Lucidity

Chapters

A Final Flourish
Set Apart
Backstage
Fallen Star
Alone
Temptation
Intermission
Compulsion
Alarum
Curtain Call
Exeunt

A Final Flourish

And now mares and gentlecolts one and all, prepare to be amazed, for our next act this evening is totally unparalleled throughout all of Equestria. I like all of you sat in the audience tonight once held the belief, the firm belief, that alicorns were the most powerful creatures in our fair land, unmatched in any and all of the magical arts. However mares and gentlecolts I have since known doubt, for I have had the privilege to bear witness to the miraculous feats of our final performer: a master conjurer, a peerless telekant, renowned illusionist, sage savant of all sorceries known to ponykind and vanquisher of the much feared Ursa Major. Those of you of a nervous disposition should avert your gazes and make your way directly from the auditorium, but otherwise I bid you stomp your hooves and welcome to the stage the Great and Powerful Trixie!

No applause, no cheering, only the chaotic rhythm of rainfall drumming against the decrepit caravan’s thinned roof, interspersed by sharper tones as droplets fell through the great many cracks to land in a scattered array of buckets, bowels and beakers. Beyond these improvised water receptacles (many of which were overflowing) the two rooms which made up this mobile home were remarkably bare, unless detritus was counted amongst the denizen’s possessions, in which case she was rich beyond measure. Piles of refuse formed mountains in the corners; whilst on the plateau of the floor within, a tripartite battle was being waged between empty bottles, used packaging and waste paper, the trio having already reached a stalemate in their occupation of the bin. Every one of the limited work spaces that there were (regardless of whether they belonged to the domain of the kitchenette or not) stood occupied by an impressive legion of dirty dishes, although in being stacked far too high they listed at crazy angles as opposed to remaining at attention. All however were subjects to the overlordship of the dust, coating everything in a fuzzy grey blanket, its dominion stretching even to the ceiling where it clung to the cobwebs along with the vast graveyard of deceased insects.

The exterior was a mirror image to the interior, being in a similar state of absolute dilapidation. Wherever the roof was not riddled with holes it sagged lazily inward, worn down under the weight of the many previous downpours it had had to withstand aside from the present barrage. Once simply varnished to accentuate the grain of their wooden construction, the four walls had by now long lost their gloss, allowing rot to take root and fungus to sprout amongst the damp planks. Mercifully however the green tinge of decay was disguised and the caravan itself granted new adornment, far in excess of its previous limited decorations, by long tracts of spray paint generously scrawled across its faces. At the same time these additions made almost invisible the loss of windows whose shutters had been nailed shut, in lieu of a more extensive fix that was never coming. Although predominately illegible (in most cases thankfully) the writing was at least extensive, somepony having even gone as far as putting effort into reimagining the sign which hung on a single remaining chain above the wagon’s front door.

In all respects therefore the caravan fitted in beautifully with its surroundings, seemingly set up as a permanent resident in the back alley where it rested with one wheel absent, its empty axle set atop a pile of bricks. Really the place was no more than an extended sewer, servicing both the main street and the pair of tower blocks looming up on either side of it as a place to dump all unwanted garbage. Unlike the filthy rivers thrown up by the clogged throats of drains at each of its ends flowing inwards (carrying a steady stream of rubbish with them), the light from streetlamps refused to enter more than a few steps, leaving the alleyway in perpetual gloom. Even in daytime this remained unchanging, overshadowed as the area was by the heights of superior structures, hidden from the world in the recesses of some unknown architect’s stylistic blind spot.

The only evidence that the caravan was not in fact the abandoned wreck that it seemed came in the form of the faintest glimmer shining through gaps in the rear room’s shutters, accompanied by the even less obvious sound of an old show tune, its noise drowned under the noise of rain. The music often scratched and skipped, its source (a gramophone looking ancient beyond its years) struggling in its only slight duty. This failure mattered little however as the tired machine’s voice went unnoticed by anypony, not least of all by the lone resident with which it shared the caravan’s bedroom portion.

The Great and Powerful Trixie will now bedazzle you with sights only before possible in your wildest of fantasies!

An equally accurate descriptor for the bedroom/dressing room/storage closet beyond 'tip' would have been to call it a museum, although a decidedly poorly maintained one at any rate. Along one side of the space a row of clothing hooks stood sentry, each bearing a differently coloured cape and matching pointed hat, like the treasured relics of past heroes. In turn their wearers past feats in life, depicted in either faded posters or in tales carefully cut from newspapers and magazines, were hung up everywhere, framed for permanency in their display. All were united in their focus on a single figure, always triumphant in posture yet also always veiled in a shroud of mystery, with trademark cloak and wide-brimmed headgear constantly hiding her features. It all added up to a shrine to this single intriguing silhouette, but any penitents there may have once been had long forgotten its existence and in turn the caretaker had become a hermit, letting care slip away as interest was lost.

See how your eyes deceive you and nothing is as it seems!

The inadequate illumination (flickering from a halo of half working bulbs surrounding the dressing table’s mirror) failed to banish the night’s darkness creeping in from outside, barely even lighting the room. A lone blue unicorn viewed herself through the looking glass, sat perched on the edge of a stool, the final remaining piece of furniture left. Her reflection was the total antithesis to her background, the lustrous shine playing across her coat and through her hair at odds with the world of fallen decrepitude. The attentions of a brush, floating in a pale blue aura, ignored this fact as it ran through the silvery strands of her mane, cut through with a stripe of light azure. A wine bottle levitated in the same way, moving to fill an equally drifting glass with the last of its contents before being allowed to tumble to the floor and roll away. The glass meanwhile, now filled to its brim with scarlet liquid, came to her lips which drew long draughts from the drink, punctuating a cycle of facial expressions they were running through as if in preparation for a performance.

Was there ever any doubt?

A small giggle escaped her mouth, spurred on more by her beverage than any real humour, continuing on as a low chuckle which finally petered out as she finished off both her ministrations and the rest of the glass’ contents. Two sets of mirrored violet irises rolled over each other’s owners, checking carefully and then deeming their fixed forms adequately beautiful enough to perform in any show. Satisfied, she rose with a bowing flourish, sending the stool on which she had been seated away to the centre of the room. All that remained to be prepared was a single item of jewellery, a small gold circlet embossed in an all-encompassing ring of sigils, which she now slipped into place over her slender horn. She forced her thoughts on her brush. It did not move, no aura forming to enwrap its handle no matter how hard she tried.

Trixie is truly the greatest spell caster in all of Equestria!

With a definitive nod she turned her back on herself, crossing the few paces to where the stool was now at rest and ascended, stepping up onto it. Her favourite cape was ready and waiting for her, its glittering length secured tightly to one of the roof’s more solid rafters whilst a loop was tied at its end now dangling before her muzzle, just big enough to slip her head through.

Trixie! Trixie! Trixie!

Her eyes screwed themselves shut, she let the podium wobble away and fall from beneath her, and then she was left suspended, the fine fabric constricting sharply around her neck.

Set Apart

Deep stillness pervaded every street throughout Ponyville in spite of the falling rain, which had finally blossomed into a downpour having spent the day as mere drizzle. Nopony moved to break this, unmoving as midnight had not long been struck by the town hall’s clock and most already slumbered in the shelters of their beds. Thick clouds and curtains hid all lights beyond those of streetlamps, left without contention to shine like lighthouses, their yellow glows taking on a colourful rainbow splendour as their rays passed through the sea of droplets cascading through the air. All in all the scene was serenely beautiful, its flux of tones in the darkness going beyond chaos to simply seem natural as they painted themselves across every wall, roof and window and throughout every garden.

Only one inhabitant was in a position to take in the town in this near unique form of brilliance, but her eyes were locked elsewhere on sights far less wondrous. Instead Twilight Sparkle sat at her windowsill, her gaze and mind both focused downwards in their entirety, each lost in a past somewhere lower.

Far below her bejewelled tower and set apart from all other buildings (therefore leaving it beyond any streetlamp’s warmth or colour), a patch of darkened earth, far blacker than its surrounding night, captured all of the young alicorn’s attentions. The ground heaved upward as jagged peaks around a central point, creating a cracked bowel like crater, baked instantly solid by searing heat. At the base of this pit a lake of thick grey ooze, an unpleasant mixture of residual ash and rainwater, was now forming. It looked like the insides of a barbed maw, encircled by the fanged splinters of a great tree’s trunk. From the depths of this dirty swirling pool a mass of sharp bony root tendrils reached graspingly outward, seeking desperately anything they could use to re-cover their ancient exhumed selves. The place was a charred gap in the ground, in the Ponyville skyline and in the heart of its current viewer. Her home was gone, burnt up with so many memories and so much she cared about, and the crystalline monstrosity in which she now sat was no substitute.

Alien, empty, cold, the castle was all these things and more, none of which enamoured it in any way to its single resident. The building was an other, distinct from all its kind in the slight settlement in its huge scale and sharpened architecture, sprouting as a towering affront to all other structures. Its difference lost it all its delicacy, making it merely a brutalist expression of its own presence, gaudy like inappropriate jewellery and just as awkward. Within, its vastness diminished little, all vaulted ceilings and great halls, imitating the depersonalised grandeur of a palace. Twilight had absolutely no want of a palace, she had only barely just accepted the idea of being a princess, but the glassy mineral structure was now all she had. She missed her adopted library: its comforting fustiness, its confined cosiness, its lack of shelf space requiring constant rearrangement, the fact that it felt that she actually belonged there. True geographically little, if not nothing, had changed but nonetheless she seemed lost. She missed her home.

Reducing your cognitive capacities to zero through self-imposed insomnia is only going to exacerbate matters, to your further detriment.

