Compatī

“It’s…” I said.

“Yeah,” String said. “It’s awake.”

We all stared in varying degrees of disbelief at the… the creature lying in the glyph before us. Copper pressed against my side, trembling.

I threw a comforting wing over her, but I didn’t think I could do anything to ease the sight of… of…

Luna, my brain kept telling me. That’s Luna lying there.

It indeed was Luna lying there, pressing her slack-jawed muzzle into the floor, every breath raspy and guttural as if her lungs were filled with mucus. That was Luna lying there, wings twitching and unkempt, with forehooves clawing at the crystal floor and hind legs bent at uncomfortable, inequine angles. That was Luna lying there, in the limp tatters of her mane pooling about her, her one visible eye darting about the room as if searching for predators. That was Luna lying there.

Was.

“No. No no no no. This can’t be happening. Sunset! Luna!” I shook my head and raced for the glyph, but String put a hoof on my shoulder.

“Princess.” Though he spoke at a near whisper, his voice cut through me like glass. He pointed at Sunset. “Look.”

Softly but surely, her chest rose and fell in rhythm. So at least she was okay. Sunset was still in there somewhere, and it stood to reason Luna might be as well, to some capacity. I could still hope.

“So what do we do?” I asked.

The Nightmare started hacking, and a dark fluid dribbled from its mouth. It retched and convulsed, every muscle in its body innervated in no clear pattern, as if all the neurons in its brain had been rewired. Feathers flitted and fluttered loose from erratic wingbeats, and I thought I heard the wet pop of a joint somewhere in there. It relaxed in a slump, tongue lolled out on the floor in a pool of that dark fluid.

A tiny, high-pitched intake of breath instilled in it the briefest moment of clarity, and for one long, chilling second, that singular, trembling eye snapped to me. Its pupil struggled to bring me into focus, dilating and contracting with an almost heart-like rhythm. All the while, that dark fluid ran down the whites of its eye like rainfall down a windowpane, down the walls around us and the chalkboard in the far corner and String beside me, down the spiral of my horn, the crown of my head, the back of my neck to puddle between my shoulder blades, down the bones of my wings to the tips of my primaries, down each and every feather pressed against my side, down my hooves and the tip of my tail with the cold grasp of death.

The second passed, the moment lost in another coughing fit of dark fluid and that feral, darting paranoia, and I remembered to breathe. Around me, the world was again as it should be, yet I couldn’t shake the feeling of being drenched, like I’d just come in from the pouring rain.

“We keep working,” String said. He headed for the cables and piton box and got back to it. “If I were you, I’d let Princess Celestia know, so she can prepare whatever she needs to. It looks like it’s trying to get its legs under it. I don’t know how long that’ll take, but I’m getting the feeling we’ll definitely need every last measure we’ve put in place here if we give it enough time.”

“I-I’ll go get Spike,” Copper said, hurrying back out the door.

“I’ll, uh,” Whistle said. “Yeah.” She turned tail after Copper.

With String back to work on the shoestring cords and Copper and Whistle off getting Spike, I was left well enough alone with the rasping, gurgling, creature lying before me. I approached cautiously, like a nature documentarist studying a sleeping lion. Again, that eye swiveled my way, but whatever power had ensorcelled me either failed to do so again or didn’t try, so I lay down inches from the glyph, as close as I could get to Luna’s body.

It… it felt wrong to call her it, but what else could I say?

This was not Luna in any sense of the name. I knew the gentleness of her touch and the kindness of her heart, the fierce intelligence behind those eyes tempered by experience immemorial. How this… possession warped the things about her I found most beautiful—the soft features of her face now hard and wild, the grace of motion now erratic and clumsy. This unholy creature, this… primal regression before me was her opposite in every possible way.

It seemed to sweat the same dark fluid dribbling from its mouth. Its coat shimmered like an oil slick when it caught the light.

I could only imagine what it meant. Was this the Nightmare slowly exuding from her? If so, would it take up a form separate from Luna or grow to overtake her physically?

I squeezed my eyes shut. Stop thinking like that. Stop it stop it stop it.

Luna was still in there. It was still her body to return to, hers and hers alone. They’d come back. They’d figure this out.

But what if they didn’t?

How could I forget the look on Sunset’s face as I cast the spell amidst the magical lightning storm? I remembered watching the light go out in her eyes, remembered them unfocus like those of the dead and dying, remembered her body falling slack as her soul slipped into the depths of whatever hell she tried clawing herself from tooth and nail. No matter how hard I shut my eyes and pressed my hooves into them so that the splotches bled into the back of my vision, my brain played and played and played the unholy movie reel of what I had done and what I would have to do should they fail: I envisioned myself touching my horn to theirs and watching them dissolve away like dust in the wind.

