War Zone-Equestria

Twilight felt as though she was floating. Her eyes were stuck shut, and she couldn’t open them, even when she tried to bring her hooves to them, but she couldn’t move her arms. She didn’t know if she was dreaming or not, but the pain she was experiencing before had completely faded, almost as if she’d completely forgotten about it. She tried to use a spell to light up the place around her in an effort to see if it would help her open her eyes, but she couldn’t control her magic at all, she couldn’t even conjure a spark. She tried to call out to her friends for help, but she found she couldn’t speak either. She felt completely paralysed, through her body. All she could do was think.

She tried thinking about what had happened before hand, but could just barely remember that she was rolling around in pain, bleeding all around her horn, which had started to also break apart. Someone had tried to contact her... Celestia, and someone else... Spike. They had tried to contact her from their dimension. So why had it caused her that much pain? She started hearing voices around her. Was that... Bullseye? Why was he yelling her name?  She suddenly felt herself being shaken around, but she didn’t know why; nothing was touching her. She was just floating completely immobilised and blinded. She felt her body sway with each shake, but she still gained no control of her limbs, and had no way of speaking back to her panicky friend. She felt herself stopped being shaken for a minute, but it started again, continuing for at least a minute or so, before her body felt as though it was swept up and thrown over something. She still had no control over herself and couldn’t tell what was happening. Was she dreaming? Was she even asleep... or unconscious?

Suddenly she heard another voice... Applejack! And Fluttershy! They were both there. But she couldn’t open her eyes to see them; she couldn’t move to feel if they were there; she couldn’t speak to ask them what was happening. She was completely helpless. She had enough trouble trying to make out all their words; not that there were many words exchanged by the two, Bullseye had said the most, but she could only hear muffled voices.  She felt herself get swept up on the other side of her body, leaving her legs in the air while her torso dipped behind her. She couldn’t feel anything touching her, but she accepted that they must have been carrying her.

It was about 5 minutes of the same feeling, while all Twilight could do was wonder what was going on, and why this was all happening the way it was. It felt as though they were carrying her around for hours, but that may have just been boredom due to her lack of activity, but as time progressed the feeling in her body slowly started to return to her though; warmth spreading through the bottom of her hooves, and slowly rising through her legs. She could move her hooves now... and her mid legs... she felt herself gain full control of her legs. The warmth started to spread through all of her body in one sudden flush, returning feeling of movement and normality to the rest of her body. She started to hover from her last position moving around freely but unable to stop from hovering. She could still hear the voices and heavy panting of her distressed friends as she kept rising. Suddenly she could see the darkness in front of her, lighting up into blue through her eyelids.   The warmth started to spread through her neck and slowly it overtook the rest of her face. She could speak again, she gasped out as if she’d been suffocating.

Finally the feeling spread to her eyes and as she wanted to since this whole mess started, she opened her eyes. But instead of the base, Applejack, Fluttershy, and Bullseye, there was a large wall of electric blue fire. It rose infinitely and extended out both left and right, also infinitely. It blazed on with spectacular colour, with no apparent changes. Twilight felt a burning shadow behind her though. She turned around to see another large wall extending to the same infinite dimensions of the other, but burning with an inferno of magnificent red. Around her though in-between the both of these was on her right side, a small fading light  surrounded by utter blackness, but to her left, a large shining wall of magenta and purple lights, with bubbles exploding off it like fireworks of plasma. Twilight was very confused, while all the walls seemed to have the sound hissing noise of strong wind and running water, she could still hear the voices of her friends, but there was another voice now... It was Celestia. But even with all her feeling restored, every word she heard was still muffled. She didn’t understand where they were or why she couldn’t hear them properly.

“Hello Twilight Sparkle” echoed a mysterious voice from out of nowhere. Twilight looked around. That voice wasn’t muffled like the others. It was coming from nearby, but Twilight couldn’t pinpoint the direction.

“Over here” said the voice again. Twilight looked at the blue wall; the voice had come specifically from there. She watched wondering if it was the wall that had spoken, as ridiculous as the thought sounded to herself, but jumped back in shock as a large ripple effect began from the bottom of the wall outwards right in front of her. It opened up from the exact same location and spread to reveal an impossibly bright light. Twilight didn’t feel the need to look away though. It wasn’t causing her eyes any pain or discomfort. Out of the brightness, lines and waves of colour emerged and it closed up again returning to the original level of light. The colours zipped and flew around her creating trails of exuberant glow behind them. They all met each other in front of Twilight and as they connected the form of a stallion took shape. It wasn’t a normal stallion though. It seemed completely made of vibrant, glowing colours, but was almost completely hollow. Twilight could see everything behind the stallion straight through him; he didn’t even have a face. Its voice didn’t seem normal either. It sounded like an adult stallion, but a bit fazed, or slightly robotic, but still was easily understandable

“Who... Who are you? What are you?” Twilight asked, backing away slightly confused by magical body of colours before her.

