Madness, and How to Live With it

Three years ago

Twilight was very frustrated. Despite everything, she had reached a limit to her studies, and was facing a nigh insurmountable wall. Nopony had ever thought of minor travel before, leaving her in the dark as to what to do. Travel over years was always spoken of, but over minutes or seconds was not.

And merely reducing the power in the normal spell only caused failure. There was something she was missing, she knew it!

But she had also been saying that for three days without sleep. Even Magica, a pony not unlike Twilight, was growing concerned for her health.

It was the middle of the night when she stared at the latest attempt of hers and sighed. She crumpled it up, and tossed it at the overflowing trashcan, buried in failed attempts. The spells she was making were constantly contradictory, magic having to be used in two different, opposing ways to work.

“Twilight.” A voice said. A purely black pony, with shining purple eyes walked to her. He seemed to increase the darkness around him, obscuring his actual form, and dimming the light she was using.

“Twilight, you are suffering greatly, and for a reason that does not require it.”

“I’m so close Noctem!” she objected, her eyes bloodshot and her posture slumping. “I’m nearly there! Every iteration has a smaller reason it isn’t working, every time!”

Noctem looked concerned. “Twilight… The spell you seek, it might just be impossible. The magic won’t work like that, reality itself denies the existence of that spell. I can think of nothing that can take time and make it take a few steps back.”

“It’s possible, I know it! I’m so, so close!”

Noctem regarded her as she began scribbling again, grave concern written on his face. “Twilight… I can make this easier for you.”

“I can move your dreams, and you can work within them, and find rest.”

Twilight looked up at him. “And in your dreams, you can have a greater understanding of your work. Your mind is well suited for it, and I know that you will either find your answer, or find the impossible truly impossible.”

Twilight only nodded, and Noctem sighed in relief. A small amount of darkness collected around him, and then it gathered around Twilight, gently smothering her in a comforting blanket.

She was already sleeping as he levitated the cocoon of shadows, her face at peace for the first time in days.

“Is she out?”

“Yes, thank the dark. I made a promise though Magica. Go and find Mordred for me.”

“Of course Lord.”

A brief while later, and Noctem had placed Twilight in her own bed, and darkened the room, to allow nothing to disturb her sleep. In two days she needed to go to Canterlot for some function, and though dreams extended time, they were not infinite.

Mordred came, and together they guided the sleeping mind to her work, and then Mordred left as Noctem watched her.

Twilight, in her dream, was overjoyed. All her work was there, but in a way that made it very simple for her to work more. Instead of paper’s restrictions, the very air allowed a three dimensional spell matrix, without the great effort needed to create one in life. Her notes were all right next to her, and everything was so very easy to move and recall.

Noctem waited by her side. For two days she would sleep undisturbed, and after that, he would wake her. She would have found her answer, or given up by then, and Noctem knew that what she sought was impossible.

She was trying to shift a mountain an inch, to make a tree shift just a tiny margin. To make the water wetter, to make the light just a tiny bit darker. It was impossible. There was nothing with the force to do those things, and to cause the tiny effect she was searching for. Like using explosives to carve rocks, but worse. It was not possible, Noctem knew that.

But Twilight didn’t. She really believed that an answer was there, and she was never going to give up until she found it.

Even if she had to make it.

Present day, Ponyville

The other teams were in Memory Castle, preparing for their own expeditions. Brave’s team had been sent first, the best of them all, in order to begin the new objectives. The idea was to grow used to the team changes first, and then try and renew the searching.

They had been shocked when Glitter returned. Carrying a mostly dead Brave on her back, her own injuries obvious. She had a broken leg, a chipped horn, and had run, carrying a stallion larger than she was, all the way back to Ponyville from Canterlot in an hour, a journey that normally took several.

Seeing her enter and not scream or cry or even register the way her front leg had a second knee, got the rest of the ponies very upset very fast.

Glitter fell unconscious moments after entering, and it was a short time later that the bearers visited her in the hospital. They were concerned, and wanted to know what had happened, why only two had come back. Rainbow winced at Brave as they entered, the older stallion barely clinging to life near Glitter. He was badly hurt, and not doing well.

“Glitter darling?” Rarity gently called, the group wondering how she was doing.