Through an extreme degree of effort Twilight forced herself to turn away from the pane, conceding the point of her always analytical inner voice, although the bedroom she now faced was hardly the balm she wanted. She had consciously chosen the smallest of the tower’s rooms to call her own, preferring its almost Spartan refinement in contrast to any of the alternative spacious voids available to her, whilst it had the added bonus of a balcony to match that of her old home. With the future prospect of in finer weather, being able to lounge outside and enjoy Luna’s great tapestry was something a very small part of her was able to almost look forward to, falling just short of being a true solace. Inside it had been simply furnished with a bed, a desk, a couple of chairs, shelves and cupboards, all still far too luxurious in design to feel like they were hers, but at present it was impossible to identify nearly any of these items. A white avalanche of paper had fallen across everything, spreading out in drifts from the desk, its obvious source, leaving only the bed really visible.

It might be a good idea to make use of one of the plethora of larger spaces in this place when you have to rearrange and reorganise all of these in the morning.

Lists had always been her coping mechanism for any and all of life’s problems, allowing any issue to be broken down into its component facets and then be catalogued. Fluttershy and others of a more environmentally concerned perspective would probably take issue with the sheer volume of woodland required to sustain this habit, but Twilight had found few other methods nearly as capable of reigning in her paranoid side. Writing something down was empowering, quantifying it and rendering it down to only its base qualities, whilst making progress against it tangible and approachable. This was of course not to mention the over the top sense of joy she felt on putting a tick against or cross through a list’s contents. Being faced with this snowstorm of fallen sheets however left her frozen; after all how useful was it to have remembered the title of an incinerated book if it was long out of print and near unique? All she had achieved was the heightening of her loss on becoming aware of exactly how much was gone.

This isn’t helping. To reiterate: you need to sleep. All of this can wait for tomorrow and fresh eyes.

Her mind frustratingly remained entirely right as per usual. Acquiescing to its demands she allowed her telekinesis to enwrap the bed’s covers, drawing them back whilst further beams of magic plumped her pillows, meanwhile extending her wings to softly deposit herself within them. Or at least that was the plan, the reality was very different. Instead of the light flap and gentle landing she wanted she found herself catapulted forwards, well overshooting the mattress to crash heavily onto the floor on the other side. ‘Horse apples!’ Hot pain shot up her crumpled wings, shooting through her spine. ‘This is just getting annoying now!’ These occasional power spikes, an unforeseen by-product of absorbing three senior alicorns worth of magic, had had their benefits (not least of which being able to keep up with and beat Rainbow hooves down any race) but their uncontrollability made calling them an annoyance and understatement. She picked herself up, shaking the blurry stars from the edges of her vision. She received screamed protests from her back as she stretched out its bruised muscles, before gingerly stepping into her quilt’s embrace and quickly slipping beneath its surface.

All the power went back to its respective owners, so either yours alone have been put out of kilter or something else has been altered, possibly biological.

‘Now who’s not helping matters!’ Almost immediately however Twilight’s only recently closed eyes sprang back open, descent into sleep denied not by inquisitive thoughts but instead by her still energised wings. Although tender from her fall they flexed and fluttered, refusing to be still. ‘Seriously?’ She rolled onto her other side, huffing in exasperation. For too long now she had been like a stranger in her own body. Ever since she had “ascended” (as everypony insisted on calling the point at which she had sprouted a pair of alien appendages which she had exactly no idea what to do with) this had been the case and when she had finally begun to get the hang of her new self the rug had again been pulled out from under her. Unfair was not nearly the half of it.

A decidedly fed up princess tried again, taking a deep breath and letting the world steadily fade into darkness. She attempted to channel blank, releasing tension with each drawn out exhale, relaxing her frame in each long inhaled breath that followed. Sleep right now was a bare necessity, as she was well aware, but more than that she longed for what accompanied it. In her dreams she knew that Luna would be waiting for her, a fact that brought with it no small amount of delight. Following Tirek’s high profile escape from Tartarus and the succeeding disaster which had followed, the Princess of the Night had been selected to review and reform Equestria’s highest security penal institution, with a new focus on reform over simple containment. This was no small task, necessitating Luna’s prolonged absence and creating something else far more essential for Twilight to lack. She missed her marefriend, feeling sorely without the support and confidence that the dark alicorn gave her. Finally these thoughts of her love did their work, letting her slip from the stresses of her conscious world, drifting into what lay beyond.

Backstage

‘Well, that’s new.’ Just moments before, Twilight’s eyes had opened and she had found herself stood in what could be described as a corridor, except that there was a distinct lack of walls, floor or roof. Instead there was just an infinite darkness in all directions, without any clear substance, meaning that she stood on what in essence seemed to be nothing, a distinctly disconcerting sensation. What warranted the title of corridor, and in fact provided some kind of dimensions to the unmeasurable space, were twin rows of doors stretching away into the distance in front of her. Turning her head to look behind herself the same sight met her, equally vast in scope. Each one of the many portals flanking her on either side was dissimilar, made up of doors in a multitude of styles and sizes as well as tent flaps, hatches and other forms of entrance. These disparate doorways were however largely united, as a great many of them were slick with running water which disappeared when it reached the invisible floor. It was certainly bizarre, only marginally comparable to the place Princess Celestia had teleported her to when she had gained her wings.

Something to do with possibility maybe, or anxiety about the future perhaps?

Whatever her subconscious’ meaning in the design of this dream it was not particularly clear, but then again she was not usually able to consider such things in the midst of dreaming. She stepped towards the nearest door, stretching out a forehoof to part the flow of droplets coursing across its surface. Her hoof felt damp, remaining so when she drew it back, raising a frown across her brow. To simply put all this down to her state of mind on going to sleep and a high degree of lucidity did not seem to be enough of an explanation. It was all just strange.

‘Twilight?’

A comfortingly familiar voice caught the purple alicorn as she considered trying one of the portals, causing her to whirl around on the spot. Luna was beautiful as always, almost as dark as the surrounding void but for the brilliant patterns of her stars which shone out in the flowing strands of her mane and tail, illuminated in the paler blue glow of her horn, shining like a beacon. Twilight’s immediate reaction was to leap forward, throwing her hooves around the taller mare’s neck in a tight embrace, almost instantly feeling Luna’s wings around her in reciprocation. More than any hug she loved the reassuring security of this cocoon of feathers, making it a difficult feat to pull out of it, although she did indulge herself in stealing a kiss from the lunar princess before speaking. ‘You have no idea how good it is to see you. Sorry about the décor though, I’m pretty lost as to what it’s supposed to signify, but you’re more the expert when it comes to all things dream related.’

‘Erm Twilight’ Luna began, initially as caught up in the reunion as her partner. ‘This isn’t your dream, in fact it isn’t even a dream at all.’

Twilight’s frown immediately returned, furthered as the concerned look was reflected in front of her. ‘Okay… so where are we?’

The pair broke apart, the older of the two breaking into a slow thoughtful stride whilst the younger followed suit at her side. ‘For want of a better title, this is the Dreamspace. It’s sort of a nexus or other world through which everypony’s dreams are connected.’

‘So, through all the doorways?’

‘Yes, each of these doors leads to somepony’s dreams.’

Twilight took a moment to take this in. In truth this discovery was neither unique nor unfathomable, this was after all not her first experience of what could be called planar travel and at the same time it in part explained the Princess of the Night’s dream-walking abilities. Still, it was quite a surprise. ‘How did I get here then?’

‘I was just about to ask you exactly the same question.’

‘That’s just it, I didn’t do anything. It was pretty late, I got into bed, feeling tired to say the least, and fell asleep. Nothing out of the ordinary… except maybe that I kind of had a surge in power just before I turned in.’

Luna nodded; the picture of somepony deep in thought. ‘Well normally I’d have to transport you here, but for myself the trip does simply consist of falling asleep, so either you too have the gift and have only just been able to discover it, or there’s a part of me still inside you from the Tirek incident. The former conclusion is unlikely though’ she quickly added.

A light pink hue rose across the purple alicorn’s cheeks on hearing the first part of this evaluation before the rest of its meaning sunk in. ‘Unlikely how?’

‘Well I first came here when I was a filly, not the most pleasant of experiences but anyway…’ Luna trailed off with a shrug, although her face darkened slightly in reflection.

They continued onward, quiet falling between them, the only sound coming from their synchronised hoof-falls striking against the nothing on which they walked. A glow continued to radiate outward from Luna’s horn. The magic bubbled across its surface continually, un-dissolving and unmoving, whilst her neck panned back and forth, as if scanning from side to side on repeat. Generally Twilight had pretty much taken it for granted that dreams were part of the Princess of the Night’s domain. Ever since she had overheard the Cutie Mark Crusaders discussing their experiences and then had herself been visited (a more than surreal experience seen as the dark navy alicorn she had found awaiting for her in her unconscious world was in reality nestled next to her in bed at the time) the idea of the older alicorn being present there had become normal. Now however, as she stepped in time at Luna’s side, the realities of this concept were placed in a new light, raising a variety of questions. ‘What’s it like, stepping into somepony else’s dreams I mean?’

Luna stopped once more, turning towards a pale wooden door, slightly smaller than its direct kin and engraved with a love heart. ‘You could find out for yourself’ she suggested with a hoof gesture.

‘Are you sure?’ Twilight quickly asked, having inquisitively taken a few eager steps forward before realising the gravity of what had been offered.

With a smile Luna nodded her affirmation, tapping her horn. ‘Don’t worry, there’s nothing bad on the other side, plus it would be good to see how far your new found powers stretch.’

Bolstered by this somewhat, the purple alicorn sent a matching aura to the door’s handle; in pulling it open spilling golden light from within and then stepped through.

In all directions there was nothing but clouds, their white fluffy fields extending far over the curvature of the horizon. Above in stark contrast the deep blues of the ether beyond painted the sky around the glowing golden disc of the sun, bathing everything in the bright warmth of its rays. Only a single rocky outcrop existed in this space, its jagged faces piercing through the lower mists like the prow of some immense ocean vessel. Rather than a cap of snow or ice however, the peaks of this rough stone ship were topped by plant life, with lush green ferns spilling from its edges and tall grasses sprouting from its surface beneath the branches of a single great tree. It was an oasis, isolated but tranquil for it, set unseen from the world somewhere below.