“Fear not Twilight Sparkle. I wish only to help you and offer you guidance. I’m certain this is all very confusing to you. My name is Aura Portarius. I watch the gateways you see before you.” The figure explained.

Twilight was happy to find that she might get some answers at last, but had no idea what she wanted to say first.

“Ummm, ok uh, Aura? What’s happening right now? Where are my friends? How did I get here? And what do you mean by Gate Ways?” she said, wondering if she should have left a space for answers between each question. She watched the colourful figure but couldn’t tell what it was thinking; It was a bit hard to judge without seeing any expression. Aura had expected a large amount of questions though and was more than happy to answer them.

“What’s happening is you are dying Twilight. The Princess Celestia of your dimension in an effort to find you tried to telepathically connect to you to locate you, but in the amount of power she forced into the spell to break the wall between the two dimensions, all of the negative energy that she had broken and collected while breaking that wall, built up and piled itself into your head, which is a wonder it didn’t kill you instantly; It’s quite a lot for one pony to retain; it almost destroyed your horn. You aren’t dead yet, but you are on the brink and are quite close to your last breaths. Your friends are fine, some of them are with you now, others will learn of your passing soon enough. You can hear them right now can’t you?” Aura asked after explaining the entire situation to her.

“Yes, but I can’t understand them...” Twilight said.

“That is because while your body is dying, your spirit is moving on, but until you are fully deceased, you will hear their last words to you. You are here because when you are ready to move on, I can grant you passage to your future in paradise. You can call it an afterlife if you prefer.” Aura said, acknowledging the blue wall he had emerged from before.

Twilight had more questions, but she couldn’t help but think about her friends and the big picture in this situation. Her death would refrain her from seeing them ever again. Her emotions started to catch up with her, and she found that even in a non sentient form, she could still cry, but her tears just fizzled and sparkled into tiny colourful explosions as they hit the invisible ground.

“I’m sorry if the information I’m giving you is hard to hear. I have no feeling of negative emotions, so I cannot determine the degree to which my statements will affect you.”

Twilight sniffled and choked back her tears momentarily, “It’s alright, but am I never going to see my friends again?” Twilight asked.

“On the contrary, they are waiting for you right now.  Time has no restrictions in the afterlife, you are technically there right now, and when you enter, you will stay there permanently, while your friends on the other hand, will join you properly when their time has also passed. However you wont be entering the gateway behind me. This one is for the beings of this dimension. For you to continue you must pass through that gateway first.” Aura said turning his head to the purple, rippling, bubbling wall. “That is the wall that separates your dimensions, you passed through it with your friends which caused the ripple effect that you can see right now. When Celestia broke through the barrier however she shattered many portions of it due to her not passing through it when she had opened it. The Bubbling you can see is the wall trying to repair itself.”

“So what is that wall over there?” Twilight asked looking behind her at the large wall of fire.

“That is a place known as Tartarus. It is a prison for the creatures who dedicate their life to evil and chaos.” Aura explained.

“But I’ve been to Tartarus, I returned Cerberus there when he escaped.” Twilight said, thinking back to the desolate cave entrance, with only a massive body of water inside it.

You’ve been to the mortal entrance of Tartarus. The creatures that are cast into there by magic are forced into the waters by Cerberus, which brings them here, he is no guard dog; No one escapes Tartarus.” Aura explained.

Twilight heard all the mumbled talking of her friends go quiet. Celestia had said something and all the sound had ceased. She looked over to her right at the spot the light was; it was so small now.

“What is that light Aura?” She asked wondering what purpose it served.

“That is your life force. It’s faded to a point that it cannot be recovered from.  But...” Aura was stopped by a loud booming noise that disturbed and rippled the both of the gateways, as the light grew, and split in the middle. It stopped growing and the light slowly started to blacken. But the darkness was quickly light up by a flurry of bright red, blue and green lines swirling in all direction flooded out of the hole and created a sphere in the air. Twilight jumped back in fright, wondering if that was supposed to happen, but Aura just stood and watched, the only movement of colour blazing off of him.

“Well... This I did not expect at all. Twilight Sparkle, it seems I was mistaken. You can indeed be saved, I had almost forgotten of magic like this.”

“Wait, what do you mean? Does this mean I can go back?” Twilight asked with a smile growing on her face.

