Heaven of a Hell

by Rambling Writer

Chapters

1 - This is a Good Idea
2 - The Obligatory Dimension-Hopping Montage
3 - It Has Books About Books About Books About Books About…
4 - (Lack of) Silence in the Library
5 - The Great Metaphysical Library Curbstomp
6 - Bureaucratic Realities of a Change in Management
7 - The Marriage of Friendship and Hell

1 - This is a Good Idea

“Starlight?”

“Yes, Twilight?”

“I need your help. I’m going to hell.”

“I… don’t think there’s anything I can do abo-”

“No, I mean I’m breaking into hell.”

“…Uh.”

“Ugh!” Twilight flicked her tail and flapped her wings once. “Okay. You know how I was really down for a while a few weeks ago?”

“That’s one way to put it,” Starlight said cautiously.

“Well, I’d gone to hell thanks to a clerical error-”

“What?”

“-and they told me I got to organize an infinite library-”

“You went to hell?!”

“-so I did-”

“Because of a misfile?!”

“-and just as I was getting into the swing of things-”

“Wait, did you say you organi-”

“-the demons or- whoever runs the place found the error and sent me back here.” Twilight had a gleam of crazed determination in her eyes, now; Starlight scooched back a foot. “That library… It had every book possible, Starlight. Literally. And-”

Desperate to stop the course she knew the conversation was taking, Starlight said, “But wouldn’t that mean, I don’t know, ninety-nine point nine nine nine and so on percent of the books are gibberish? So the library’s worthless?”

“I told you, I organized it! All of it!” yelled Twilight. “Comprehensible, meaningful books are nice and close to each other. Think about it: all the information you could want, need, imagine, create, right at your hooftips.” Twilight looked into the distance with a thousand-yard stare and reached out for an invisible shelf. She sobbed a broken sob and put her hoof back down. “So. No more moping. I’m breaking into hell to use that library.”

“…Breaking… into… hell.”

Twilight tilted her head. “Yeah. That’s what I said, isn’t it?”

“Okay, look.” Starlight planted her face in her hoof and disguised the gesture with a ruffle of her mane. “For starters, how are you even going to get there? It’d take-”

“Inverted demon-summoning spell!” Twilight said brightly. “It’s easy. I broke it down to fundamentals, isolated the components that drew people from hell to Equestria, reversed them, and now we have a spell that goes to hell from Equestria. I think. I haven’t tested it yet. But I’m sure we’ll be fine.”

“And where did you even get a demon-summoning spell in the first place? Those-”

“Oh, just the Lesser Key of Solomane.” Twilight levitated said book in front of Starlight, still trailing a few tattered strips of the pony skin in which it was bound.

Starlight laughed nervously. “I-isn’t it super illegal to have that book? Something about summoning an army of demons to take over the world? Not to mention all the dark magic in it?”

“Normally, yes. But I’m a princess. I got it for research.”

“So what do you need me for?” More and more, Starlight was missing the days when “Hey, let’s go to hell!” was something you only said while drunk and not something your old teacher proposed as a casual weekend getaway.

“I need your help to power the spell, at least until I know where the Library is and can set up a direct link. The amount of magic needed is huge, too much for me to handle alone. But with you adding your power, we’ll get it done easily! Pleeeaaase? I’ll owe you a favor.” Twilight made big eyes. Starlight wanted to use them for target practice.

One last straw to grasp at. “And if we can’t find the library?” asked Starlight. “What if we’re just stuck wandering hell for eternity?”

“Planned for it!” Twilight held up an amulet. “Automated homeward teleportation. Activate this and it’ll teleport you back to the Cutie Map from anywhere in the multiverse. This one, I have tested.”

Starlight stared at the amulet. “It’s made of bone and the blood’s still wet on the runes.”

“So the spell needs bone to work and I dug up a few graves. They were dead! They weren’t using the bones anyway!”

“…Is the chain on this made of sinew?”

“And I just used a little bit of my blood — the original spell called for pus, but I figured out the conversion rate — and-”

A losing battle if ever there was one. Twilight was on the literary warpath; none who stood in her way would survive and even her allies risked permanent trauma afterwards. “Fine. I’ll help. But just this once.”

“Yesssssss!” Twilight practically shoved the Key in Starlight’s face. “Read the sections on summoning in that, then come to me. I’ll give you the next steps from there.”

“Great.” Starlight nudged open the book and was immediately confronted with a positively lovely picture of a gangrenous wound caused by Lereinje. “I’m breaking so many laws by doing this,” she mumbled.

“I’ll pardon you. Princeeeeeess!”

“So, Starlight? How’s it going?”

“I can hear them, Twilight. I can hear them in the silence, just shy of the edge of hearing. The endless shrieks of the damned. A dismal chorus of boundless breadth that speaks of pain and agony far beyond mortal comprehension. A perpetual litany of prayer and supplication begging, pleading for a release, however slight, however temporary. A release that will never come. Can never come. Forever.”

“Oh, that’s normal. It’s hell, what’d you expect? Just cast the silencing charm on page 36 and everything’ll be fine.”

“…Are you sure you’re okay?”