“…Heroes?” she whispered, and they gathered a little closer to her, her face and form angled away from them.

“It’s us Glitter.” Rainbow said, and she seemed to be more at ease once she heard Rainbow.

“How are ya feelin?”

“Is sir alright?” she asked, almost fearfully.

“Brave’s going to be fine.” Rainbow told her, hoping that she wasn’t lying. “What happened out there Glitter? What..?” Rainbow trailed off as Glitter began shaking.

“It was… It was…”

“Glitter darling, you don’t…”

“I DO!” she suddenly screamed, and stunned the group. “I do, and you need to listen to me. Before it’s too late.” The bearers looked at one another in concern, but remained silent.

She was still facing away from them as she began, “We went to Canterlot, all five of us, just like normal. It took longer than it normally did though. Without you Rainbow, it was harder to gather everything, and the others weren’t enough. Two of them to replace one pegasus, and they couldn’t match up…”

Rainbow felt uncertain if she should feel proud at that. “Sir was upset about losing you. Felt like we were going to be in trouble without you. When he told… her… about the spears, I saw her take the little ones, fewer than you did.”

The others looked at Rainbow, and she gently whispered that Brave had asked the centaur for some of their spears, and she had been using those, despite their size and weight.

“I grabbed a bit of everything, made myself as prepared as possible. It was useless, but it made sir feel better. Then we got inside, to the first hall… and we encountered multiple talking things. They might be trying to get out, you need to keep an eye out for that.”

“We tried to fight back. I had one of the good spears, and held one off, and… she… kept missing. Sir got angry, and everypony was afraid, even when he got one with three spears, all at once… It wasn’t going away.”

“But we were holding. One was almost dead. And then princess Twilight came back.”

“And she… she…” Glitter shuddered greatly, but found the strength to continue. “She spoke sounds that made us all freeze up. They hurt to hear, and it felt like we were paralyzed, forced to hold still. I watched her pull the spears out of the things, and she seemed to scare a few off, but she was different. Stranger. Her eyes were glowing, and everything about her was like she was teleporting from place to place. She used magic, but the magic was the same color as the eyes, and she was healing the things…”

“Sir snapped out of it first, just as she healed the last thing. He grabbed my spear, and killed it, and would have… could have…” Glitter slowed, and the bearers felt uncertain, a morbid curiosity filling them.

“But when he tried… a pony was there, had always been there, and sir hit him. A pony with eyes… eyes that… They…” Glitter shuddered again, and the group watched her quiver in terror for a moment. “Twilight turned around, and then…”

“And then he… it. It… did something. Like it could create and use anomalies at will. Open was turned into a ball, and then he… disappeared. Carrot Top tried to hurt it, but I saw her eaten by the thing that looked like a pony and it went for sir. I grabbed him, ripped him free from the thing’s grasp and ran. Carrot Root was right behind me, until she wasn’t. I heard her screaming, but I didn’t stop. I kept running, and it was… right behind me the entire time.”

“Even now… It’s right behind me.” Glitter said, her voice haunting.

“Waiting. Waiting for me to feel safe, so that I can turn around, and see the eyes that aren’t eyes, and look at it, and not know what it is, and know that I’m dead. But I won’t be dead.”

“Just like Root and Top. Open died in an instant. It had been merciful to him. It ate Top, but she’s still alive. Root is still screaming with her sister. I can hear them. I can always hear them.”

She turned to look at them, and they all backed away just a little. Glitter’s eyes had cracks in them. The impossible colors of the things visible in them, one great one running over her right pupil, bisecting that eye. They could see her eye moving under the cracks, as though they were overlaid on her eyes.

“I… I saved sir from it. But I think… I think it had me the moment I touched it, and it decided to let me go. I can see it sometimes, on the edge of my vision. Watching me. Waiting for me. Nothing can stop it. Nothing can hurt it. It is the perfection of life, and the anathema of reason. I saw it, and there is nothing that I can tell you that will tell you what it was. What it could do. The power of it, and the cruelty.”

“Because the thing that took Canterlot is still here. And it knows that we are alive, and enjoys making us suffer. It’s just sitting there. There’s no reason why everything hasn’t fallen to it. It’s bigger than anything, its form is incomprehensible, and its power overwhelming. I felt it when I touched it.”