No no no.

I slammed my muzzle into the floor, and the pain blossomed all the way up into my sinuses. My eyes teared up, and I gritted my teeth, forcing myself to focus on the pain, focus on the searing throb and visualize myself in this moment and just stop thinking for once in your goddamn life.

The Nightmare snarled, and I opened my eyes. Through the tears, I saw it clawing at the floor with its forehooves, unable to find footing. The scrape of its horseshoes echoed stridently off the cavernous room, devoid of books and other homely décor that would have otherwise dampened the sound.

I took a moment to compose myself. My hoof came back dabbed with blood when I checked my nose, but it was a small price to pay for tearing myself out of that spiral. I took a deep breath, and when I exhaled, out went all the pent-up fears and my reservations with it.

Focus. Make a checklist. Do what you do best.

First, like String said, the others needed to know, beginning with Celestia. She needed as much notice as possible, to enact whatever plans she may already have in place on a national level. It would also lend some authority to waylaying whatever concerns the others would bring up when I broke the news.

Second, we needed to figure out what exactly happened to Luna. How to get her out or get her back.

Third, what was the Nightmare capable of? That meant careful study. Any little shred of information we could leverage could mean the difference between Equestria as it stands and…

Don’t think that.

Don’t think. Breathe in. Trust, and the rest will follow.

And follow it did, through the double doors behind me in the form of my number-one assistant, with Copper just behind him. Spike scampered up to me, quill and parchment at the ready.

“Twilight! What happened? They said some—what happened to you?” He dropped everything and grabbed me by the cheeks to inspect my muzzle. “Are you okay?”

I waved him off. “I-it’s nothing. I’m fine. I need you to send a letter to Princess Celestia.”

The Nightmare chose that moment to descend into another coughing fit. It retched and sputtered, doubling over into an almost fetal position.

Spike’s eyes went wide as he stared past me at the Nightmare. His wings snapped to his sides, and he took a step backward.

I hesitated. Part of me wanted to shield him from the bitter reality we faced. He was still like a little brother to me, and he always would be. But I couldn’t deny he had grown so much since that fateful day we came to Ponyville, and he possessed a level of insight I needed now more than ever.

“It’s important, Spike.” I couldn’t hide the defeat in my voice, but I liked to think it lent weight to our situation. Please don’t ask questions. Please don’t make me say it out loud.

His eyes danced between me and the Nightmare before ultimately settling on me. He picked up his quill and parchment, a look of grim understanding in his eye.

“It’s awake,” I dictated, skipping any formalities I would normally feel compelled to include. “We’re finishing the last of our containment measures, but I believe we’ll need you and Star Swirl here should things get worse. Your faithful student, Twilight Sparkle.”

Diligent as always, Spike penned my letter to the tee before rolling it up and sending it up in flames. We watched the wisp of smoke snake a trail for the nearest window, and out with it went the faint tinkling whoosh that buffered us from an uncomfortable silence. Now without that buffer, the silence tingled down the back of my neck with that same unnatural sensation of rain.

Spike spent those uncomfortable moments staring past me, at the Nightmare. “I-is Princess Luna okay?”

“I don’t know,” I said. “But our job is to make sure nothing worse happens. So that’s what I’m going to do. We have a few other things that need taking care of.”

He clenched the remaining ream of parchment in his claws, nervously rolling and unrolling it, his eyes searching for something among the cracks in the floor. Eventually his eyes met mine, and a sense of responsibility swam among the myriad emotions I saw in them.

“What’s first on the list?” he asked.

My eyes gravitated back to the nearby window my dragonfire message had egressed through. “That was. Second would be assessing the Nightmare itself. Which, well… I already kind of did that, too. Sort of.”

I looked over my shoulder. In its current state, it seemed relatively harmless, but like a baby doe learning to stand, I expected that to be short lived. And when it did “get its legs underneath it,” as String had put it, I had no reason to think it wouldn’t be able to bring Luna’s full power to bear just as quickly. The glyph may as well be papier-mâché at that point.

The issue wasn’t if, but when.

Copper chose that moment to remind me she existed by stepping up beside me. She nuzzled me just behind the jawline, and it sent the warmest fuzzies through me from hoof to horntip.

“Just tell us what you need us to do,” she said.

“You guys are so fucking gay,” Whistle said, joining us. She wore a playful smirk that filed down the sharp words I had primed at the tip of my tongue. Her level of snark was going to take some getting used to.