“I’m not okay! There’s a library out there that has every book possible and I’m not in it!”

“Look, I- I’m getting there, okay? I’ll let you know when I’m done.”

“Great! But please don’t take too long. So many unread books…”

Twilight leaned into Spike’s room. “Spike?”

“Yeah, Twilight?” He only barely looked up from his comic book.

“You can have the weekend off. Starlight and I are going to hell.”

“Okay. Cool.”

“Keep the castle semi-clean, remember to lock up at night, and don’t eat all of the double chocolate chunk ice cream at once, okay?”

“Yeah. Sure.”

“Great. We’ll be back… I’m not sure when we’ll be back. Before Monday at the latest.” Twilight shrugged and left Spike’s room.

Spike turned the page, wondering if Baron Von Ruthless had noticed his doomsday device of the day was missing its gyroscopes yet. Aaaand… Nope. Still monologuing.

A few rooms over, he heard Starlight. “Twilight, where did you get all this raccoon blood?”

“Raccoons, obviously. Let’s just say Fillydelphia won’t have a procyonid problem in the near future.”

“Ew.”

“Every book possible! Sacrifices must be made! Be thankful they’re raccoon sacrifices and not pony sacrifices. But the exchange rate isn’t the greatest, which is why we need so much.”

“So what’s with the tuning fork?”

“It creates the right frequencies to-”

“No, I know that, but why does it look… so…”

“The waves it makes have an imaginary wavelength.”

“Oh.”

Spike’s stomach growled. He reached into the bowl next to him and grabbed- But it was empty. Darn. Spike hopped out of his beanbag chair and headed for the kitchen, taking the bowl with him. Twilight’s and Starlight’s voices were coming from one of the rooms he passed.

“Armadillo bile?” asked Twilight.

“North point,” confirmed Starlight.

“Antler?”

“East point. Also ew.”

“Diamond?”

“South point.”

“Toothpaste?”

“West point. I still don’t know why we need that…”

“Toothpaste contains crushed oyster shells. You’re brushing your teeth with DEATH!”

“Whatever. The bloodstones are…”

Spike reached the kitchen. He was cutting back, so… two rubies, three sapphires, one emerald, a not-exactly-small chunk of chrysoprase, and a handful of crushed quartz to roll it all in. Two handfuls. As he walked back to his room, curiosity made him stop at Twilight’s and Starlight’s room again. The door crackled with energy.

“Lorem ipsum ova paschae!” intoned Twilight. “Mannulum verbis!”

“Inanis strepitus!” yelled Starlight. “Multum ineptiu et perditio tempus!”

“Habes multus otiu viciu ad interpretari hic!” they chorused. “Redire ad historia!” Thunder boomed, reality flexed, the earth shook, and Spike stumbled a little and dropped his gems. Doggone it.

As Spike gathered his gems back up, he glanced at the sickly red smoke that was leaking from under the doorframe.He sniffed. Yeegh. Sulfur. And… was that brimstone? Yeah, probably. It smelled like what he had when he had bad breath.

Then what Twilight had said truly hit him.

She couldn’t be serious, could she? No. It was too wild, too impossible. There was no way she could’ve been telling the truth.

But if she had…

Spike was at the freezer in a second. He yanked it open and- Yes! Twilight had been telling the truth! Spike freed the double chocolate chunk ice cream from the freezer, retrieved a spoon, and dug in. He wouldn’t eat all of it; just ninety-five percent of it. Ninety-nine percent. Even better, he’d have plenty of time before Twilight returned from hell, so he could take this nice and slow.

2 - The Obligatory Dimension-Hopping Montage

“Hey! Back of the line, bozo!”

The world had barely resolved itself when Twilight was being jostled on all sides. She was in the middle of a queue, a long queue, in a bureaucratic office. And “long” wasn’t some measly hyperbole, oh no; in spite of serpentining back and forth across the room, the queue stretched into the distance, beyond what Twilight could see. Naturally, there was a single clerk handling the veritable continent of queuers.

Right next to Twilight was a mare, hitched to a cart full of papers piled high (Twilight caught the title of one of them: Form 8ABD3-6932i-27/RX-MLP — Confirmation of Bureaucratic Competency in Demonic Environments During a Simultaneous Summoning and Deathday Party (Part 6, Section K) ). The mare was glaring at Twilight as if the latter’s default response to absolutely anything was “kittens in a blender”. “Look,” the mare said testily, “not that seeing another pony isn’t great, but if you’re also applying for a job here, get to the back of the line!”

“Applying… for a job?” If all else failed, a job as an infernal bureaucrat (wasn’t that redundant?) might get her access to the Library, and all she had to do was be complicit in the torture of billions for eternity. Hmm. Decisions, decisions.

“Well, during life, I may have been lazy,” said the pony, “and misfiled a file or two. Dozen. Dozen. Every day. For years. But it wasn’t like I did anything bad! No one died or anything. Except for that one time, I guess. And the other. And the other. And… hmm.” She frowned. “And there was that one time a misfile almost caused a war. And all the other times. And that one time it actually caused a war. But it was hardly hell-worthy! And I got sent here anyway.”