“Yes Twilight, you can go back. But if that is your choice, I must warn you of the price it will cost you.” Aura started catching Twilight’s attention. She was watching the colourful anomaly very inquisitively, but she knew she may not like what he was about to say.

“You can be saved at any time now. Your body is still in an ample condition, before I believed it impossible for you to be saved, but your will is far stronger than I thought. This is very dark powerful magic, one that I never believed Celestia would use again.”

“Again? You’ve seen this before?” Twilight asked looking surprised.

“3 times. But the magic behaved differently, it swept them up in a wave and pulled them away from me. You seem to have a choice here. This is good, I will have the time to explain the coincidence to you.”

“But what if I run out of time? The light around it is fading. And the sphere won’t have anywhere to take me if it fades.” Twilight said thinking about how it had to enter through her to get here.

“You don’t understand this magic Twilight. No spell can resurrect the dead. But a spell cast on the living can feign, and prolong death for quite some time.” Aura explained redirecting her attention to the sphere. A surge of electricity found its way through the hole and lit up the room in spectacular electric blue light. As the electricity spread, it started to bend and direct itself into the orb, which absorbed it all, and started to burn brightly. It started to shudder and extend to tiny lengths, dropping puddles of bubbling plasma to the ground. Shortly after it absorbed the electricity, the light that had once surrounded the gateway, faded completely, leaving just the colourful, electrified orb, bubbling in its place. Twilight knew that her life force had fade completely, and could now be technically classified dead.

“Is it currently your wish to return among the living Twilight Sparkle?”

“Yes. I’ll do anything to get back to my friends.” She replied.

“You may want to reconsider...” Aura informed her before imploding into a ball of light, and exploding around the room, creating a gust of particles and wind as the ball expanded past Twilight, distressing her mane and tail. Images of her friends flashed in front of her.

“If you wish to return to the others you may still do so, but the cost will be one of their lives.” Aura’s voice explained ringing all around Twilight.

“No! That’s not fair! They shouldn’t have to die for me to live!” Twilight yelled as images of specifically Pinkie Pie, Applejack, Rainbow Dash, Fluttershy, and Rarity were displayed to her.

“Twilight Sparkle, only one of them will die if you return, I do not know which, or when, and I do not wish to take them, but for a life to be returned another must take its place. The choice will be a demonstration of your true character. That is not all though. If you are to stay and continue to your afterlife, the girls will live, but must spend the rest of their lives trapped in the alternate dimension, surrounded by war that could threaten to end their lives at any time. So the risk of losing one of them is just as strong wether you stay or leave.” Aura explained, before imploding the light he had become into itself and dropping to the ground, where he rose in his normal colourful form. He wasn’t finished talking, but he allowed time for Twilight to assess the situation and think about the decision she was going to make.

“I... I don’t know. What if I go back and die again anyway? They’ll still be trapped.” Twilight pointed out.

“I believed that would be running through your mind, but there is more I must tell you that may make the choice easier to make.  If you return, you will not die in the alternate dimension, I cannot confirm whether you complete your goals but you will not be killed. If you return will you attempt to go to Canterlot to save Spike?” Aura asked.

“Yes.” Twilight said, already having made up her mind that she still wanted to help save Spike.

“I cannot guarantee you will succeed, but you will not die. You will be able to return yourself and 4 of your friends back to your own dimension, but one will die here. But if you stay, they will never see their loved ones again, nor be able to live their everyday lives.” Aura knew there was more he could say to explain, but Twilight understood.

“So no matter what I do... there will be negative repercussions. If I stay my friends lose their lives. If I go back 1 loses their life, while the rest of ours get theirs back... Oh but... No I can’t let that happen! If I go back I’ll make sure none of them die. I’ll stop it from happening somehow!” Twilight said trying to assure herself that if she returned her friends would be safe.

“I’m sorry Twilight, but that would be impossible. You bring one back and expect to not lose someone in their place.”

Twilight didn’t listen though. She had to go back, it was her only option. She contemplated that it would be greedy of her to move on to paradise while her friends were left to suffer in a war zone, but she was confident that if she made sure she kept her friends safe, she could save whichever one was supposed to die.

“I’ve made up my mind. I’m going back.” Twilight said trotting next to the bubbling ball of light.

“Then I won’t see you again for a long time Twilight Sparkle, but I will be seeing a friend of yours very soon. Good luck on your mission Twilight.” Aura told her fading into particles which spread out in all different directions.

Twilight watched as the walls started to shrink inwards and fade away, and then turned around to face the sphere in front of her. She slowly walked into it and felt it stick to her and pull her further in.

“I will save my friends. All of them!” She said looking back one last time. “You’ll see.”