She jerked her head over her shoulder, at a procession of Royal Guards, followed by Princess Celestia and Star Swirl. “Guess who I found walking through the front door on my way back from the library?”

“Princess!” I said. I rushed over and threw my hooves around her.

“Twilight,” she said. She hugged me back, and that timeless safety of her presence filled me from head to hoof. “It’s good to see you.”

The tinkling of magic followed on the coattails of our embrace, and I looked up to see my dragonfire message coalesce and unfurl for her. It seemed, thankfully, she was a few steps ahead of me.

“What in the name of…” Star Swirl said. When he saw the Nightmare, it looked as though all the joy in the world had left him. “Oh… my dearest Luna. What happened to you?”

And there went that timeless safety, pulled back like a funeral veil. I sighed and untangled myself from the hug and the safety it imparted. I took a step back, and as if on cue the Nightmare let out a low, guttural growl to remind me that our situation was anything but safe.

The Nightmare had dragged itself toward us, a streak of that blackened oil-like substance spanning the distance from where it lay a minute ago. It pressed the side of its face against the barrier. The fluorescent pink glow of magic holding it at bay added a sheen to the streaks of its fluid-slicked fur and was in its own way a strange contrast to the murderous fixation in its eyes.

It had grown incisors like those of a wolf, and it bared them in what passed as an attempt at snarling. From them, that black substance dribbled down the barrier to sizzle and snap like hot grease when it reached the glyph’s inner markings, and up trailed little wisps of black smoke.

“We should get you out of this room,” I said, taking Princess Celestia by the shoulder. “I don’t like how it’s reacting to you.”

There was a haunted expression on Princess Celestia’s face. It was the look of a mare brought face-to-face with her most closely held fear. It nipped at her heels all the way out into the hallway, where she stopped and took a moment to collect herself. A deep breath in, then out, and she took the lead.

The guards that had preceded her into the portal room followed us out and took position flanking us. It was weird being escorted to and from wherever. I didn’t think I’d ever get used to it, not to mention the circumstances made it feel less like a princess’s escort and more like that of a prisoner’s.

A prisoner of my own title. Was this how Princess Celestia felt anytime the world was in peril?

She led me to the library, where a pair of Royal Guards attended the doors. They saluted before opening them to reveal a commotion going on inside.

Nearly a dozen more guards ran to and fro, rearranging stacks of books and making a mess of our earlier setup. The foyer table had been swept clean of the knickknacks that gave it the homey feel I loved in order to make way for a map of Equestria. They positioned little wooden markers here and there along the roads connecting Ponyville to other towns and cities.

Lily sat in the corner, on the verge of tears, Starlight beside her, doing what she could to console Lily. When Starlight saw me enter, she came trotting up.

“What the hell’s going on?” Starlight asked. “First Copper comes in and drags Spike out by the scruff of the neck, and then the next thing we know, half the Equestrian army barges in, saying they need the space to set up and then start making a mess of all our stuff.”

She looked up at Princess Celestia, and it seemed like she just now noticed her presence. “Oh, uh… hi, by the way.”

Meanwhile, Lily trotted up and buried herself in my chest without a word. Her tears stained through my coat, and she hugged me tight.

I didn’t know what I had done to engender such a reaction, but wrapping my hooves around her came naturally. The sentiment brought my eyes up to the guards around us. The more I watched them reconfigure my library into a war room, the more that loathsome helplessness from earlier today coiled around my heart and squeezed.

I wanted to yell. I wanted to grab the books from their hooves and stuff them back on the shelves. I wanted to tear the map from the table and snatch up all these heartless brutes in my magic and toss them out the door for desecrating my library and how dare they doubt that Luna and Sunset would succeed.

I wanted to believe that all this was unnecessary. I wanted to believe that I’d see them again.

And I would. I would I would I would.

A hoof rested itself on my shoulder. It belonged to Princess Celestia, and the look in her eyes said she understood more than I could ever imagine. She knew it hurt, but right now I had to be a leader like her. Her wordless obligations reminded me of my purpose, and I in turn looked at Lily in my hooves.

I did my best to channel that obligation, and I gave Lily a gentle squeeze before holding her at arm’s length. I held her there until she looked up at me.

“We have work to do,” I said gently but firmly. “We have to do our part.”

She sniffled and wiped her eyes, but I caught the barest hint of a smile in there somewhere. She gave me a reassuring nod, and I took that as cue to let go.

I turned toward Princess Celestia and resettled my wings. “You brought soldiers?”