Then she grinned and tapped the side of her muzzle. “But, see, I’m smart. I think fast, then I say to the demon introducing me to hell, ‘Demon,’ says I, ‘I’m worth more to hell as a worker than a tormented. I bet your bureaucracy’s pretty bad.’”

“Oh, yeah,” whispered Twilight. “It’s bad.”

“And then we strike a deal, him and me. I get to stay out of hell in exchange for sorting out hell’s bureaucracy. But…” The pony sighed. “I need to get it all approved first. And at first it seemed easy — fill out the form, and away I go — but the official said I need to fill out this form first, one thing led to another, and…” She sighed again and jerked her head at the cart of papers.

“Ticket number six million, seven hundred thirteen thousand, two hundred eighty!” screeched the clerk. “Six million, seven hundred thirteen thousand, two hundred eighty!”

“And it’s weird.” She looked up at the clock. “I feel like I’ve been here getting bounced back and forth between officials forever, filling out more and more forms, but that clock says no time has passed.” Her voice dropped to a stage whisper. “Maybe they really do need my help. But seriously, you need to get to the back. I’m not giving up my spot.”

“Right,” said Twilight, not sure how to break the news. “Sorry. I’ll-”

“Hey! Twilight!” Starlight forced her way across lines to Twilight. “Are we in the right place? This…”

“I don’t know.” Twilight pulled Starlight over a few lines so the pony would stop glaring at them. “I think we’re in the right circle,” said Twilight, “but the wrong… personal area. This is definitely Sloth, and the Library was in Sloth. Let’s try again.”

“Wait.” Starlight cocked her head and lowered an ear. “You were supposed to have it right the first time. Are we just going to jump around hell at random and hope we wind up in the right place?”

“We might not,” Twilight said defensively. Her horn started glowing. “Now get busy with the teleportation spell.”

“…This is gonna be a looooooong day, isn’t it?”

The floor was covered with gold coins. Even at its most shallow, the coins were still piled an inch deep, forcing Twilight to literally wade through them. The rest of the place looked like a mall, of all things, stores on both walls stretching off into infinity. “Starlight?”

“Over here!” She didn’t sound far away. “Take a look at this store.”

Twilight pushed her way through the coins, gave up, and flew over them to where Starlight was. More and more golden treasures were piled high everywhere; whoever had designed this hell didn’t have much of an imagination in the way of precious metals. Starlight was staring at a storefront, speechless. Twilight took a look.

EVERYTHING EXCEPT SPATULAS!
The store for all your
non-spatuling needs!

“‘Spatuling’?” Twilight asked. “What kind of a word is that?”

“I don’t know whether that’s usage of a spatula or a baby spatula.”

Twilight walked across the surface of the coins to the door and peered inside. A store of everything except spatulas lay beyond. She checked the times. “It opens at 8:00,” she said to Starlight, “and right now, it’s-” Clock check. “-yep, 7:59 forever. Greed. All the money you could want, nothing to buy with it.” She looked back inside. Even from this position, she could see Allen wrenches, gerbil feeders, toilet seats, electric heaters… “Not the best punishment. What’d happen if you were actually looking for a spatula? You’d pass this store witho-”

“Spatula City’s right behind us.”

Twilight looked. “Ooooof course. ‘We sell spatulas,’” she said, reading their slogan, “‘and that’s all.’” A sign in one of the windows caught her eye. “Huh. They’ve got a sale on hydrodynamic spatulas with port and starboard attachments. And it’s buy-one-get-one if you get the turbo drive version.”

They didn’t say anything, but their voices kept echoing down the mall for long moments. “Are we early?” asked Starlight. “Has the pony this hell is for just not died yet?”

“Probably not.” Twilight looked down. “You know… if this is real gold-”

“Alright, people, look alive!” a demon said, stepping out of a hole in the air, followed by numerous others. “She’s due to die in five minutes! You, janitors, take up your positions! You, security guards, start patrolling! You, mortals, start-” The demon did a double-take. “Mortals? Mortals! Security breach! We need-”

Twilight jumped on Starlight and hugged her close. “Spell! Now! Anywhere!” And they were gone.

“Twilight,” hissed Starlight, “we should get out of the line while we can. I don’t think they’ve noticed us yet.”

“We’ve been at this for hours. Aren’t you hungry?”

“Yes, but not ‘attend hell’s bake sale’ hungry!”

“Look at the sign. It’s free.”

“Yeah, and I bet the food’s rotting corpses soaked in kerosene!”

“No, it’s cake.”

“…Real cake?”

“Yeah. The ponies ‘selling’ it are the ones being punished. For Gluttony; they have to give away all the food they can eat without having any of it themselves. If it was rotting corpses, they’d be happy to get rid of it.”

“Fine. We’ll have some cake.”

One not-actually-that-long wait later, they had (admittedly tasty-looking) cakes shoved at them by a scrawny pony with a smile so fake even the worst Chineighse knockoffs poo-pooed its quality. “Thank. You. Come. Again,” the pony said as they left.

“Alright,” Starlight snapped. “We’ve got cake. Now let’s get going.” She tossed the cake over her shoulder.