“Nothing is safe anymore.” she whispered. “It’s here, it isn’t going away, and we’re all going to live forever in madness. Just as soon as it moves, as soon as it decides that our hope and fight isn’t funny anymore, and we’re all going to wish for death.”

“I… want… to laugh. To… heroes. Heroes, please.” She begged, shifting to be closer to them.

“Kill me before it gets me. Before I end up like Root and Top. I don’t want to die like that, living forever. I don’t. Please. Kill me.”

Her simple pleading expression, and the hope that they would comply made them all freeze in horror. Glitter was near begging them to end her, and wove a tale that said that there was no hope for them. As she had spoken, most of them had been stricken with paranoia, imagining that the thing she described was actually in the room. As if it was lurking under the bed, or hiding behind a curtain.

“Please! You have to! Before it gets me!” she said, growing distressed. “Before it gets everypony! Everything!”

“Staring, always, always staring at us! Hating us! It wants to make us all immortal, so that we suffer without end because it hates us! Hates everything!”

“It eats stars, and even to gaze at it is enough to kill! Trapped for so long, but now it’s here! And nothing will ever make it leave! NOTHING IS COMING TO SAVE US! NOThing…” Glitter trailed off, and the bearers looked at Rarity, her horn alight as the young unicorn fell asleep.

They could only look at her. She had her eyes closed, breathing deeply. Then she nodded.

“We are going to princess Celestia.” Rarity said, perfectly calm. “And talk to her about this.”

“But what if…” Rainbow said, looking back at Glitter.

“That was nothing.” Rarity interrupted. “She had been through a lot, and she is simply distraught. She will be better.”

“But…”

“She will be better. Let’s go.”

Canterlot gardens

Great was following after Hope in the gardens. Her father had called her out here, to show her something, but she wasn’t sure what he wanted her to see yet.

The gardens were always nice. Nopony was caring for them anymore, but the slight overgrowth didn’t mar them by much. It still looked pretty and peaceful, the blooms colorful and the vines elegant as they crept up trellises. Several ponies were here, the gardens peaceful and pleasant to look at.

Hope led her to the statuary, and then over to one in particular. She looked up at it, confused. Why would anypony carve such a… mixed up thing? It had parts of everything, and seemed to be caught in an expression of fear for some reason.

“Do you see him, my daughter?”

“I do… why would anypony make that?”

“They did not. He is… perhaps a cousin of mine.”

“In stone?” she asked, and then brightened. “So he’s my second cousin! Can we make him not stone father?”

Hope shook his head. “We are family, but he is too… strict. He would only hurt things, both what needs to be saved, and what is already saved. A little part of stone, and a little part of life, damaging to both.”

Great nodded. The thing hurt things. Got it. He’s kept in stone because he hurt things, and he needs to be kept in stone, because he’ll hurt things. It made sense to her.

“I have taken a few steps to keep him sealed. He might be able to break free on his own, were it not for something else to keep him in stone. What was there is missing now, and I have replaced it with my own seal.”

“Can you see the seal, my daughter?”

Great looked, and then squinted at the statue. Then she saw it. A broken spell over the stone, and a mess of tangles covering the statue. She had only seen her father’s magic once, and she recognized it. She sometimes wondered why it would work, considering its nature.

The tangles he threw with spells shouldn’t work, but they did. And they were always somehow infinite, as though the tangle was impossibly huge. The one on the statue seemed a lot smaller though, and as she watched, it seemed to be decaying.

“I can see it father.”

“I want you to seal him, my daughter.”

“Me!?”

Hope looked at her. “You are stronger than you think. Much stronger. I think that he is growing too used to me. But should we work together, his prison will be kept whole. I believe in you Great. You can do this.”

Great nodded, and looked at the statue again. She spent a moment of thought as to how to seal him, and then it struck her.

If he was getting used to tangles, she should use straight lines.

She focused, and began weaving, being very careful to keep everything ordered and straight. It was hard to be so orderly, but she kept going, even as Hope wove his tangles over her straight lines, until she was done.

She sat back, panting, and saw the spell grip firmly, and the tangles stopped decaying. She had done it.

“I am so proud my daughter. That is perfect.”

“Thank you father.” she said, smiling.

“You have a stone thing in your room?” he asked, perfectly innocently and Great started.