I tried sounding curious rather than resigned, though I knew Princess Celestia saw right through it.

“As a leader, Twilight, it is important to establish a presence. And while I might be a princess capable of great things, I’m still only one pony and can only be in one place at a time. Should things grow worse, they will be here to help in many ways that I might be too preoccupied to do myself.”

“Aren’t you worried about scaring the population with an, uh… a sudden, increased military presence?” I instinctively flicked my eyes back at Lily, who busied herself helping the guards.

Celestia smiled at me. “Oh, Twilight. A contingent of soldiers occupying Ponyville in case a monster threatening to destroy Equestria gets loose? That’s just Tuesday.”

She held that smile a moment longer before letting it sour. Normally, I’d laugh at such a joke if it weren’t for this particular “monster.” It wasn’t just a monster. It was Luna.

“You’re thinking about it as a leader should,” Princess Celestia said. “And I can tell by the tone of your voice you’re worried for more than just those close to you. I’m proud to see that, Twilight.” She threw a wing over my shoulder and pulled me close. “But to your question, an increased military presence is a sign that something is wrong, yes, but it is also a sign that we are aware and are working on the problem. What’s most important is that they feel safe.

“Discretion is a powerful tool in the right hooves, but being a leader also means knowing when to set it aside in favor of assurance. I believe we have reached the point where they should have the opportunity to know something is amiss, and to be ready should something happen. There is a fine line between safety and complacency that I refuse to cross.”

A minute but severely uncharacteristic pause filled the space after her last word, one that wasn’t meant to add weight to her words but rather was dragged down by them.

Again, my brain finished for her.

“Equestria’s finest are here to make sure everypony is safe,” she continued. “And I’m here to make sure they are safe, as well as you and your friends.”

Make sure everypony is safe. And there the uncomfortable thoughts crept out to make themselves known to me. I pinned my ears back. There was only one way to truly guarantee what she just said.

Yes, and…?

She read clear as day the question I didn’t have the courage to put into words. “No,” she said definitively, and I withered beneath the guilt of imposing such a thought on her of all ponies. “If I must fight Luna again, then I will do so. But I refuse to execute my sister on the presumption she and Sunset won’t succeed from the inside.”

Her features softened. “I know you didn’t mean it as a suggestion, Twilight. The temptation to seek the easiest answer will always present itself, but that doesn’t always make it the right answer.”

“I’ve gotten the feeling there really is no right answer here.”

The barest suggestion of a smile came and went on her face. “As any wise ruler would understand. That’s simply part of being a leader. But we must still choose, or fate will choose for us, and I’ve learned in my time that fate is often far worse at picking the best answer than we are.”

Choosing not to choose is still a choice and all that. Well, I could think of at least one choice we needed to make.

“Then we should also warn the Crystal Empire, in case things…” I was about to say “get out of hoof,” but I caught myself. We were long past that point, and it didn’t feel right beating that sentiment to death.

“I’ve already sent word,” Celestia said. “Cadance and your brother already know, as do Dragonlord Ember, Pharynx, and the leaders of Griffonstone. I have ponies who will notify us of their response.”

Their response. Their response to what? To the coming calamity? The doomsday unfolding before my very eyes? Each and every what-if that had played on repeat in my brain since the lightning storm?

I looked at her, then the soldiers carrying out whatever orders had them scurrying to and fro, then the map of Ponyville and the lines some captain-looking guard drew along the road leading to Canterlot. Evacuation routes. Rallying points. Lines in the sand.

I couldn’t help but look each and every one of them in the eye as they passed me by, my brain painting the broken and twisted images of what would become of them should we fail.

“So what do I do now?” I asked.

Celestia turned back to me with that motherly smile that never failed to calm my nerves. “Do what you do best, like you already planned. Study it. Figure out anything you can learn that could help us on this side.”

But I already did that.

What else was there to know? To see? I shuddered as my brain continued down the list of senses.

“I’ll do my best, Princess.”

I left the library with what felt like a heavy stone where my heart should be. I crossed paths with Lily and Starlight in the hallway, still helping the guards organize the books and other library effects they had relocated. I caught Starlight’s eye, and I saw in her the worry of a mare who had no ideas left to share. But there was, at the tail end of it, a glint of reassurance. She believed in me more than I did.

Without a word, she carried on with her organization, but I latched onto the sentiment and took with me what few shreds I could manage to the portal room.

A pall hung in the air, as if the castle itself commiserated in this unshakable lack of agency. String was still busy hammering away—almost done from the looks of it. Star Swirl, meanwhile, sat beside the barrier, studying the Nightmare.