Twilight snatched the cake from the air with her magic and shoved it in Starlight’s face. “Come on, Starlight!” she said. “Don’t have your cake, eat it!” She was already gulping down huge bites of her own cake, and the look on her face said it was better than anything.

Starlight dubiously took a bite of the cake. Five seconds later, she was vacuuming the rest of the frosting off the plate. “You know,” she said, “I wouldn’t mind waiting again. That was hella good.”

Twilight scraped the remains of her own cake off of her face. “When we get to the Library, we’ll find you the multiverse’s best cake cookbook.” She licked her hoof clean.

“I’ll take it.”

“You mean bake it?”

Punch.

“Just look important,” Twilight whispered to Starlight, “and they’ll think we’re supposed to be here and ignore us.”

Starlight shuffled to one side to let another business-suited demon past. “Why are we staying here, anyway?” she asked. “We’re supposed to be looking for Sloth, right? This is an office building. Plane. Dimension. Thing. Whatever, this is not Sloth.”

“Well, no,” admitted Twilight. “But we got shuffled out of our target circle for some reason, so if this is, I dunno, corporate or infernate, we can find out some of the structure of hell and focus our jumps a bit more.

“‘Find out some of the structure of hell’? How?”

“…I dunno.”

Starlight facehooved.

The decor of the office was infernale chic, with perhaps more pointy bits than were necessary, but Twilight had never imagined demons as extremely fricking dapper as the ones here. It was true: no matter who you were, what you were, a good suit made you look classy as all get out (apparently, “classy as hell” wasn’t an exaggeration). And if you ignored the smell of brimstone and bleach, the whole place wasn’t too bad.

But they were hiding, and that was the important part. Demons passed them by, never giving them any more than a-

“You two mortals look lost,” said a demon.

Twilight opened her mouth to make up some excuse, but Starlight quickly said, “Yes! Yes, we are.”

“Go see Levannerthan.” The demon pointed. “Second hall on the left, just past the ‘Your Rival’s Birthday Party’ office.”

Starlight pulled Twilight down the hall. “Such a great plan,” Starlight mumbled to Twilight. As they approached Levannerthan’s office, they could hear voices coming from it.

“Whaddya mean you don’t have a punishment set up yet?! She’s been waiting in limbo for a decade!”

“You have no idea how hard it is to punish someone for envy, do you? Barely anyone has envy as their main vice! It’s always sin number two or three! There’s like no precedent!”

“There’s plenty of precedent! I’m the one who runs Envy, for crying out loud! Why did you even APPLY for Envy?”

Starlight pushed open the door to the office. Two demons were inside, quarrelling. Starlight hadn’t even opened her mouth when the larger raised a hand to her. “I’m Levannerthan, and I’m also sorry, give me a minute,” he said. “Buckthym here can’t seem to do his job and craft a personalized punishment for an envious pony.”

“Oh, sure,” snapped the smaller demon. “Just insult right me in front of the guests!”

“Was she envious of a particular person?” said Twilight, sliding in after Starlight. “Make her the president of that person’s fan club.”

“…Are you even trying?!” Levannerthan screamed at Buckthym. “A decade! A decade and nothing from you! Then this… mortal flounces along-”

“Flounce?” Twilight asked, frowning.

“-and she solves the problem in two minutes! One and a half of those minutes waiting for a chance to speak!”

“I did not flounce.”

“Oh, like it’s so easy for you!” snapped Buckthym.

“Yeah, that wasn’t flouncing at all,” said Starlight.

“It is! I’m not head of the Envy Division for nothing!” said Levannerthan.

“It was more of a… mosey. Or an amble.”

“Oh, lay off! You’re always getting on my case!”

“Or a promenade?” asked Twilight.

Levannerthan ate Buckthym.

“Yeah, maybe,” said Starlight.

Levannerthan licked Buckthym’s ichor from his lips and said, “So! Mortals aren’t supposed to be in here, but I’ll ignore that since you solved that problem so easily. Any other small favors you need? I’m sure I can pull a few tendons around here, get something done for you.”

“Could we have, I don’t know,” said Twilight, “some sort of badges that let us be here? Constantly having to evade security demons is a pain.”

“And a map!” said Starlight. “We reaaaaally need a map of hell.”

“Yes! A map! A map would be great. How did I forget about a map?”

“Oh, both of those’re easy,” said Levannerthan, nodding. “I’ll just pop out for a second, and- Here, have some MINTs while you wait.” He vanished out the door.

Twilight and Starlight looked at the bowl Levannerthan had gestured at, then at each other. “Those are mints?” Starlight asked skeptically, backing away.

“Maggot-Infested Necrotic Tissues, probably.”

“Yeah, not touching those.”

Starlight lounged against the wall, trying to avoid looking around her. She would’ve thought that this section of hell, being a place of punishment for lust, would be more prudish, not like… this. And yet, the place’s other inhabitants were inconsolable.

Finally, Twilight trotted back from the stage, looking a little shaken. Starlight stood up straight. “So? How’s a bar filled with beer kegs and beautiful dancing mares a punishment?”