Scootaloo stretched out her forehooves, previously acting as a pillow between her head and the tree’s gnarled trunk, feeling the soft tickle of the floor’s fronds against her sprawled back, before lazily rolling onto her stomach and rising to her hooves. The delicate scent of spring woodland (thinned in the strong breeze blowing across this high-altitude haven so as not to be overbearingly pungent) danced through her nostrils, causing her to sigh as she continued to stretch out her long settled frame. No small amount of pride filled her as her wings extended to their full impressive length at her sides, fluttering slightly as they instinctively tested the air currents. Her eyes ran across the feathery limbs, part checking and part admiring them, but then could not resist moving onward to steal a quick glance at the marks which now adorned her flanks. A pink butterfly in the midst of a power dive looked back at her, leaving spiralled trails behind it as it broke through a plume of vapour and the sound barrier along with it. Finally, she had grown up.

All of a sudden her hooves were at the very edge of the cliff, her body swaying back and forth before the precipice. The urge to jump was strong, the reason for her to waver unclear.

‘Race you!’ No sooner had the excited voice reached her ears then a cyan streak shot past her, sending a gust whipping through her mane.

At once she was in flight, the coiled springs of her muscles launching her upwards, meanwhile in a few wingbeats she was propelled forwards in hot pursuit. The once still world became a blur of motion, her rapid flaps speeding her effortlessly faster and faster, as if there were neither boundaries nor limits that could hold her back. It did not matter where she was going or in fact where the supposed finish line might lie, all she cared about was catching the other pegasus, no longer very far in front of her. She pushed herself further, harder, faster and the gap closed to nothing until the two of them were side by side as they tore across the sky. Fighting through the oncoming train of wind slamming itself into her she managed to look sideways where a pair of shining pink irises met her across the gulf. A broad grin covered Rainbow’s face, her mane framing it in a beautifully chaotic tornado of colours, unconcerned despite the fact that they were travelling at speeds which would have given even the Wonderbolts pause.

‘Pretty good squirt!’ The words were mouthed, inaudible against the roar of movement.

Their acceleration however continued unabated, heedless of everything else, the pair driving one another onward, each pushing the other to go further. The screaming gale became deafening, the world dissolved utterly beyond the two of them and then…

*Bang!*

A titanic explosion rocketed outward. It blasted away the cloud blanket in its entirety, two parallel lines of colour, one simply in a range of pinks, the other containing the entire spectrum, trailing in its wake. A duo of archways were left bridging the sky, splashing its plain canvas with their mixed tones, whilst below the plains of Equestria were now exposed.

From a whiteness that had consumed her vision Scootaloo emerged, finding herself broken into a hover underneath the artificial rainbows of which she was half the architect. The other half meanwhile mirrored her, cyan wings fluttering to easily keep her aloft, as they both looked up at what they had together created. Unthinkingly they drifted, only noticing their collision course at the last moment, having to catch each other in their forehooves to prevent the crash. Scootaloo felt the burn of embarrassment cross her face, her eyes falling downward in response, along with her mane to mask her visage, until she felt a hoof gently brush away her fringe. Gaining the courage to look upward she met Rainbow’s smile, filled with warmth and outward pride. The two of them were drawn together, coming closer and closer until finally their lips met tentatively in a kiss, beginning timidly at first but losing this as it continued.

‘We should leave her to it’ Luna whispered in Twilight’s ear, breaking her from her trance like state induced as she watched over the unfolding scene before her. The two alicorns for some time now had remained unseen just over the threshold of this airy dream world, stood on an immaterial platform high above. Now they both turned to whence they came, stepping back through the wooden portal to the darkened corridor beyond.

Fallen Star

The rasping sounds of somepony desperately fighting for much needed oxygen filled the space as Trixie Lulamoon gasped her way into consciousness. Coughing slightly at first, she greedily drank down the cool air to fill her deflated lungs until gradually her heavy breathing came back under her own control. Her violet eyes, having shot open at the same time as her mouth had thrown itself agape, spun searchingly about in a quest for any clue as to where the hay she was. The only concrete thing they discovered however was that she was currently lying on her side, her body flopped against a near colourless onyx surface whose hardness pressed uncomfortably into the bones of her jaw and shoulder joints. It was unpleasantly like she was laid out on a shined stone slab, a thought which brought with it a variety of distinctly unappealing images. As her heaving chest finally slowed, her panting becoming controlled breath, she slowly found herself able to rise unsteadily to her hooves, wobbling as she tried again to better take in her surroundings.

Hardly what we were expecting, if not a tad unimpressive all things considered.

Darkness, oppressively thick and opaque, nothing more, extended in the featureless void of her setting. All was inky blackness, above, around and below, and yet without any visible light source she could still see herself, as if she were a blue sketch on a chalkboard. It did not seem therefore that the place was veiled in shadow, acting to hide whatever it might contain, but rather instead that there was quite literally nothing there to be seen. At the same time however it was not simply a colourless box, there being only the floor with any recognisable substance to it, a feature lacking in any walls or ceiling if they even existed at all. Dimensions were indistinguishable, without any distance or horizon to speak of, as if she stood in the eye of a storm of mist.

It’s all rather an anti-climax isn’t it. We deserve far better, or at the very least far worse.

This was true, but what had she really been expecting? Golden gates and ethereal palaces perhaps? No; no pony on Equis had proven in the least bit capable of recognising how exactly great and powerful Trixie had been, so why should what followed after be any different. Flames, red hot pokers and shackles instead? Again no; although she was well aware that she was not exactly a "good pony" she hardly thought her crimes warranted damnation. So Limbo then, unless of course her present environment was in fact a punishment. ‘If Tartarus is other ponies, then surely the Great and Powerful Trixie can’t be damned’ she mused aloud (in part shocking herself with the sound of her own voice in the emptiness), ‘although some kind of welcome or fanfare would have been nice.’1 Her flippant stoicism was however only skin deep as the thought of infinity here crept up on her, tying a knot in her stomach and hanging weights from her heart. She shivered, the cold beginning to bite at her, climbing up through her hooves.

Trixie’s thoughts were cut short as in front of her a pool of light appeared out of nowhere, forming as something akin to a near distance, as if somepony had flicked a switch, causing her to jump almost out of her skin. She could not see from where the illumination fell, but where it landed a chair and table had materialised, both steely grey and angular but nonetheless amazing in the sea of absence in which they had formed. Lacking any other guidance or purpose she made directly for this beacon, careful to keep the building need for something, anything, other than the absolute nothing from making her hoofsteps frantic. Retaining her self-control she reached the drab furniture and huffed: ‘the Great and Powerful Trixie is unimpressed. Surely she deserves far better.’ Her voice rang out, a bit more indignant than she had been aiming for, as she show pouted to her non-existent audience.

Nothing happened. Apprehensively she took a step into the pond of white light, burning brightly against the charred setting. Nothing changed. She walked in a circuit around the table, coming to a stop at its matching chair and sat down. Still nothing happened. Her forehooves tapped out a rhythm against the grey surface before her. Nothing and yet more nothing, leaving her only increasingly aware of the body she inhabited, devoid of any other distractions. She shivered, she still felt cold. ‘Is this seriously it?’ Her question caught in her throat, dying as a dry cough and sputtering which spasmed through her, but even when it stopped its sore sensitivity remained. She massaged her windpipe and then forced further coughs forth; still however it felt almost as if something were caught in it, merely becoming more tender from her attempts.

‘Hello Trixie.’

The unicorn’s head spun on its axis in pursuit of the authoritative mare’s voice which had broken the silence. Or at least she thought it had been a mare’s, it was hard to tell, it being an equally uphill task to find the location of its source. It had spoken only two words but they had boomed everywhere all at once. ‘Who’s there?’ Trixie’s own voice in contrast could not raise itself to such heights, sounding empty, unable to hide the fear which had forced its way into her tones. ‘Show yourself!’ Her attempt at anger fared no better, helping little, merely revealing her loss of any security, whilst she craned her neck around to search the shadows at her back. ‘Stop toying with me! The Great and powerful Trixie demands that you show yourself immediately!’

‘As you wish.’

Three more words, no more distinct than and just as overwhelming as those that preceded them. Trixie spun back round to facing forwards and stopped. Two slitted eyes stared back at her across the desk, their irises azure, as if afloat in the nothingness, meanwhile as their unicorn viewer looked on in shock a set of fanged jaws drew themselves into a grin beneath them.

Author's Note

Notes:
1) No Exit by John-Paul Sartre

Alone

‘So now you tell me, what is it like?’ Luna asked, closing the wooden portal behind her as she followed the Princess of Friendship back out of the stratospheric dream world in which they had been spectators.

Twilight meanwhile strode into the corridor, her back to the other alicorn and mind in turmoil. What it had been like, in no uncertain terms, had been a sensory overload. She had felt everything, from the caress of the breeze and plants to the shockwaves of the twinned blasts, but deeper than that she had been strapped to a rollercoaster of emotions which were not hers to sense. There had been intense pride, followed by determined resolve and then unsure embarrassment which had become passionate affections. In each case however her feelings had neither been her own nor had she had any right to them. Now she felt like a thief combined with the uncomfortableness of having seen too much, being a witness to another pony’s secret thoughts, not to mention the fact that one of her best friends was the subject of these. ‘It was incredibly invasive, not unpleasant in of itself, but like I’d hijacked her thoughts. How can you do it?’ she continued, failing to hide the degree of accusation which had slipped into her voice. ‘I mean, it lays bare anypony’s inner most thoughts. You’ve only shown me one and I already feel guilty for what I’ve seen.’

Luna just sighed in response, although not disappointedly, and nodded. She stepped back into her previous pacing down the corridor, magic pulsing through her horn as she scanned the space, and bid her fellow alicorn to follow. ‘It would seem that you’ve not been spared any element of my power. You are quite right in your appraisal though, it is a highly intrusive sensation, but I’m equally subject to the guilt that you feel.’