“Have you learned anything about it yet?” I asked, stepping up beside him. I tried to not look at it, but I couldn’t avoid seeing it in my peripheral.

It lay panting with its shoulder against the barrier. Its eyes were on me, and I felt that cold, penetrating stare clawing its way into the recesses of my soul.

“There isn’t much to learn, I’m afraid,” he said. “It is gaining its bearings, slowly but surely, but beyond that there isn’t much to glean.”

I eyed the black goop trailing back to the center of the glyph. “Do you know what that… stuff is?”

“I do not, nor do I really care to. I can only imagine it is some sort of byproduct of the magic allowing the Nightmare to take possession of her body.”

“A byproduct implies a reaction of some kind.”

“It would indeed, but calling it a byproduct is merely a temporary label on something we don’t yet know enough about to properly define. Likewise, assuming there’s a reaction of some kind is dangerous at best.” He gave me a world-weary smile. How long had it been since he last slept? “I know you mean well, but assumptions—”

“Assumptions are what got us in this mess in the first place, I know. I just…” I just what? I was grasping at straws, that’s what. I had been from the get-go. All my academic discipline, all my scientific expertise down the drain because I couldn’t separate my foalish hopes from reality.

There was a thudding sound, quiet enough at first that I thought maybe String or Whistle had dropped the mallet up in the scaffolding. But then I saw them looking down our way, hooves hooked over the railing. Their eyes were locked somewhere to my right, and I felt mine drawn like magnets toward the one thing in the universe I didn’t want to look at.

Shoulder still pressed against the barrier, the Nightmare braced its elbow against the base of the glyph so that it could lift its head and hit its temple against the barrier. Again. Again. Rhythmic, unblinking, staring into and through me as if it were reading the pages of my soul. And with every unholy thud against the barrier, I felt the drizzle of rain on my withers, felt the echo of magic against bone recede downward into the cavernous depths of whatever space existed inside me.

The longest second of my life passed, and I took a breath to shrug off whatever it was about this creature that kept ensnaring me in its vile magic. I realized I was shaking.

I wiped the back of my neck to rid myself of that accursed wetness, but my hoof came back dry.

“Princess,” Star Swirl said. He looked at me as if staring at a ghost. “Are you—”

“Hey,” String cut him off, striding toward me from the scaffolding. How’d he get down here so quick? He jerked his head toward the door, bidding that I follow him out, and I couldn’t get out of there fast enough.

The moment we stepped out, he shut the door behind us and turned to me. “We should be careful what we say in front of that thing. We don’t know if it can understand us.”

“True, but does it matter? It wants out, and at this rate, it’s going to get out.”

“No sense in taking chances or adding to our problems. And who knows if what you say might jeopardize Sunset. It’s in there with her, and if it can go back into the Dreamscape, it could go after her there, too. Or worse, it could just as easily turn around and maul her right there in the glyph.”

That realization was like ice water running down my back.

“I think for now you need to not be in there,” he continued. “I saw the way you were looking at it. There’s something going on, and I don’t like it.”

“What, you think it’s, like, mind-controlling me or something?” That was an absurd leap in logic, but I felt the wetness running down the back of my shoulder blades. Hypnosis, at the very least, wasn’t exactly a wrong guess.

“I have no idea what it is, and I’m not going to jump to conclusions. But it’s getting to you one way or another. I think what you need most is to get some rest. Go to bed. It’s late anyway. We’re almost done with the shoestring, and as soon as we are”—he jerked his head toward the portal room—“we’ll be getting the hell out of here, too.”

“But—”

“Princess.”

I winced, but nonetheless sighed. I couldn’t help right now. I had been wrestling with that notion all day. I knew it. He knew it. Hell, the Nightmare probably even knew it. I had no productive options left since yesterday, but hearing it from somepony else cut as deep as ever.

“Alright,” I said. “I’ll… go try and sleep… or something.”

I trundled off to my room. I didn’t even bother brushing my teeth. Just face down in my pillow, letting the darkness try its best to pull me down into something I could hopefully call sleep.

And I lay there.

I tossed and turned for I didn’t know how long. A few minutes? A few hours? Time had a habit of slipping past me whenever my brain went into overdrive trying to wind down for sleep. A dark room could do that to me. It made it too easy to think, and I had too many things to think about right now.

I could still hear it—that thudding thudding thudding of its head against the barrier. I could see those eyes staring into me, splaying me out like a cadaver on a mortician’s bench.