“Well, the kegs have holes in the bottom…”

“Okay. Makes sense, I guess.”

“…and the mares don’t.”

“Oh. …Oh.”

“Yeah. Let’s keep moving.”

“Hold up. How did you find out-”

“LET’SKEEPMOVING!”

The place looked like an ordinary cafe in Canterlot, barring the sanguine sky that may or may not have been literally dripping blood. And considering the weird turn Luna’s tastes had taken recently, all you’d need to do was stick up some Nightmare Night decorations and you could overlook even that.

“So, yeah,” said the pony sitting across from Twilight. “I was prideful of my successes in life, and now I get graded poorly on literally everything I do-”

“Horrific infodumping!” screamed the demon standing behind the pony. “1.5 out of 10!”

The pony groaned and hung his head in his hooves. “And it’s hellishly annoying.”

“Stating the obvious! e out of 10!”

“e out of 10?! What even is e?”

“Improper math skills! 0.123958230502 repitan out of 137!”

“If you take one plus one-over-x,” said Twilight, “and set that to the xth power, e is what you get as x goes to infinity.”

“Oh,” snorted the pony, “like that’s a big help.”

“Twelfth use of sarcasm this hour! 2 out of 10!”

“Actually, it is. In compound interest, for example-”

“I’m good, thanks.”

“Interruption! 2 out of 10!”

Finally, Starlight coughed. “So are we going anywhere, Twilight?” she asked. “Something about every book possible? Or can I-”

“Have you deciphered the map yet?”

“No, it’s-” Starlight pushed the wiggling thing that was vaguely recognizable as a three-dimensional map at Twilight. “I don’t think this map is… whatevering right. You said we were going here, right? But this-” She waved a hoof around the diner. “-doesn’t look anything like that.”

“Hmm. You’re right,” Twilight said, tapping her chin. “Can you see where we actually are?”

“Right here. I think.”

“Double hmm. We’ll need to do some more jumps and see how the destination compares with the coordinates. There might be something wrong with this map.” Twilight pushed her chair away and stood up. To the other pony, she said, “Sorry, but we need to get going.”

“That’s okay,” said the pony. “Thanks for stopping by.”

“Sincerity! 9.5 out of 10!”

The pony spun and looked at the judge, a big smile on her face. “Really?!”

“Inability to simply accept good scores! 3 out of 10!”

“MOTHERF-”

Twilight looked up. An endless wasteland, flat as salt plains, stretched around her. The ground was dry and parched, with cracks looking like it was on the verge of falling apart completely. Pools of bubbling acid were scattered about, spitting caustic fumes into the air. But that didn’t matter, because they still weren’t in the Library. “Son of a botch!” she screamed.

Wait, what? “Botch. Botch. Booootch. Bit. Itch. Botch. …Ship. Dock. Punt. Hiss.” Hmm. Twilight nudged Starlight, still dazed on the ground. “Starlight, could you swear at me?”

A still-woozy Starlight ruffled her mane. “Gruh?” she mumbled.

“Swear at me. Please? Just the F-word. Or something.”

“Fudge,” sighed Starlight.

“No, no, the obscene one.”

“Fiddlesticks.”

“About oscillating the unmentionables.”

“Fornication.”

“That starts in F and ends in U-C-K.”

“Firetruck.”

“That’s two words! Swear at me!”

Rolling her eyes, Starlight asked,“Why the funk should I- What the funk?”

“Hoo-ee, holy ship! Ain’t seen no funkin’ other ponies in a funkin’ long time.”

A grizzled earth stallion in a sailor’s uniform was standing in one of the pools, acid up to his withers. Below the surface of the liquid, his legs weren’t much more than bone and burned muscle. A coffee cup hovered in front of him, periodically floating to his lips for him to take a sip. He waved a burned, nearly skeletal leg at Twilight and Starlight. “Yo.”

“Um. Hi.” Twilight waved back. “Sorry, we’re just, uh, stopping by and can’t stay long.”

The sailor shrugged. “Eh. Whatever. Wasn’t funkin’ expectin’ anything better’n this piece o’ship.”

“Why can’t I swear?” Starlight mumbled, half to the sailor, half to herself. “Ship. Ship. Ship. Shiitake. Okay, what the funk?”

“ ’Tis a part o’my torment. Them demon punts installed a funkin’ profanity filter or summat.” The sailor sighed. “I tell ya, d’ye know how funkin’ hard ’tis t’be a funkin’ sailor an’ not able t’funkin’ curse all proper-like? Buffer ’em. ’Tis funkin’ hell.”

“I think that’s the idea,” said Twilight.

“Buffer ’em anyway.”

Starlight looked around the place. “Not very creative, is it? Just, stand in acid for eternity and that’s it. Where’s the karmic irony? Where’s the sophistication? Where’s the-”

“Hey, it’s not my fault! I’ve only been doing this for three thousand years, I’m still new!”