‘So why do it then?’

‘Watching over dreams is a heavy responsibility, though I don’t count looking into happy ones like the one you just saw as part of that, rather that’s more of a guilty pleasure, providing a small reprieve from the… darker things that I have to deal with here. Although it should also be noted that I haven’t indulged like that in quite a while, as now I tend to end the night in your dreams as well you know. You’re my safe haven.’ The Princess of the Night cracked a small smile, but before she could continue Twilight broke in.

‘Hold on a sec, when I go to sleep you always seem to be right there waiting for me, so how does that work?’

‘Oh, apologies I should’ve clarified that. Time doesn’t work the same way here. What feels like hours or days in a dream can in reality be mere seconds or the reverse can be possible, meanwhile here in the nexus of the Dreamspace things seem to be timeless’ Luna roughly explained. ‘I can’t really elaborate further on the intricacies of it as they don’t seem to be entirely fixed.’

Twilight continued to walk at her marefriend’s side listening intently, her inquisitiveness helping in part to dampen her disconcertion at treading a path through an infinite space, which now had additionally been revealed to not obey the laws of linear time. Her train of thought now changed tracks on considering the other alicorn’s earlier reserved words, switching to concern. ‘Luna, what did you mean by “darker things”?’

‘Like I already said, watching over everypony’s dreams is my responsibility’ the dark alicorn began, considering carefully her words before she spoke them, ‘just as Tia runs the court during the day. Between us we divide and conquer, if you’ll pardon the term, to try to take care of everypony. Whereas she is the public face which settles public problems, my domain is more in the private sphere. On the one hoof this covers small things, like in Scootaloo and the rest of the Crusaders' case their apprehensions about finding their purposes for example. On the other hoof though this is also about those ponies on the edges or fringes, who’ve maybe slipped through the net, which I know sounds horrible and authoritarian but that’s not what I mean by it. I’ve heard it described like me and Tia are parents to Equestria, which personally I hate as I’ve been a decidedly absentee mother, but that’s kind of what I mean. It’s therefore more that I try to be always there to listen, help or advise anypony who needs it, to be a private ear or voice that they can trust.’

‘But what about what you just showed me?’ Twilight interrupted again.

Luna raised a single eyebrow as she continued. ‘I doubt that you being privy to what you just saw is a breach in that trust. You’re just as much their princess as I am and you lack my past as your shadow. Also it’s hardly like she’s the first filly to have a meaningless crush on her mentor' she jibbed with a grin, rising to a low giggle at the pink embarrassed hue it raised on the purple alicorn at her side. Her mood however re-darkened as she returned to the subject at hoof. ‘What I mean by darker things is that I’ve therefore seen a great many at their worst, or in their lowest places. I wouldn’t shun this duty, nor would I wish it upon anypony else, for it is draining to say the least. This is also not to mention the fact that I’m not the only one that dwells here…’ A flare sparked from the tip of Luna’s horn, causing her to abruptly halt mid speech.

‘What do you mean?’ Twilight questioned, but already Luna was making for a tall arched doorway with a determined look on her face, making an answer unlikely.

‘I’m sorry Twilight, I promise I’ll explain everything to you, but right now I have to see to something’ Luna apologised, turning and drawing the shorter alicorn into another hug as she spoke. ‘I’m sorry to leave you like this, but please either wait here or if you find your door wait there and I’ll find you.’

‘How?’

The Princess of the Night merely tapped her own horn and then the other princess’ in reply, lightly laying a kiss on the purple alicorn’s cheek as she departed from her.

An aura of pale purple magic briefly flared before fizzling to nothing. Twilight was now alone as she wandered the single great hallway. So far her attempts at blindly replicating Luna’s senses had all ended in failure, leaving her none the wiser of what lay behind any of the portals she passed or where her own was, the concept of whose existence was weird to say the least. The result of this was considerable annoyance, both in her student self and on a higher level. She knew it was foalish to wish for instantaneous mastery, particularly seen as there was no evidence that her new powers would be anything more than fleeting, but none the less she desired it, not for wants of pride but rather those of guilt. Right now she felt like she had failed, not thinking twice about Luna’s nocturnal duties other than her own indulgence in them, meanwhile her partner had soldiered on alone. If she could in any small way lift a part of the burden off of her marefriend she knew she had to try to.

She focused once more, calling magic back into her horn, feeling the rapid pulse of energy as it flowed through her and closed her eyes, trying to simply feel her way without any other sensory distraction. When her vision reopened she was before a doorway, rustic in style but painted starkly plain white. Nothing else called out to her to reveal anything more. ‘Well, here goes nothing.’ In defiance of what she had been told, fuelled by a potent cocktail of love, intrigue and a need to do something, Twilight let her telekinesis pull on the door’s handle and she stepped through into the unknown.

Temptation

‘What’s the matter, cat got your tongue? Don’t tell me the "Great and Powerful" Trixie is lost for words, she’s hardy well known for keeping her mouth shut!’

Trixie was however just that, cemented in place where she sat so much so as to feel as part of the chair she was glued to, colour drained from her feature’s to match the seat’s greyness. When the voice had appeared in the silence she had been shocked enough, but now faced with its source she found herself initially struck dumb by its presence. All there was standing across from her (or rather seemingly floating) was a pair of disembodied eyes and a jagged grin, meaning that either the being which they were a part of was either incorporeal beyond them or blended perfectly into its surrounding darkness. In either case the effect was mildly disturbing, to say nothing of its visible features obvious abnormalities. It was a predator’s visage, wearing a crocodile’s smile along with slashed nocturnal pupils across its irises. ‘Who are you?’ the blue unicorn blurted, re-finding but not yet regaining control over her voice.

‘Hooray! Not only can she speak, but she has maintained her cognition as well!’ the incomplete face smiled, seemingly genuinely pleased about this observation. ‘You have no idea how tiresome it is to never meet ponies capable of making civil introductions, not to mention time consuming, and time is certainly nothing we want to be wasting. Less helpfully however, who I am is not the easiest question to go about answering. I’ve been called a great many names in my time, most of which have neither been particularly pleasant nor entirely fair, and I’ve also born a great many titles along with them. I’ve worn a countless multitude of offices, from the grandest peaks to the lowliest ravines of favour, I’ve been a princess and I’ve been a king. No, let’s forego the pleasantry of my name. A far easier question would be what am I?’

‘Fine, what are you?’ Trixie’s composure had almost returned to its full former force and she snapped the question without hesitation. A degree of her fear had been dampened by her aggravation as the creature had spoken its self-indulgent piece, combined with its general tone which skirted on the cusp of mockery, doing nothing to enamour its speaker to her.

‘Ooh, and she’s still got the makings of wit too! How cute!’ the thing chuckled to itself. ‘As I said, the answer to that question is plain and simple: I am your salvation.’

The showpony snorted, she knew a spiel when she heard it. ‘Okay, feel free to cut to the chase at any point you want. You know if this is just a glorified waiting room you could just say so, particularly if you’re aiming not to waste our collective time.’

‘Waiting room?’ The twin azure orbs thinned in the darkness as if frowning, had their owner had brows to actually frown with. ‘Oh I see.’ Its smile which had similarly contorted with its eyes now returned along with the features’ intrinsic threat. ‘Let me assure you that this place is most certainly not a “waiting room” as you put it, nor is it the hereafter as I suspect you believe.’

Trixie was once more caught off guard, thrown unsteady as the rug was again pulled out from under her by its words. ‘So I’m… I’m not dead’ she asked uncertainly, the query seeming all the more surreal as she verbalised it.

‘No you’re not dead’ it laughed back, but without any hint of warmth in its personal mirth, ‘or at least not yet anyway.’

‘What do you… *cough!*’ Her building question was killed off by a fit of coughing, half-forgotten tenderness returning to her throat with a vengeance. She spluttered against a barrier of nothing, panting heavily in each interlude she was granted to draw back the air she had uncontrollably expelled from her lungs. Her neck meanwhile felt too tight, as if it were a mere straw when what she really required was a fire hose, leaving her gasping as she wheezed further. She coaxed in what small amounts of air she could manage to draw on, only barely sipping whilst her body willed for far more, making several attempts to clear her throat during the process. Rubbing her windpipe in hopes that her forehooves’ caresses would again loosen it, she began again. ‘Ahem… what do you mean by salvation then?’ she managed, eyes forced closed in her last attempt to free her airway.

The thing had not batted an eyelid (although it was not exactly clear whether or not it exactly had them) as Trixie was overcome by coughing, retaining its broad toothed grin throughout when it was in her sights. Now however as she looked back up it was nowhere to be seen and in its place she was instead met by her reflection, staring out from a shined surface which had materialised from nowhere. The mirror was jet black like obsidian, making it just barely distinguishable from its background. ‘That again is a pleasantly simple question.’ As the creature spoke she watched its leering face appear above her twin’s shoulder, but as she whirled around in surprise she found that beyond the world of the looking glass there was nothing there. ‘I offer you power…’ When her gaze came back to the mirror its image had changed. Where once a light blue unicorn had sat there was now an alicorn in her place, new wings to match her coat fluttering gently at her sides. Her eyes darted to view the new feathered appendages, however in reality once more she was disappointed, there being no hint of change in the fur of her barrel. ‘…and greatness.’ In looking up she discovered a vast crowd had formed at her twin’s back, all caught in the chaos of silent cheering.

Trixie! Trixie! Trixie!

‘In short, I offer you what has until now been wrongfully denied you. Am I therefore not your saviour?’

The tempting reflection flexed its wings, driving her already ecstatic audience to even higher muted roars. ‘So what’s the catch?' Trixie asked, awed by the sight but not made foalish by it. ‘What do you want in return?’

‘All you have to do’ the creature answered, its smiling shadow of a face appearing amongst the figures of screaming ponies, ‘is let me in.’