I tried shutting it out, holding my pillow over my ears, pulling the comforter over my head, but I could still hear the thud thud thud of its temple against the barrier as if it were against the inside of my own skull.

I couldn’t tell if I lay in a pool of my own sweat or if the pouring rainfall sensation could reach me even here where the fleeting certainties of foalhood claimed that I should be untouchable. But all the same, I turned over, and the chill of a draft on seemingly wet fur clawed up my back.

Sleep wasn’t going to happen. I got up, went to the kitchen, grabbed the biggest mug I could find, and filled it with the stale coffee left over from the day before. Still warm and a little burnt from being forgotten on the burner, but it would do. I closed my eyes and reclined my head to let the first sip’s warmth wash through me.

The clip-clop of hooves signaled a visitor to this liminal space of mine. It was String. He looked a bit confused to see me, and if my tired brain were allowed one biased assumption, just a little bit annoyed.

“Thought I sent you to bed,” he said.

“You’re not my dad,” I grumbled. I felt the silence build between us well before realizing what had actually come out of my mouth. “Oh my gosh. I-I’m so sorry. I’m—”

“No, that was… I, I phrased that poorly.”

Another beat of silence passed before we laughed away the misunderstanding.

“I just can’t sleep,” I said, rubbing the back of my neck. “I’m just tossing and turning. There’s no point in trying.”

“I get it. Honestly, it’s why I haven’t bothered myself.” He made for the cabinet and got his own mug.

I offered him the pot. “Then why’d you send me off?”

He shrugged while pouring a healthy portion for himself. “Maybe I was just being too cautious. Part of me also just wants to do everything I can to make it easier for the rest of you.”

I nodded. Couldn’t argue that. Parents were like that, always wanting what’s best for their children.

“It’s standing now,” he said after his first sip. He stared into his mug, and I swore he looked ten years older as he said it.

I got that sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach. I mirrored him by staring into my own mug. We were on track for everything I had hoped wouldn’t happen.

“Can it use her magic yet?” I asked.

Yet, my brain needled.

“I don’t know. It hasn’t tried, at least. Star Swirl’s been lookin’ the thing over. He’d have more to say.”

“Then let’s go hear what he has to say, I guess,” and I trundled for the portal room, String following close behind.

As promised, it was standing now, albeit unsteadily. It swayed like a drunkard well past their cut-off point, but its eyes were those of a predator, keen as a knifepoint and just as focused on me as ever. It tracked my movement as I followed String over to Star Swirl at the table.

“This is done, at least,” he said as we went, nodding at the cabling that wound around and around the portal room in a neat, professional spiral.

I followed it with my eyes, each and every lap around the room, slowly but surely sloping downward for the pitons driven into the floor, leading down into the roots of the castle. Along that route, I caught sight of Copper helping tear down the scaffolding along the back wall.

She, Whistle, and Starlight stacked the planks and metalwork on a cart, along with the boxes of leftover pitons. A haunted look filled her eyes, one she shared with me as she wheeled the cart past me out the door.

Star Swirl sat at the table, cleared of everything but a few scraps of paper he scribbled on. The worry on his face had me second-guessing if I should interrupt. He looked at wit’s end for an answer lost among the scribbles.

Still, I had to try. I had to be their princess.

“Any luck?” I asked.

He didn’t lift his gaze from his notes—equations, snippets of archaic knowledge, many slashed through and re-annotated and slashed through again. The desperate calculations of a pony at their final few inches of rope. The weight of the world lay upon his shoulders, and it carried in his voice.

“No,” he said. “I really do not know what to do or how to stop it. I’m afraid we’re at the end of the line, Twilight.”

His words got that sucking, hollow feeling in my chest. I didn’t know if I had the heart to stomach any more bad news, let alone the pall that hung over this place like a funeral.

Still, I had to be their princess, and so I turned for the Nightmare.

It watched me approach with subdued hunger. A low growl rolled out of its throat, and it reminded me just how sharp its incisors were with a snarl. A primal instinct welled up inside me, made my hooves light as feathers and my hackles stand on end, but I kept my scowl locked with it.

Again its gaze pierced me, into me, and the wet trickle of magic started down my horn. This time, I pressed back against it, and as our magics co-mingled at the base of my horn, I realized. That reaching, searching, scrying in its eyes…

It wasn’t staring at me.

I doubled down on my defiant scowl. “You can’t have it.”

It snarled in reply, and in a flash threw itself against the barrier. The barrier’s pink magics undulated outward along its surface, like the ripples caused by a rock thrown into a lake.

I staggered back, a Shield Spell already at the base of my horn. I centered my breathing and resettled my wings.