Twilight and Starlight both jumped and spun around. A she-wolf demon with griffon wings and toilet paper stuck to a rear paw, taller at the shoulder than the tip of Twilight’s horn, was stepping out of the air, looking forlorn. Before Twilight could apologize, the demon continued, “I was a tempter for so long, giving mortals what they don’t want is alien to me! I’m still working out the kinks! And all the good ideas for Wrath have already been taken.” She shook the toilet paper off. “And the middling ideas. And the bad ones. And the bottom-of-the-barrel-ones. And-”

“Well, you could start by not giving him coffee,” suggested Starlight.

The demon looked horrified. “Seriously? Can you imagine going through eternity with no coffee? That’s cruel and unusual even for hell.”

Twilight couldn’t deny that, and Starlight was nodding sagely as she pulled out their map.

“Anyway…” The demon did a halfhearted bow. “Welcome to hell,” she mumbled, “I am Marechosias, this is the personal hell of blah de blah, you’re lost, aren’t you?”

“Are we?” Twilight asked Starlight.

“I don’t know,” Starlight said. She turned the map upside-down and frowned. “Give me a minute.”

“We’re not lost yet,” said Twilight.

“Well, gooooood for yooooooou,” sneered Marechosias. Taking a sword, she poked halfheartedly at the sailor.

Twilight’s friendship reflexes engaged. “So what happened?” she asked. “You seem… I guess ‘up’ would be the bad thing here. Are you? Is something wrong?”

“Downsizing,” muttered Marechosias. “You… ponies, with your love and friendship and tolerance and harmony and all that… Blech. You make it hard for a tempter to do any actual tempting, you know? I offer you the world if you’ll just damn your soul to hell for eternity, but oh, you’ve got frieeeeeeends, they’re beeeeeeetter than the world, oooooooooooo!” She made jazz paws. “It’s hard for hell to support all those tempters when nothing comes of it, you know? Stop ruining our economy!”

“I’m… sorry?” lied Twilight.

“I got replaced by Baphomane millennia ago. And Baphomane’s not even a real demon!” Marechosias shrieked, beating her wings. “He was made up by some idiot named Aleistrot Cropley! But pretending he exists is cheaper, so now Behemoth gets to do overtime when ‘Baphomane’ gets summoned, but Marechosias? Nooooooooo.” She sat on her haunches and pouted at the acid. “I used to be a Marquis,” she mumbled. “I commanded thirty whole legions of demons. Thirty funking legions! I was a great tempter. And now I’m just some unpaid intern of a tormenter. Pfah.” She contemptuously spat out a plume of fire.

“Funkin’ drama queen, ain’t she?” the sailor whispered.

Twilight and Starlight looked at each other. Starlight mouthed “we’re lost”, shoved the map at Twilight, sidled over to examine one of the acid pools. Twilight coughed and said, “You know, while we’re here, we are lost. We’ve got a, uh, map…” She showed it to Marechosias. “…and we’re trying to get to the Library of Babel. A Library of Babel. It’ll probably be organized and well-sorted by a very, very intelligent person. But we can’t seem to read the map right, so… any chance you can help us?”

Marechosias examined the map for a moment. “Well, duh. You’re reading it inside-out.” In a movement that made Twilight’s brain hurt, Marechosias pushed the map ana into the fourth dimension, reversed it, and pulled it kata into the third. “See? You’re right here and you need to be — you wanted the organized one, right? — you need to be here.”

“Uh-huh.” Twilight tilted her head back and forth as she looked at the map, a grin spreading across her face. “Yeah, yeah, that makes a lot more sense! Thanks! Starlight, I’ve finally got the right coordinates! Are you ready?”

“I think I have burns on the insides of my lungs,” gasped Starlight from where she was writhing on the ground.

“Oh, quit whining,” said Twilight. “One last jump, and if that’s not the Library, we can go home. Okay?”

When the unicorns had left, Marechosias and the sailor were alone on the acid plains. The sailor raised an eyebrow at Marechosias. “Y’know,” he said, “mebbe the reason y’ain’t a funkin’ mar-keeeeee no more is ’cause yer too funkin’ nice fer a demon. Yer supposed t’be a botch.” He took a sip from his mug.

“Oh, ha ha. Very punny. So very, very punny.” Marechosias yanked the mug away. “Anyway, coffee break’s over. Get back on your head.”

3 - It Has Books About Books About Books About Books About…

Twilight knew she was there instantly, before she’d even opened her eyes. The room had that same cavernous silence. That same heavy, almost tangible atmosphere of mountains of knowledge. That same musty smell. That same surprisingly pleasing feeling of demons being eternally frustrated. She opened her eyes.

She was in the foyer of the Library of Babel. Bookshelves stretched up to ceiling, miles away. Aisles ran to infinity and beyond. Each and every inch of each and every shelf was positively stuffed with books. The sole reason Twilight didn’t hear a heavenly choir of angels was because she was in hell. (Maybe the angels were still navigating the bureaucracy.) She wouldn’t even have minded an infernal choir of demons.

She was about to pick her first few books when something in the corner of her vision caught her eye. Words hung in the air, strange glowing symbols that Twilight somehow instinctively understood, even though she’d never seen them before.