Intermission

The moon’s silvery rays fell from above, coming to rest along with the light of the stars focused on a single cottage. This three storey dwelling was but one of many forming a village not much bigger than a hamlet, surrounded on all sides by the imposing shapes of dense woodland, the limbs of its gnarled denizens reaching up towards the speckles of the night’s sky. The clustered buildings were rustic and simple (much like their counterparts in Ponyville), mostly plainly whitewashed with thatched roofs and few exceeding a second floor in height, making them look squat against their background of tree trunks. In most cases drawn curtains veiled their windows from within, but from this single taller house, set apart in its lunar spotlight, orange burned outward to pierce the evening’s shadow.

Twilight, having stepped through the unknown doorway, found herself immediately in the main street of this world as soon as she crossed its threshold, facing ahead of her this singularly illuminated dwelling. What was strange about this (bearing in mind her expectations) was the fact that there was nopony in evidence anywhere populating the space, leaving her none the wiser as to whose dream she was stood within. In spite of this she was definitely sure that this was somepony’s unconscious imaginings because of the alien familiarity which had beset her on entering it, combined with a crushing melancholy despite its almost idyllic setting, both of which feelings were certainly not her own. More than this though she was aware of a low murmuring, just barely audible, as if the speakers who were creating it were more like insects buzzing about her ears than real, although in any case they were entirely invisible.

‘No, please don’t go! I’m sorry!’

A lone filly’s voice; loud shrill and scared, sliced through the others silencing them in an instant, whilst the sadness Twilight was experiencing hit a new peak, becoming actually painful in her heart. The central house’s front door flew full open, swinging wildly on its hinges to crash against the wall it was set in, and out through it strode the imposing figure of a night pegasus in the full battledress of a Lunar Guard. The relatively tall pony’s features were mostly covered up by its armour, revealing only its membranous wings and a few patches of fur (all granite grey) and its eyes shining deep crimson through the slits of its plumed helm. A single azure iris shone out from the breastplate of its interlocking steel carapace, a match with its own slitted pupils in their deep red settings beneath its helmet. As the door swung closed behind it, the unknown soldier sighed deeply before taking off in a single fluid wingbeat from her bat-like limbs, swiftly aloft and climbing in flight towards the clouds of the far off horizon.

‘Get out.’

A fresh voice broke in lower than the first one, obviously a stallion’s in its gruffness, whose tacit anger forced Twilight’s ears back against her head and tied a knot of guilt within her. The door swung wide again and a young onyx coloured zebra filly tumbled through as if blown by a strong gust of wind, losing her hoofing to land roughly in a heap as she did so. Sharp pain shot up through the alicorn’s leg as she looked on, watching the grey striped filly (her markings a total match to the hue of the departing night pegasus’ fur) pick herself up from the dust, wincing as she did so. Almost instantly the young mare’s eyes (electric pink with catlike pupils) sprung to attention, searching after the fast vanishing pony which had preceded her.

‘Mummy?! Mummy please don’t go!’

The filly’s desperate words went unheeded by the one she called after however, and in a few final flaps she had departed over the horizon, disappearing into the suddenly darkened clouds. In the self-same moment the cottage door slammed shut without warning, turning the filly full circle on the spot to scrabble and bang against the closed portal.

‘No, please let me in! I’m sorry! I’m really sorry!’

The surface was unyielding to her frantic blows and her words dissolved into sobs on the doorstep. Loss hammered down hard on Twilight, welling up from nowhere within her, equally afflicting her as much as the one she viewed, almost to the point of forcing tears from her own eyes. With this latest and most severe of the alicorn’s strange extra-personal sensations she was broken from her frozen state, filled with the intensive need to do something. Before she could act however the distraught filly far in front of her took to flight, running full tilt for the edge of the glade. ‘Wait!’ Twilight yelled, but if she was heard it had no effect, leaving her only the option of pursuit, crossing into the forests beyond the village.

Shadows became all pervasive as the sky was masked by the covers of foliage, twisted branches weighed down with leaves acting to shield the under canopy from all but the barest minimum of light. The dark brought with it an old fear, or rather a youthful one, of what might lurk within or of what it might conceal. Her body answered her apprehensions before their reality became visible, a buzz of scuttling clicking in her ears whilst her flesh began to crawl. As she passed between ancient trunks, tracking the faint hoofprints of the one she followed in the root crossed dirt, the sources of this became gradually evident in webs strung above and creeping down to ground level, growing ever thicker till they covered every surface. In amongst these their creators moved, forcing her to repeatedly remind herself that she was not in fact afraid of spiders in spite of the terror they seemed to instil. Nonetheless she chose to lightly hover onward rather than walk, feeling further pity for the filly whose dreams had conjured the creatures and whose whimpering invisibly reached her hearing.

Ahead of her the tight scrum of trees came to an end, dispersing to provide a round gap in their number. This new glade was no more illuminated than the woodland that came before it however, an overcast sky of clouds maintaining the shadows. Twilight touched down in this openness before its singular feature of a huge stump with a large hole nestled between its buttresses. The running hoofsteps she had been following stopped before this gap, becoming a scuff mark as they slipped inside, so thus she followed, folding her wings in close and hunching over so she could fit through. Walls of green tinged sludge pressed in on all sides, as a tunnel sloping ever steeper downwards, dirty water in places oozing between the layers to create a stream of mud beneath her hooves. She slipped and slid deeper down into the earth, still beset by senses beyond her own, in this case a feeling of filth and matted fur all over her being.

‘Why?’

The zebra filly’s questioning voice, thin and cracked, drew the purple alicorn from the passage, entering into what could be best described as a cavern, with domed ceiling formed of the dead stump’s roots as well as its living kin like veins in the muck. Surrounded by tendrils sat a pool of clear water into which the grey and onyx mare (now caked in marring streaks) was staring, her dishevelled twin looking back up at her. She extended a forehoof sending ripples across the mirrored surface, but then before she could recoil two matching hooves sprang up, latching onto her neck and then her reflection dragged her in. Her scream split the air and everything instantly dissolved into black. Only Twilight remained, as if all else had been switched off, in the infinite darkness.

Compulsion

‘Sweet Celestia! Please could you just express yourself clearly’ Trixie sighed, swiftly forgetting the cold feeling the creature’s words had sent coursing through her back, submerged beneath both the sweet fruits still displayed before her and her own impatience. ‘The Great and Powerful Trixie is swiftly getting tired of having to beseech you for answers, in many cases prompted directly by you towards the questions she has to ask. If you have something to say just say it, and make a clear explanation of your meaning’ she continued, eyes still caught up in gazing on her reflected self. She stretched one of her new wings to its full impressive span and then the other, enjoying the until then unknown tingle of sensation as her feathered appendages felt their way through the air. Each movement she made, no matter how slight, elicited both mute enthralled awe from her illusory crowd and her own satisfaction, furthered greatly by her audience’s continued reactions.

‘As you wish, there’s no need for aggravation. I thought of all ponies you could appreciate a bit of theatricality, but anyway to business’ the spectral visage acquiesced, still ensconced in the elated rows it had created, an unaffected shrug evident in its tone even though obviously absent in any physicality. ‘Although I am loath to admit it, this place is very much a prison for me and though like any cage it has its gaps between its bars, these do little to make the place bearable. Ultimately I grow bored, the glimpses I am given through the holes in my cell's walls only worsening my condition in showing me the world from which I am withheld. But I digress; you therefore are my way out, my escape. All you have to do is let me into that pretty little head of yours, to share the space if you will, and then we can leave this place together. You’ll of course have my gratitude for this service and with it all the power I have offered. Together we can achieve everything you’ve ever dreamed of, truly becoming “Great and Powerful”, not to mention that we might reap revenge against those that have wronged us both. Fun no?’

Despite its voice remaining pleasant throughout, as if it were merely running the gauntlet of small talk, the words it spoke still involuntarily sent a shiver up Trixie’s spine. She was by no means a little filly, its honeyed tongue therefore falling far short of the deceptive mark, she was well aware of the pact it was asking of her. There were more old mares’ tales than might easily be counted of those who had struck such deals with unknown entities, those that made their home in Tartarus or dwelt in far worse places, inevitably suffering for their transgression and she was in no hurry to count herself amongst their number. At the same time this was not her first encounter with such darker magics, with her latest experiences only ending in disappointment, giving her little reason to place any hope in this demon’s smiles.

‘Come now Trixie, I am no mere item of jewellery and I do not ask you to bankrupt yourself to have me.’

‘You can read m…Trixie’s thoughts?’ she blurted in surprise.

‘No need to when she writes them clear across her face’ it answered. ‘I am aware of your past though, but you shouldn’t be alarmed at this. To judge is others’ domain not mine. I mean I really want us to be friends, so wouldn’t have anything to gain by pointing out your inadequacies, highlighting for example that you’re a talentless showpony from a minor curiosity sideshow who failed and dropped out of Celestia’s School for Gifted Unicorn’s. I would also try my hardest to contain my surprise that somepony so lacking in any magical abilities such as yourself actually managed to pass the entrance exam to get in in the first place, particularly bearing in mind that you’ve since relied on a mixture of pyrotechnics and simple lies to create your “magic”. No, the fact that you’re a pitiful excuse for a unicorn is really none of my concern.’

‘Trixie is not pitiful!’ the blue unicorn bellowed angrily, feeling each of the blows of its verbal assault, whilst a supporting scene played out before her in the obsidian mirror. At its first strike her twin’s wings had been plucked from her, bursting apart, reduced to being only clouds of feathers which mingled with a rainbow of confetti fired across her stage from unseen sources. In the same moment the delicious alien sensations the appendages had brought with them disappeared too, only to be replaced by the feeling of her trademark hat and cloak materialising in their place. Both accoutrements looked old, frayed at the edges and marred by staining, as much as they looked like a fool’s garb.