“You can’t have my Tantabus. And you’re not getting out of there. We won’t let you.”

It snarled again, crescendoing with every breath it took until in a fit of rage it reared back and slammed its head into the barrier. Its eyes were on me as it pressed the side of its face against it, and that’s when I saw to my horror the silver threads of magic wind up its horn to bleed into the barrier like water washing down a windowpane.

Everyone in the room stopped and stared, and I heard the collective holding of breath, the single moment of silence when everypony’s heart skipped the same beat.

The Nightmare let out a gurgling roar, reared back its head, and slammed against the barrier again. The chaotic energies at its horn crackled and snapped like lightning seeking a ground. They forked every which way along the inside of the barrier, skittering up its pink sheen, chaining into one another and down into the glyph, now glowing white hot.

The Nightmare spread its broken, tattered wings wide in a spray of dark fluid, and it let fly a bolt of magic directly into the barrier.

The resounding thunderclap shook the castle, and within seconds, Princess Celestia stormed through the doors, flanked by her guards. The fear in her eyes was momentary, before she furrowed her brow and strode forward.

“Get everypony out of the castle,” she said to Star Swirl. “I will deal with this.”

He hurriedly ushered the others back. “You heard her. Move, move!”

Celestia turned that blood-chilling gaze my way, but I stood my ground.

“I’m not leaving,” I said.

“Twilight, this is no time to argue.”

“I know. I’m not leaving. I saw it with my own eyes: you had to do this alone once. But you’re not alone this time. I won’t let you be. Not again.”

“Twilight, that is noble of you, but you are a leader. Equestria needs a leader in case—”

“Then that’s what my brother and Candace are for,” I said, matching her glare. “I’m. Not. Leaving.”

She held her gaze on me a moment longer. The words she wished to say and the feelings she and I could only wish to share in that moment passed across her face like a cloud across a field, but the moment passed, and she turned to the guards.

“Go. Evacuate the castle. Ready the others.”

They saluted and were off, shepherding everypony toward the door.

Copper pushed back when they tried to move her. “W-wait, Twilight!”

“Copper,” String said, throwing a hoof over her shoulder as she tried slipping past them. “We don’t have time. We have to move.”

“We can’t just leave them!”

He wrapped her in his magic and wrenched her from the floor. “This isn’t your fight anymore,” he said. To Celestia: “Princess, that glyph is holding back a lot of energy. When it goes, this entire room—”

“I’m aware. We will be fine.” She put a wing over me, and for the briefest moment I knew that maternal safety it always instilled in me.

He stared incredulously at her but turned to leave, taking Copper with him.

Copper tumbled and twisted in his magic, reached out for anything to grab hold of and claw her way back to me. The fear in her eyes said it all, and I wished from the bottom of my heart that I could have said goodbye with more than simply a look.

It was for the best.

Star Swirl was the last one out the door, making sure the others got out safe, and with a grim look of farewell, shut the door behind him.

Beside me, Princess Celestia stared long at the Nightmare. A hollow sadness dwelled in her eyes, a certain remembrance at war with her sworn duty. Her chest expanded with a deep breath, relaxed as she released it, and she closed her eyes. A thin line of magic followed the spiral of her horn, and as she spread her wings, up went a transparent shield laced with strands of iridescent light.

I lit my horn to add my power to the spell, and as our magics intermingled in the space before us, I resigned myself to the consequences of my failures.

The Nightmare took our stance as a challenge. Snarling, it craned its neck back and drove its horn into the barrier as if it were a lance.

The barrier flared to life, concentrating all its blinding energy on that single point. For the briefest moment, it held fast, and I let myself hope it would hold firm, but the first signs of failure started to show in the form of a tiny hole at its center.

A bolt of blue lightning clawed its way out from that point, arcing outward like a chain ripped from the crystal beneath our hooves. It snarled toward us to crash white-hot against our shield and skitter across it in dozens of little filaments searching for cracks to seep through, provoking a glassy radiance along the shield like the ripples of a fishing line drawn every which way across the surface of a pond.

Others fired off in other directions to leave glowing red scars along the floor before latching onto the shoestring cables and following them down into the heart of the castle. The corded steel glowed cherry red with the raw energy and began sagging and unraveling in places. What few sections of shelving that were made of wood went up in flames.

So much raw energy. The sight of it sent a cold chill rippling down my back. Even if our shield held, what kind of catastrophe would surround us when the dust settled? We couldn’t just stand here and wait. We had to do something before that happened. But what?

