Mitternacht

Black.
As far as Twilight could see, there was nothing but darkness around her.
There was only black, no light, no matter how hard she looked.

The ground below her was smooth and somewhat cold. The air was cold as well, and everything was silent.

She didn't know how she got there, or where 'there' was.
She didn't remember what happened before she got there.
She remembered falling asleep, but she didn't remember waking up.
She arrived at the conclusion that this was a dream. Yet there was somenthing weird about it. It felt like a dream, yet it didn't. The world around her felt like it could just disappear at the blink of an eye, but she was there. It was like her body still awake had been taken and put inside a place that was only the product of someone's imagination.

She decided that, wathever was happening, she would have had a better time figuring it out if she was able to see something, so she tried to use her magic to create some light.
It didn't work.
As she was trying to figure what the cause of that was, she heard the sound of something moving near her, getting closer. Something big. Too big. She tried to fly away, but she unfortunately found her body wouldn't detach from the ground no matter how hard she flapped her wings. So, seeing as whatever the thing was it was now too close for her to feel comfortable with, she did the next most logical thing to do.
She started to run in the opposite direction.

And then she hit something.

"Ouch! Why are you running like that? And who are you?"

"Sorry, I heard something coming near me and I freaked out, I didn't mean to run into you." Answered Twilight, happy to have found something that wanted to talk to her rather than eat her. "My name is Twilight Sparkle, I'm an alicorn from the city of Ponyville."

"You must have run into a bhole. You're pretty lucky to have run away if that's the case. I've never heard of this 'Ponyville', guess you must be from somewhere far from here. And what's that about you being an alicorn? You think I belive that?"

Before she could answer Twilight felt a pair of hooves running along along her body, stopping first on her horn and then on her wings, then finally leaving contact with her body.

"Convinced now?" She asked, a smile on her face no one could see.

"Holy thunderforce! You actually are! And I thought your kind existed only in legends and fairy tales. What are you doing here anyway?"

"I have no idea actually, I just found myself here, but I don't know why or how I got here in the first place. I don't even know where we are!"

"Can't you just, you know, use magic?"

"I've tried that, but it doesn't seem to work. Neither do my wings. It's like every type of magic is just blocked by something."

"So you being an alicorn is basically useless right now?"

"Hey!"

"Sorry about that, but I guess..."

He was suddenly interrupted by the sound of something moving in their direction.

"We better get away from here. Follow me."

"How am I supposed to follow you when I can't see anything?"

"just grab my tail in your mouth"

"Why do I have to be the one to put a tail in her mouth?"

"I'd gladly let you lead the way if you want to. Do you know where to go?"

"..."

"Guessed so."

Reluctantly, Twilight grabbed his tail in her mouth and started to trot behind him.

"What were you trying to say earlier?"

"The fact that magic is blocked here would explain why there hasn't been a pegasus or unicorn born among us for so long. There apparently were some when we first arrived here, but nopony I know remembers ever having met one."

"We? How many others are there? When did you get here? Why? And where is 'here'?"

"Wathever happened when why first got here happened too long ago for me to know for sure. I know we moved to this land from somewhere else, probably running away from something. I don't know why we decided to stop here, in a place with nothing but darkness, especially considering how there are things like the bholes living here, but maybe we just got stuck here. As for the others, there are about a dozen different roaming tribes I know of, each fairly big, and the occasional family living on its own. I don't know where 'here' relative to the outside, I was born here and I'll likely die here, I just call this place 'home'."

"What are bholes?"

"The likely reason of why we're stuck here. I've never been close enough to one to tell you exactly what it is, and don't know of anypony who did. All I know is that they're big, they hunt alone, and they're slow enough that you can outrun them. And I've never found the body of a dead one, but I bet they eat those. I don't know what else they eat, but i'd rather not go inside their territory to find out."

"That sounds horrible. Why haven't you tried to run away from this place?"

"Oh, trust me, it has been tried. No one ever got far enough that we couldn't hear the screams. We don't know if they where bholes or something else, but every possible direction has been tested and they all resulted the same way."

"How do you even tell directions in here?"

"You just do. When you're born in a place like this you just get used to it. Or you don't, but those don't last long."

"Where are why going now? Are we going to meet the tribe you're from?"

"Actually, we're stopping by to eat first."

As she was about to ask what he meant, she suddenly felt the ground beneath her shift from being the same smooth surface it had been up until that point to what was unmistakably a layer of grass.

"So, are you going to eat some or do you prefer to keep my tail in your mouth? Anyway, there's also a river nearby, just follow the border of this and you'll find it, then come back the same way. I'll stay here."

Some time later, after having drank some water and eaten some grass, Twilight asked:
"So, where are we going next?"

"..."

"Well? Aren't we going to meet your tribe?"

"We could try to meet up with someone, but I doubt they would wnt to have something to do with me."

"What do you mean by that?"

"Ponies don't usually live on their own. I wasn't away from my group when you met me, I'm always on my own. I've been, let's say, banished from other tribes. I'm not allowed to go near one."

"Why?"

"I've done some things that they thought weren't exactly nice."

"What did you do?"

"Do you really want to know?"

Something sounded off about his voice to Twilight. It seemed different. Somehow, it seemed familiar.

"You never told me your name."

Before she could be given an answer, something happened to her. She felt like something wasn't right, like she had to run away from there. She felt scared. Before she realized it, she was running away. She couldn't tell where she was going, or if she was being followed. She just kept running and running. And when she heard it, it was too late to turn back.
And then something hit her.