‘Of course she isn’t! How silly of me to have forgotten the vast legions of fans more than willing to testify to the contrary. Oh wait a minute, she doesn’t have any!’ Its malevolent grin grew all the wider as it chuckled to itself at her expense. ‘But then again it is an easy mistake to make, after all a crowd is a crowd and laughter is laughter, so who’s to say what the true meaning of either is. Of course it helps little when the subject is herself alone, entirely friendless and without any kin to speak of, therefore being without anypony who could honestly translate it. Joking aside though, let’s be truthful with one another. All you have in any real numbers are enemies, along with their loathing and resultant mirth at your pitiable self.’

‘Shut up!’ The gleeful faces of her twin’s audience turned to snarling expressions, their tightly crowded number becoming an angry hoard baying for blood. Each member of their newly formed mob alternated between silenced laughter and shouting their displeasure, in both cases their gnashing maws dripping with the venom of their hatred, matched in the gleaming daggers of their eyes. Trixie’s own gaze darted from one visage to the next, searching them all in turn for any variation but finding nothing. In this she did however discover fissures forming at the mirror’s edges, cracks breaking gradually inwards across its surface, meanwhile in an instant the entirety of her tormentors disappeared. Her reflection now sat alone in its dishevelled costume, save for the leering creature which loomed closer over her shoulder.

‘Come now Trixie, we both know that you can’t shut out the truth. You wouldn’t be here if that was the case.’ The predator’s azure irises stared out and into her from the crystalline looking glass. ‘I wasn’t lying when I said I wanted us to be friends. Surely only a friend could be so brutally honest about your wretched excuse of an existence, and in any case I only did so to make it clear to you that you had nothing, less than nothing, to lose and everything to gain from my generous offer.’

A background of dilapidation formed behind her twin, filled with the decrepit form of a stagnant caravan, immobile in the setting of a decaying back alley overflowing with rancid rubbish. ‘Buck you!’ Trixie spat back bluntly, unable to rise to more.

‘Okay, let me put it a different way.’ The fault lines still forming across the mirror now fully ruptured towards its centre, splintering all images including the dejected unicorn held within it. It finally shattered, sending outward an explosion of vicious shards, but these dissolved rapidly back into the darkness before striking anything. Revealed now in its absence was a length of rope dropping down suspended from the nothingness of the ceiling and ending in a noose at which the creature reappeared, watching her through its loop. ‘You really don’t have many other options open to you.’

Alarum

‘Buck’ Twilight swore, immediately catching her mouth with an embarrassed forehoof as she did so, falling back to her haunches against the door at her back and letting out a long drawn out sigh to follow the vulgarity. She felt tired, her body going as far as to crack a small yawn to that effect for its fatigued state (yet another insane prospect bearing in mind she was for all intents and purposes asleep), exhausted beyond simple physical exertion. In a very short span of time she had lived in the forms of two others by proxy as well as inhabiting her own and is was like each one had sapped her energies, as if bearing the strain of all of them herself.

And Luna does this every night.

‘Not just that’ she corrected herself. ‘Every night she walks the length of all of Equestria’s dreams, not only the mere pair I’ve had to deal with.’ The immense feat entailed by the Princess of the Night’s duty was hard to imagine to say the least, seeming as infinite as the tremendous corridor that Twilight was sat back in. She herself had barely scratched the surface of what this place contained, having only seen the dreams of two fillies at the polarised ends of the emotional spectrum. Although her latest experience had not been pleasant, it still had only been a youthful nightmare, playing on basic fears such as that of the dark and arachnophobia, alongside the threat of parental loss or disappointment. How much more, both quantitatively and qualitatively, had Luna seen? Her mind switched back to thoughts of time, considering the vast distances of the other alicorn’s dream-walking. How many lifetimes had Luna spent here simply trying to care for her subjects? The dark alicorn now seemed to her much older than either her youthful form suggested or she herself felt, not in terms of age but rather in sheer weight of experience.

Yet still she chose you.

That thought brought a wide smile to Twilight’s features, spreading a warm glow within her and leaving her beaming through the darkness. These feelings roused her from her seat, setting her determinedly to task once more as she tried again to coax magical foresight from her horn. Neither the thoughts nor the emotions attached to them were new to her; she had many times stopped in her considering and had to remind herself that it was all truly real. To say she felt like the luckiest mare on Equis for the love that was unconditionally hers (although a severe understatement not to mention seriously cliché) summed it up quite nicely.

Twilight stood herself in the centre of the corridor, taking a deep calming breath as she slowly veiled her vision. Blind of all distractions she channelled all her focus towards her single (if unclear) goal. The coursing pulse of energy flowed through her, wrapping its aura around her horn and emanating with a slight force before her. She let herself be guided by what little this divining arrow constituted, treading the path she interpreted from it. Even if she was not destined to keep this new found capacity for dream-walking, she would nonetheless for so long as she had it turn it towards supporting her Princess of the Night, that the dark alicorn might be given some respite to more enjoy what was her charge. A flare of sparks crackled and broke forth, bringing her to a full stop, whilst her intrigued eyes came open to meet the view of a basic wooden portal, defaced beyond all recognition by scrawled graffiti and the tinged stain of festering damp. Despite this it did however strike somewhere a chord of familiarity, although this stopped short of actually enlightening Twilight any further. Steeling herself to her purpose with nought more than a final resolute intake of breath, thoughts of Luna still fresh in her mind, she closed the distance, opening the doorway and stepping through.

Trixie rasped as her windpipe closed to nothing, cutting off her breathing and her voice along with it. The chords of some unseen woven snake constricted about her throat, growing ever tighter and tighter as if gradually piling on even more of their serpentine length to crush her. This squeezing moved on the rest of her body, leaving her lungs deflated, forced to breath out their precious contents, with the short gasps she drew to try and reverse this failing utterly in their futile attempts. Now in desperation she struggled, forehooves scrabbling ineffectually at the invisible bonds, all to no avail in that they sensed neither hoof nor chord to free her from. The chair beneath her was rocked wildly by her exertions, wobbling between bipedal positions on the spot before its balance was finally lost, tumbling sideways with a crash whilst she herself landed hard, quickly rolling onto her back.

‘Great and powerful indeed! Ha!’

All articles of furniture disappeared as she choked on the freezing surface of the floor, leaving only the cruel noose swinging infinitesimally above like a pendulum. Back and forth it swung under her gaze, not just ticking by the passing moments with regularity but impossibly seeming to speed up its passage with each oscillation. Trixie’s vision blurred briefly, the drought of oxygen beginning to make itself felt, and as it cleared it was filled with the creature’s non-existent form staring down into her, mere inches between her own face and its lack of one.

‘Time grows short my little pony. Now it’s time to make a decision, not that you ever had any real choice about it to begin with, nor was there ever any doubt.’

The world became cloudy again, pained tears forced from the blue unicorn flowing to submerge its forms. Through these rivers however the demon actually glowed brighter, its azure irises and pure white fangs gleaming with fresh brilliant energy through the flood. Trixie’s hooves continued to tear at her throat with no result, control steadily slipping away from her starved limbs. Beginning slowly as a tremble (much like a shiver against the increasing cold) and then becoming full formed shaking, her movements dissolved. Her body was overcome by spasms, spreading all through her as she coughed against the strangling force.

‘Why do you still insist on resisting? There’s no hope for you now beyond me. Just give in and let me help you. Give in.’

Why won’t we give in?

The strange lucidity of her inner voice at once surprised the fading unicorn, but she could not answer its question: in truth she did not know the why of it. It was unlikely that it was her past unsuccessful soiree with such darkness which held her back and neither was it the case that its offer was not tempting, because it truly was. What did that leave? Simply her stubbornness perhaps, still puffed up by self-worth, or maybe something more? No, all the arrogance she had had was fled with her withheld air. This left only one conclusion, bringing with it no small amount of further shock. Trixie knew that she was not nice, nor pleasant or for want of a better word “good” as a pony, but she had no want to fall (even if she was being strongly pulled) any further. Defiance in the end was not much, unlikely to be even known by any beyond herself and the creature, it was not redemption, but it could be her own small victory.

‘Enough!’ it snarled, bearing down on her. ‘Give in! Just let me in! Let me in!’

‘Trixie?’

No light this time to greet the purple alicorn as she passed through the portal, neither lunar nor solar brightness in evidence, rather instead only the denial of its dichotomous opposite. This was however not what struck her first as she entered. Far more pervasive than this formless blackness, much the mirror image of the land she had just left, were the dual sensations of a tight grip winding itself about her throat and angry yelling ringing against her ears. The pressure around her windpipe was unpleasant but not enough to cut her breathing, the rage filled voice meanwhile held in it the same flickering familiarity that there had been in the door which brought her here. All this however faded into the background; set against the space’s single central figure flattened against the floor (or rather the immaterial substance which constituted it) gasping desperately for air. ‘Trixie?’ Recognition struck fast behind her vision, concern forming the called question from her lips to follow it.

‘You’ll have to excuse me for a moment, though for your sake hopefully no longer, but feel free to make up your mind in the meantime.’ The voice again (which Twilight was sure she knew), a mare’s, commanding to the point of regality, but mixed with other tones playing at its back to make it seem as if not just one were speaking, came again although more hushed. Two azure eyes appeared between her and Trixie’s collapsed form, a set of invisible lips unzipping themselves in the dark space beneath them, moving quickly from an initial frown to a drawn grin. ‘Well hello again Twilight, long time no see. I must admit you’re not who I was expecting, but nonetheless welcome.’

‘Trixie’ Twilight began, taking a momentary pause to collect herself, ‘how I’m here and erm… dream-walking is kind of a long story, but I’m here to help if I can.’

‘Oh no no no my little princess I’m not Trixie’ the not quite face interjected, moving as if it shook its non-existent head in the negative. ‘You don’t recognise me do you, likely too much on your new royal plate to remember little me.’

