

“Fair point.” Suddenly, Lucidity brightened up considerably, a large smile appearing on her face as a new idea occurred to her.

“What?” the other mare asked, wondering just what her subconscious could be up to this time.

“I think I just thought of an idea that will help us defeat Luna. C’mon, I’ll tell you about it on the way.”