“How did you…” Great began, and then stopped. He was her father, he knew everything. Of course he would know about the stone thing.

“Yes.” she said, waiting for his response.

“Why?”

“I think that… I think they’re ponies father. Broken ponies in stone, like your cousin. I wanted to try and fix one, and then I could fix the rest.”

Hope regarded her, and then smiled. “Be careful Great. They are delicate, even to sound. If you break it, you can’t put it back again. But if you whisper, it shall hear and understand you.”

Great beamed. Her father didn’t mind and he was telling her how to help it! “Thanks father! The moment I have it normal, I want it to meet you first!”

She ran off, and Hope watched her go. Once she was gone, he looked down at his own hoof, and regarded it. Then he struck the statue, and watched the impact, and then looked at his hoof again. He seemed worried.

Great made it back to her own room, and looked around. She soon spotted the stone thing, heading over in its odd way, and she smiled. She had been trying to care for it, even if she couldn’t understand why it did what it did. Like lie on the bed for hours and not move, or eat a few scattered rocks in the castle.

She leaned close to it, and heard its gentle sounds and smiled. Whisper her father had said.

“Hello.” She tried, soft and careful.

It cracked slightly and she jumped. She nearly yelled, but recalled her father’s warning and kept her mouth shut. They were very delicate it seemed.

From a little farther away, she whispered “Sorry” in the softest sounds she could manage. It didn’t crack more, and if she watched, seemed to nod.

Making progress! “If you understand, go to the bed.” she whispered. Then she waited.

It didn’t move for a moment, and then went to the bed and Great nearly squealed in happiness, rearing back and clapping her hooves instead. They could understand! She just had to be really careful with them!

Next step, understanding. She put her ear right on it, and then began shifting around it, listening as it moved every now and then. She could hear the little puffs, and she was searching for where they were coming from.

She found it, but only for a second. A tiny line on the head produced the sounds, and if she had her ear right on it, she could just make out words.

“What.” was all she heard, before it jerked away from her. She smiled, (it talked!) and then thought about it. Why run away when she had heard it?

She shrugged, and then decided. Try to listen until she had some idea what it was saying.

It was a little difficult to chase it around the room, and in the end she had to trap it to listen to it. Pinning it in a corner, and then managing to wrestle its shifts into something she could pin against the wall without breaking it. It felt very delicate, like she could shatter it without really trying. While its motion was strange, she could feel it trying to move, unable to escape, and she smiled. It looked a little more like a pony when she had it standing.

It had stopped making sounds, but as she stayed there, pinning it, her ear against the line, it seemed to relent.

“What are you doing?” in the softest voice she had ever heard. She closed her eyes to hear it better.

“Listening.” She replied, making the softest of sounds, barely a breath.

“Your ear is in my mouth Twilight.”

So the line is a mouth then. Makes sense, sort of. Who’s Twilight? Her?

“It’s there so I can hear you.” She breathed.

It seemed to hesitate at that. “You… can’t hear me normally?”

“No.”

“Celestia, what happened Twilight? Are your ears hurt?”

“No… why are you calling me Twilight?”

A sudden tension that she could feel. Being able to talk to it made it a lot more like a real pony. Its hooves felt a little more like hooves instead of stone now.

“That’s your name. Twilight Sparkle. Have you forgotten?”

“I have not forgotten my own name. I am Great Change, who are you?”

Another jolt. A long moment before a response.

“Shining Armor. Your brother.”

She opened her eyes in confusion, wondering why it would say that, and eyed it. Then she forgot it had said anything; it was rather different now.

It was still stone, but instead of the lumpy mess, it was rather well carved. She could make out hooves, and the impression of fur, and eyes and a mouth. She kept it pinned for a moment, looking at it, and decided that it made a rather nice statue. Not at all the lumpy, slight scary, mass of stone from before.

She let it go, and it got to its hooves rather quickly, the only real thing missing from it the color. The only color it had was a splash of white on its back. The sharp tip of the horn made her a touch concerned though.

She heard its whispers again, and for a moment considered listening. She decided against it. It was creeping her out a little, calling her something else and claiming familial relation. She was going to ask Hope if she had a brother, and if not, demand to know what it was thinking.

Demand very quietly, so she didn’t hurt it, but she would demand.