‘I’m sorry Trixie. Please believe me though that I didn’t forget about you’ the purple alicorn half lied, feeling every ounce of her internal self-reproach as she did so, ‘it’s just…’

‘I’m not Trixie’ it said bluntly, stopping her. ‘Then again, it was not like this that we last met. Allow me to jog your memory.’ In less than a blink what features there had been disappeared, replaced by a large jagged piece of grey crystal. Twilight took her turn in frowning as a low chuckle, deeper much more in the tone of a stallion, filled the space. A black bubbling began to pour from the stalagmite’s multifaceted face, then a crimson horn (sharpened to be much more like a tusk) emerged through the tar like magic, followed swiftly by the pinpricks of two equally red pupils set in the depths of freakishly emerald irises. The frothing puddle formed itself into the length of a serpentine mane, carrying with it a visage as grey as the crystal it was snaking out from, sporting a pair of fanged canines like some kind of mythical vampony.

‘Sombra?’

‘King Sombra if you please’ the dark stallion’s deep voice countered in its base notes, ‘unlike you he actually earned and deserved his title. But no guess again’ he continued, although in an in an instant his voice reverted back to its previous mixture of mareish tones. In a burst of smoke the crystal, its protruding face and all vanished, the acrid gas stinging the purple alicorn’s eyes closed. When she could again reopen them a new figure was in the midst of appearing through the dissipating mists, striding out in a warrior’s full armoured carapace, form complete with both horn and wings. Its azure irises and entirely serrated maw had returned with it, each set with a menacing shine and grin, aglow against the fur of Luna’s darkened mirror image.

‘What?’ The creases in Twilight’s brow deepened as she was forced into an unsure step backward. ‘Nightmare Moon? But…’

‘Oh Twilight, if you could only see your face!’ the nightmare laughed. ‘Your confusion is quite palpable, not to mention a tad hilarious to behold. Could it be that the great Twilight Sparkle doesn’t know what unites us both and others? Well actually I shouldn’t be surprised really, after all the sisters have always loved their secrets, so why should your being the sun’s “favourite pupil” and the moon’s “safe haven” make you any different.’ Persistent in its mockery, it continued: ‘even though you might think otherwise.’

A particularly violent rasp from Trixie, still pinned in place on the floor, recaptured Twilight’s attentions, pulling her forward only to be blocked by the taller alicorn in front of her. ‘What did you do to her?’ she asked, increasingly alarmed by and aware of the grip still around her throat.

‘Nothing, nothing at all. Truly.’ The nightmare was the image of mock innocence and hurt at the accusation. ‘All that ails her is of her own doing. Or rather at least most of it is, for you at least can take the credit for some of it.’

‘But I haven’t done anything’ the purple alicorn protested, making a move to step around the one in her way, but her barrier continued to track and anticipate her every action.

‘Exactly. You did nothing after you shamed an incredibly self-conscious pony into flight, causing her to go on a self-destructive quest for vengeance and then beating her a second time, leaving her hated by many and laughed at by all others. Truly you are the rightful Princess of Friendship!’

‘That’s not how it happened…’

‘Of course not, I’m sorry, it must be so cumbersome and time consuming to be burdened with alicornhood, power and a castle, not to mention fame to the point of deification. There can hardly be much space on your lists for the troubles of mere mortals like her.’

‘No…’ Twilight began, its words striking exactly where it hurt.

‘No? Your darker side then perhaps, that little part of you which allowed you to so easily master Sombra’s magic? Did you enjoy grinding her into the dirt, and was the chance to repeat it just another thrill? Maybe you even hoped she’d return for round three.'

‘No…’

‘No? All that leaves is that you’re simply inadequate, not ready for any of what your wings or title entail. I couldn’t possibly hold it against you though, being the sheltered little bookworm that you are.’

‘No!’

‘It’s no wonder that you’re so wrapped up in yourself, wallowing in misplaced self-pity over your library or else obsessing over your own happiness with your night-time princess.’

‘Shut up!’ Twilight shouted, her flaring anger shooting a few sparks from her horn, succumbing to the continued assault of her silver tongued attacker as it exposed and struck each of her nerve endings in turn.

‘Aww, does the truth hurt?’ questioned the nightmare in a caricature of true concern, unconvincing mostly for the fanged smile which appeared to follow it, along with a striking up of the demon’s own magic, matching the carnivorous fires in the rear of its gaze.

‘Enough!’

The purple alicorn’s neck spun to find the newly appeared voice, overflowing with its owner’s rage as it rolled through her and everypony else like a shockwave, roaring with the force of a storm through the air. Mane and tail billowing wildly in the angry whirlwind of her own making, face contorted in a mask of pure loathing with which Twilight was not accustomed and which desecrated the alicorn speaker’s beautiful features, Luna stormed forth from the re-materialised doorway.

‘You will not speak to her like that!’ the Princess of the Night continued bellowing, her fury showering an overburn of energy from her horn whilst beneath her thundering hooves the same power surged outward through the floor as lightning, painting pure white streaks across its blackness. ‘Nor will you threaten her!’

‘Hey Lulu’ the nightmare flippantly replied, seemingly unperturbed. ‘Took you long enough to get here to spoil the fun, although this time I fear you may be too late, and your little protégé here is hardly much cop is she.’ The embers of the demon’s own magic now fully ignited in a silvery aura.

Like each other’s reflections the two dark alicorns mirrored one another as they came closer together and then turned to circling, each in a zone of calm before the inevitable clash. Twilight meanwhile was forced into further backward steps, caught at the centre of the coming cyclone, trying to move fluidly so as not to upset the settled tension and therefore release it. Barely had she made it to Luna’s side then it began; dams of loathing breaking forth from both sides in waves to strike against their hated other. Bolts tore through the air with deadly intent, whilst sparkling shields rose and fell in response or else their targets blinked away, passing in and out of existence. No strike hit its mark however, each one merely landing elsewhere amongst the immaterium to pulse through its shadows. Naturally the tumult reached its crescendo and halted, its opposing forces coming to a dead stop where they had begun, breathing heavily.

‘That’s enough foreplay don’t you think’ the nightmare grinned through bared jaws, sending out a single murderous beam towards its enemy. Luna in turn responded in kind, their clashing streams of magic ballooning at their point of impact as a reversed tug of war developed with them both trying to force the other into submission, to be scorched by the searing rays. Pained strain etched its lines across their drawn faces, but gradually the fatal orb began to inch its way in Luna’s direction, much to her adversary’s delight.

Twilight, put through a balletic dance of dodging between the blasts of the magical melee, rediscovered herself and her will in the same moment, unthinkingly teleporting to her princess’ side. She bound their powers as one, releasing a stream of purple energy to enwrap and bolster her love’s one of silver in a spiral. The scales tipped in reverse and an explosion burst the bubble away from the pair of them, its detonation throwing their armoured adversary to the ground.

‘Not bad’ the creature coughed begrudgingly without rising, not obviously injured but struggling immobile where it lay. The predator’s slitted pupils locked with Twilight’s a final time as it concluded: ‘you should dwell on what I said and take heed of it’ and then it disappeared, swallowed back into the shade.

No time was granted for revelry of celebration, a sore scratching rasp unmaking and denying it before it could begin. Trixie choked violently for a final time, back arching and limbs thrashing as they kicked outward against nothing, whilst the vivid violet of her eyes paled as they bugged slightly from her skull. Above the writhing unicorn a previously unnoticed swinging noose came to a stop and when it did so the blue unicorn beneath it went suddenly limp, vanishing like the tormentor before it and somehow making the infinite blackness darker in her absence.

‘Trixie!’

Curtain Call

Nothingness: not just darkness but blindness, not merely silence but deafness, in all an absolute sensory absence, the antithesis therefore to all the sweet fruits which lay beyond it. Into this world (or lack of it) stepped a light, distant and indistinct but nonetheless seeming as a flame, burning bright and loud against its background. Although far off in the distance and the view of it constricted, as if its inferno stood at the end of a long tube or tunnel, it gradually grew closer, growing ever harsher as it approached. It also accelerated, growing ever faster as it closed the distance, becoming the speeding headlamp of an oncoming train in transit, until it finally struck home. White hot pain came with it, roughly waking up all other senses as it bit deep into every nerve ending, puncture points pulsing as they were scorched by venomous barbs.

A gasp split the quiet, breaking the surface of the stormy sea, as her body found itself forcibly exhumed, rising up from the depths of its burial. Her lungs burned, left without the air they craved for so long that now they screamed against its return, and her muscles ached, each and every one as equally starved and therefore feeling as if they truly had been run over by a train. Iron and ozone jointly attacked her elsewhere, the former dug in as a stagnant pool on her palate (not much but pungent), whilst the latter lead a charge in assault against her nostrils. She was on her back she realised, feeling the dirty pit of the floor she lay on beneath her spine. Beyond this hole the patter of water fell against her ears, both as the low percussion against wooden slats and the twinkling tones of droplets against porcelain. Finally the leaden shutters of her eyelids discovered the strength to raise themselves, bringing her fully back into the world.

‘It’s okay Trixie, just breath.’

The voice was soft, coming to her tenderly in its reassurance from a purple face above, itself wrought by concern. With a little struggle against an inner soreness she allowed herself to obey its words, deep inhale begetting slow exhale in turn. Her pains still refused to dissipate but it did succeed in calming her.

‘I’m so sorry.’

She barely heard the apology, her head and mind within it beginning to drift in its fatigued state, tiredness beating her battered being on all sides. Before her a set of violet irises (a mirror to her own) held her tight, whilst a similarly shaded aura engulfed their owner’s horn, moving to paint its hue across her vision as it blanketed her being. She was afloat, weightless at once, but too drained to resist the telekinetic embrace which held her, even if she had wanted to. Through the comforting purple haze the last thing she saw was a brief snapshot of her home’s inner decrepitude, before in a burst of energy it was lost to a chaotic flux of colours, leaving only the unmoving reassurance of the solemn yet caring face looking down on her.

‘It’s going to be okay, I promise.’