And as if the universe saw fit to challenge my greatest fears, I saw something that got the hairs standing up on the back of my neck.

Amidst the thunderstorm, a shape rose up behind the Nightmare, silhouetted by the brilliant, crackling light. I had to squint to recognize the stature of the figure, the mane and tail that in any other moment would have set my heart at ease, but seeing it now froze the blood in my veins. I stood in wide-eyed terror as Sunset got to her hooves.

She rubbed her head and looked up at the thunderstorm, then the Nightmare between us. She scrambled backward to avoid a lightning bolt that snarled past her to become one with the glyph. Confusion turned to surprise turned to panic. Her eyes met mine, and it felt as if time stood still as the fear in our hearts attuned to one another’s.

Then, of all the things she could have done, she did the one and only thing that could ratchet my fear up one final notch:

She smirked.

“Sunset,” I yelled. “No, wait!”

Either she didn’t hear me, or she didn’t care. The tip of her horn glowed cherry red, and I felt my heart stop as she lunged at the Nightmare. Like a fencer deflecting another’s blade, she caught the Nightmare’s horn with hers, and the thunderstorm of magic crackled red and silver, exploding upward like the innumerable branches of a tree.

I shielded my eyes as the energy grew too bright to look at, and the lightning storm sputtered and died as quickly as it had erupted. When I dared peek, Sunset lay on top of the Nightmare. Neither of them were moving. Neither of them were breathing.

“Sunset!” I couldn’t even hear myself over the ringing in my ears. I ran as fast as I could to her side, but I was met with the painful reminder that the glyph was still active. It was like running headfirst into a brick wall.

Get up get up get up! I scrambled to my hooves and threw myself against the barrier, pushing with all my might as if it were a door I could simply open.

Celestia stormed up from behind and tried grabbing me. “Twilight—”

I swatted her away. Contingency be damned. I refused to let Sunset die before my very eyes.

I charged up the first spell I could think of and blasted it at the chalk to vaporize it and undo the glyph. But the chalk lines soaked up my magic and flashed briefly like lightning deep within the belly of a cloud, just like we designed it.

Shit! What do I do what do I do? “Sunset!”

She still wasn’t breathing, and for the life of me I could barely breathe myself. My head was spinning, my hooves felt like jelly. I didn’t know if the wetness running down my face was blood or tears. I clawed at the chalk, ignoring the white-hot sear in my hooves from the rampant magic it had soaked up.

“Twilight!” Celestia shouted. She wrapped me in her magic, and my body seized up.

I struggled against it, reaching out a hoof toward Sunset, watching her go, watching her die. I gritted my teeth as every fear, every uncertainty surged to the tip of my horn, and I turned it on Celestia.

“No!”

The shockwave blew apart her spell, cracked the walls and ceiling, blasted the loose rubble away from us like shrapnel to embed in the far walls. She took a frightful step backward, and I bolted past her.

I threw my magic around a nearby piton and ripped it from the wall, taking a healthy chunk of the castle with it. I slammed it into the floor to shatter it free and dove at the chalk line in a murderous frenzy.

I jammed and jammed and jammed it into the glyph, inch by inch tearing away the crystal beneath it. Magic arced from it in all the colors of the rainbow with every strike until there simply wasn’t any floor left to connect the circuit. The final filaments of magic skittered and curled between the interwoven lines like electricity down a tesla coil until it went silent. Heaving for air, I let the piton tumble to the floor and dashed inside.

“Sunset!” I grabbed her by the shoulders and laid her on her back. There was blood everywhere.

I staggered away, looking for the injury, only to see a piece of crystal about an inch long stuck out from the inside of my foreleg, likely from the piton. I ripped it out, threw it across the room, and pulled Sunset close.

“Sunset!” She wasn’t moving, wasn’t breathing. I couldn’t feel a pulse. “Wake up!”

What did she cast? What kind of spell would do this? If only I knew, I might be able to reverse it.

I gritted my teeth and cast the Wake-Up Spell. Nothing. A Clarity Spell. No movement. I focused my magic and reached in with a Healing Spell, but there was no injury to heal.

“No no no no, Sunset, no…” I started chest compressions. Something. Anything. Keep the blood flowing. Preserve the brain. She’ll wake up. I had to trust, I had to trust, I had to trust.

The blood from my leg matted her fur, and my hooves kept slipping. Keep the rhythm, don’t let her die. And I kept it and kept it and kept it and kept it until I went blind from the tears and collapsed on top of her with the weight of every broken promise.

I pulled the body of my best friend to my chest and cried like a foal as I cradled her in my hooves.