A Message from the Lower-Downs in Management:
* * *
Although it may seem counterintuitive, please do NOT reset
this Library for another Sloth punishment. It is completely
organized in accordance with a precise system (see the catalog
for details) and the benefits of an infinitely structured Library
far outweigh the time saved by reusing punishments.
Violators will be eaten.
Hell thanks you for your cooperation.

“Oh, sure,” mumbled Twilight. “Now that it’s properly set up, they use it freely, but they don’t mention that I’m the one that set it up!”

But her discontent was gone in seconds. She was here. She could find anything. She double-checked the locations of a few books. Yes, her system was still in place. Excellent. She teleported around the foyer with pops and blips; even this relatively small space had plenty of books worth reading. Cross-temporal nonfiction, mostly. She picked up Puddinghead’s diary, Celestia’s autobiography from the future, her own autobiography from the future, her own autobiography from the future in a timeline where she was born a kirin and ascended to a kirin-batpony-crystal pony alicorn, a collection of love letters between Daybreaker and Nightmare Moon-

Starlight coughed and groggily crawled to a seat. She stared up at the room above, trying to take it all in. “So, this is it? The Library of Babel?”

“Yep! Although, since it’s organized, I guess it should technically be the Akoltshic Records now, but oh well.” Grinning broadly, Twilight dropped her pile of books on the nearest table. “Isn’t it great?”

“You’re saying that somewhere in here is every book possible?”

“Absolutely! I’ve got it all categorized.”

“Philosophical treatises written by drunk sororfillies?”

“Uh-huh.”

“Daring Do books with author’s notes?”

“Yep! Including the ones that haven’t been published yet!”

“My life story, beginning to end?”

“And mine, too. I’ve got two versions here! See?”

“All of Starswirl’s works, only with every noun replaced with ‘chicken’?”

“I actually read the ‘watermelon’ version of one of those.”

“Romantic fiction of me and you?”

“Totally.”

“…Porn of me and you?”

“What part of ‘every book possible’ don’t you understand?”

“Okay, fine.” Starlight dropped to her rump and crossed her legs in annoyance. “You know where everything is. Where’s the book about what’s happening to us right now?”

Twilight tapped the floor for a moment. “Okay, you see that spiral staircase over there? Take it thirty-nine stories up, go fifteen feet to the right, go left for twelve hundred-”

“You’re kidding.”

“Am not! Want me to get it for you?” Twilight vanished in a spark of teleportation and reappeared a few seconds later, levitating a very short novella in front of her. “Here.” She tossed it to Starlight.

Catching it, Starlight examined the cover, a laughably amateurish effort of crudely-composited photos that didn’t even have the author or title on it. She glanced at the spine. “Uh… Heaven of a Hell, by Rambling Writer. Who’s Rambling Writer?”

“Dunno. That’s just the author of that particular permutation. They might not even exist.”

Starlight rolled her eyes and cracked the book open.

“Starlight?”

“Yes, Twilight?”

“I need your help. I’m going to hell.”

Starlight blinked. Okay, that was… Maybe this was the book of now. She flipped forward a few pages.

“ ’Tis a part o’my torment. Them demon punts installed a funkin’ profanity filter or summat.” The sailor sighed. “I tell ya, d’ye know how funkin’ hard ’tis t’be a funkin’ sailor an’ not able t’funkin’ curse all proper-like? Buffer ’em. ’Tis funkin’ hell.”

“I think that’s the idea,” said Twilight.

Déjà vu began to creep over Starlight. Okay, one last look, then she’d be convinced. She went ahead a few more pages.

Starlight rolled her eyes and cracked the book open.

“Starlight?”

“Yes, Twilight?”

“I need your help. I’m going to hell.”

Starlight blinked. Okay, that was… Maybe this was the book of now. She flipped forward a few pages.

“Gah!” Starlight pitched the book across the room.

“Hmm?” Twilight asked as she trotted over to a table with another stack of books.

“I’m at now!”

“That’s usually the case.”

“I mean in the book! I’m at now!”

“When?”

“Now!”

“You’re at now now?”

“Yes! Now!”

“If that weirds you out, then go back to then.”

“I did! I already passed it.”

“When?”

“Now.”

“Now?”

“Now!”

“Not then?”

“No, I was at then just now.”

“Then you could go past both then and now to later.”

“Now?”

“No, later.”

“Go to later later?”

“No, go to later now.”

“Why now? Why not later?”

“Well, if you don’t go to later now, you’ll be going to now later, because later will be now then. And now will be then later, I guess.”

“…When will later be now?”

“Soon.”

“…How soon?”

“Well, it might be later. It depends on how soon later is.”

“But later will be now eventually, right?”

“Yes, but not until later. Or maybe sooner.”

“…My brain hurts.”

“Yeah. In here, that happens every now and then, sooner or later. Read this.” Twilight tossed another book at Starlight: So You’re Learning About the Library of Babel and Recursion Makes Your Brain Hurt and Your Partner Has Already Adjusted — What to do About It (Especially YOU, Starlight).

Starlight stared at the book. Everything. “So, uh, where’s the catalog?”

Starlight was halfway through a chronicle of Big Mac marrying Sombra — who knew apple pies were the key to morality? — when a tiny little problem occurred to her. “Hey, Twilight? How long have we been in here for?”