A loosely blanketed shape rose and fell to the sound of heavy breathing, the bed’s new and first occupant having instinctively curled herself up into a ball as soon as she had been gently placed within it. The cleanly shimmering silver stands of a washed and yet uncombed mane splayed out across the pillows, the blue unicorn’s head the only thing left partially visible beyond her cocoon. Her face remained inclined away and tucked into the covers, disguising its features, leaving only a gauze collar of bandages wrapped around her neck on show beneath her halo. Despite their presence though she slumbered peacefully, the dual sedatives of exhaustion and light painkillers forcing the thick balm of sleep upon her, whilst at the same time dulling any pains she had had.

‘We should leave her to her rest.’

Twilight nodded along her affirmation, joining Doctor Stable as he receded back out of the tower’s guest room, laying just a few steps away from the doorway to her own. She let her magic close the door behind them, allowing herself a final reviewing glance to the bed, and then turned to address the golden brown unicorn. ‘Is she going to be okay?’

Stable’s glasses levitated from his muzzle, a handkerchief appearing from one of his white lab coat’s innumerable pockets to clean their lenses, as he considered the question. ‘I can only answer in terms of her physical well-being, everything else lies beyond my professional expertise’ he began. ‘The noose cut in pretty deep, so although the wounds should heal quite quickly in time without issue, she’ll likely have some scarring in places. If she’s lucky these too will fade, but otherwise I’d suggest a scarf or cape to cover them.’ His glasses floated back into place before his cobalt blue eyes. ‘Ultimately she’s very lucky you got to her when you did, I am however no psychiatrist and there’s much more than just her neck which needs healing, so in spite of my better medical judgement it’s probably positive for her to be here.’

Twilight remained silent, listening intently, being granted only the faintest hint of relief as guilt remained her most prominent feeling, the demon’s accusations levelled against her still very present in her mind.

‘Of course she’s going to need to see somepony, but for now your being an ear to listen or a shoulder to support her, combined with the relative space and privacy of this place are going to be a massive help to her. You did good’ the doctor concluded, laying a forehoof on Twilight’s shoulder in assurance, as if he at least in part sensed the route of her thinking. ‘Now, I’ll see myself out and will be back tomorrow to see how she’s doing when she’s more lucid. For you however, I proscribe that you get to bed as well.’

‘Thanks doc.’ The purple alicorn nodded once more, as always appreciating the doctor’s down to earth nature which simply cut straight to the point, ignoring the nonsense of rank and title which made others prone to pointlessly insert a bow or ‘your majesty’ between every other word. She watched him depart, a wide yawn forming across her lips (unsurprising as the tacit prognosis of her own considerable tiredness was correct), and then turned away to her own little room. Ignoring the mass of papers that remained she collapsed straight into her bed, rolling the covers around herself. Sleep, although slow in coming, held just beyond her reach by pressures both new and old playing on her mind, gradually found her and she slipped into its recesses, in part wondering what awaited her on the other side.

Exeunt

For the second time that evening two alicorns walked side by side down a seemingly unending corridor of portals, vast to the point of infinity, their steady passage this time lit by not one but both their horns glowing in unison. Just less than a single step ahead the older teacher (conflictingly wary of what she taught) subjected their path to her gaze, whilst her determined pupil (unflinching from her goal of mastery) followed in imitation. Since the younger had reappeared (never itself a given) they had remained deep in conversation, the night having been a long one, bringing with it a plethora of discoveries as well as questions in need of answering. To this end together they talked, each trying to excise the shadows which, although not truly an opaque barrier, had risen to stand between them.

‘She needs some space for now’ Luna persisted, her speech continuing with their path, ‘to let her subconscious at the very least come to terms with what she’s been through. But, in time, when she’s ready we can be there to help her through this. You did well tonight.’

Twilight shook her head. ‘No, not really I didn’t.’

‘You can’t blame yourself for what happened’ the dark alicorn responded, reading her partner perfectly. ‘This isn’t your responsibility, so if it’s anypony’s fault it’s mine, and Trixie can be chalked up as another I’ve failed to find, and therefore let slip through the cracks.’

‘No’ Twilight returned, stopping as definitively in place as her words. ‘I’m not going to let you call yourself a failure on my account. What if the thing was right? At the very least I let her down, but what if there’s more to it than that? What if…’

Luna’s wing came to wrap around the smaller alicorn’s shoulder, pulling her in close to her side, hugging her tight. ‘Believe me when I say I know it’s hard to, but you should try to ignore what it said.’ Her other feathered appendage went to Twilight’s muzzle, inclining it up to face her own rather than the floor as she continued. ‘Looking for our weaknesses is what it does so that it can make use of them. It’s how it gets out and as you’re the most caring mare I know, your concern for others knowing no bounds, that’s where it chose to strike, to try to get you to needlessly self-doubt.’ The Princess of the Night leant in nuzzling against her partner. ‘Do you trust me?’

‘Yes’ Twilight answered simply without needing thought.

‘Then trust me when I say that you’re perfect.’

Their lips met tenderly, each passing caress a cure for even the most potent poison. For some time they remained unmoving from their joint hug, each at that moment very much needing the sustenance of their closeness. Newly bolstered however, they did eventually choose to return to motion, drawing back away following the last in a series of soft kisses.

For a few steps further on they remained quiet until Twilight raised her voice up once more. ‘I want to help you here’ she said flatly, ‘or at least for as long as I’ve got these powers that is.’

‘No’ Luna replied, perhaps a bit more bluntly than she had intended to, although her inner discomfort in expressing the refusal was writ large in her tone.

‘But I can help.’

‘I’m well aware of that. It’s not that I don’t appreciate what you did earlier or where you’re coming from with the offer, but it’s just… well like I said before: I wouldn’t wish this on anypony else, not least of all you. The… thing we faced earlier is the worst, but it is not the only denizen here and I would not risk you to any of them.’ At this point her partner opened her mouth to interject against this rebuff, but to this she raised a hoof pleadingly to be allowed to continue. ‘You said it appeared in the guise of Sombra and then later when we fought it had changed into the being of my other self; we two were always its favourite prizes. In his case it preyed on his inquisitiveness, using it combined with his own almost paranoid cares for his subjects to get at and then tempt him. As for my own fall, you’re already very much aware of it, not to mention it being well known by the rest of Equestria as well, suffice to add that it found me in a very dark place, not so dissimilar from that of Trixie.’

It was Twilight’s turn this time to wrap the other alicorn in her wing, the difficulty of even this fleeting retelling plain to see, leaning into the taller shape in an attempt to emphasise her supportive presence to her partner.

‘I should mention that I don’t at all hate Tia for what she did’ Luna added as an aside, her speech fast becoming an outpouring explanation, ‘even if there’s probably a small wretched part of me which can’t let it go, but in my absence how many do you think I wasn’t there for? Because of my selfishness how many Trixies were there who didn’t have anypony and didn’t get a second chance? That’s why I have to do this.’

‘But you shouldn’t have to face it alone.’ As she had spoken Luna’s eyes had focused on the distance, growing darkly clouded, now however Twilight gently coaxed them down to meet hers, gazes looking into one another. ‘It shouldn’t just be your lone burden to bear, particularly if I can carry some small part of it. Please let me be there.’ Her wing moved, purple feathers stroking the dark navy of her partner’s muzzle, guiding it downward to her own where she met it with another kiss.

‘Thank you, but…’ Luna began, resistance wavering, before Twilight’s lips silenced her again.

‘No buts’ the purple alicorn shushed, ‘I love you.’ By now they had travelled far down their path between the parallel ranks of portals, with most being pretty nondescript, eliciting little interest from her, but now as the pair parted she better caught sight of the far too familiar doorway at the other alicorn’s back. It was a finely carved crystal slab, a neat six-pointed star etched on its front face, the door to her own bedroom. The surreal image, now the last in the evening’s long stream, spawned new questions in her mind. What would it be like to step into her own dreamland? Would it be as a normal dream filled sleep or would she again be a spectator except this time to her own subconscious? Luna meanwhile picked up on her staring and turned to follow her gaze, smiling understandingly as she realised what was being looked at. ‘Does everypony have a door here?’ Twilight asked.

‘Yes.’

‘Even Princess Celestia?’

‘You know Tia wants you to stop using her title, but yes she does, although we agreed a long time ago that I wouldn’t stray there.’

‘Why?’

‘There should be a degree of privacy between siblings, there being certain things about each other we really don’t need to know, whilst at the same time we agreed to be honest with one another. Though that condition was ultimately something else I fell down on, I never have broken the promise attached to it. It’s a small pride perhaps, but nonetheless mine.’

‘So what’s it like?’

‘What’s what like?’

‘Come on, you know what I mean’ Twilight pushed, gesturing towards the doorway which held her attentions. ‘What’s it like going through your own door?’

‘Erm… if I remember rightly it’s like dreaming normally, except with a much higher degree of detail and control, more so than even the most lucid sleep, but it’s rather hard to remember.’ Receiving another questioning look from the other alicorn she continued: ‘it was there where I… changed, so I haven’t had the nerve to return since then.’

‘What about your dreams though?’ This question got only a weary shrug in response, but in Twilight it threw up a new weight of concern. How could somepony not dream? Her loathing for the demon, already hardened by their meeting, was prompted to new heights, spurring abject hatred for it for what it withheld from her marefriend. Holding back her inner seething she noticed that Luna was looking past her, again slightly vacantly, turning her to find a portal of fire scorched stone webbed by sulphurous seams. ‘Is that yours?’

‘Yes, although it’s my being in Tartarus makes it look like that.’

Twilight took a few steps towards the blackened rock surface and then looked back to her partner, beckoning her to follow.

Luna’s eyes visibly widened. ‘Twilight, I really don’t…’

‘Nopony should be denied their dreams. For one thing I know you, so I don’t have any fear for what may lie on the other side. At the same time I know that anything else there may be will not be of your making, and together nothing can be insurmountable. So please, your dreams should be yours.’

Side by side they stepped up to the door and to the sound of scraping stone their joint streams of magic slid it open. As one they briefly paused in a final embrace on the threshold, each feeling the strength of the other’s presence and trusting that it would always remain, and then onwards through it together they moved, disappearing into a corona of light which filled the portal.