“Dunno,” Twilight said with a shrug. “Now, shush. Changeling Blueblood’s about to-”

“So now that we know where this place is, shouldn’t we get back to Equestria? Just to check in?”

Twilight looked up, her flabber thoroughly gasted and then some. “Are you crazy? Now? We just got here!”

“And you’ve read a thousand books in the meantime!” Starlight pointed at the carefully arranged ten-by-ten stacks of ten books each next to Twilight.

“Not quite a thousand, unfortunately. See, these three stacks are all missing a few books. And we’ll arrive back in Equestria right after we left.” Before Starlight could ask the obvious, Twilight had conjured up a blackboard and was scribbling complex equations on it.“It’s easy. Knowledge is power, right?” Scribble scribble.

“Okay…”

“And power is energy divided by time.” Scribble scrawl scrawl.

“Wait, I think you’re talking about two different-”

“And energy divided by time is matter divided by time.” Numbers scribble scribble!

“Yeah, you’re definitely-”

“And matter divided by time bends spacetime divided by time, which is just plain bending space, while time has been divided out of the respective region.” Scribble diagram diagram ERASE diagram!

“I kind of doubt-”

“Sooooooo…” EMPHATIC. CIRCLE. Twilight grinned and proudly swept a hoof around the library. “This much knowledge in one place effectively nullifies the passage of time in an outer reference frame. We’re experiencing time dilation so extreme that we can spend years in here without so much as a single instant passing in Equestria. Not only that, but space is so warped that, in higher dimensions, everything is more or less folded on top of itself in three dimensions, allowing easy, instantaneous teleportation to anywhere in the Library’s infinite space!”

“But if that’s true, doesn’t that mean the owners of those independent bookstores are time travellers from another universe?” Starlight frowned. “Wait. That explains a lot.”

Twilight pushed the blackboard away. “So, short version: we can spend as long in here as we want without worry.”

“So long as you’re out in the next ten minutes.”

Starlight and Twilight both turned towards the rumbling voice. “Oh,” said Twilight, her voice going as flat as undrunk soda. “Hello, Beelzebuck.”

Beelzebuck paid the greeting no mind. “Mortal, you must-”

“Beelzebuck, Starlight. Starlight, Beelzebuck,” Twilight said in a bored voice, gesturing back and forth. “Say hi, Starlight. Or have you met?”

“Um.” Starlight slowly lifted a hoof up and twitched it, grinning nervously. “Hi? I’m… Starlight Glimmer, and, uh-”

“The two of you,” snapped Beelzebuck, “are not welcome here.”

“Say hi, Beelzebuck. Don’t worry, Starlight,” Twilight stage-whispered, “his bark is worse than his bite. Although, considering his bite is acid-laced…”

“Thank you for that spectacular reassurance,” Starlight whispered back.

“Anytime!”

“Both of you,” said Beelzebuck, pointing at them, “are trespassing. You are not allowed in here, and I’m giving you ten minutes to depart.”

“But whyyyyyyyyyyy?” moaned Twilight. “All we’re doing is reading! And building book forts. Like that one behind you. I mean, check out the turrets!”

“For starters,” rumbled Beelzebuck, “you’re not dead.”

“That’s easy to get around. Watch this!” Twilight’s horn glowed for a few seconds, then she slumped limply to the floor. Or, to be more precise, her body slumped to the floor. Her soul remained standing and smirking, only slightly less solid than her body. “I’m dead now. Happy?”

Starlight glanced up from her book and raised an eyebrow. “Impulse control isn’t a strength of yours, is it?”

“Oh, hush,” said Twilight’s soul. She waved a hoof dismissively. “It’s just self-induced cardiac arrest, so the body’s largely intact, and thanks to the liminal nature of hell, it’s way easier to reverse here than it is back in Equestria. I just…” Her horn glowed again and her soul dissolved into glowing particles that rushed back to her body. She immediately stood up, looking as peppy as ever. “See?”

Beelzebuck clenched his jaw with a might that could turn coal to diamonds. “Leaving aside your life signs or lack thereof, this is not a public library.”

“Mind if I just keep reading until you sort this out?” asked Starlight.

“Aw, come on!” protested Twilight. “I’m, like, the number one donor for this place! I deserve an exception.”

“Leave, or I will be forced to remove you from the site,” said Beelzebuck.

“Guess not,” said Starlight. “I’ll stay quiet.”

“You do that,” Twilight said slyly, “and I’ll tell Satanner all about the Cheez Whiz Incident.”

Beelzebuck crossed the space between them instantly and pinned Twilight to a shelf by her neck, his form writhing in combined anger and fear. “How do you know about that?” he roared. “Paimane gave his word that it wouldn’t get out!”

Twilight simply smiled and levitated a book from a stack. She showed it to Beelzebuck: The Big Bad Book of ALL the Blackmail, by Everyone, Anywhere, Ever. “I know my system,” said Twilight. “It’s a very good system. And this book is very comprehen-”

Beelzebuck snatched the book from the air and threw it down. Before it’d even touched the floor, it burst into flames, and it exploded into ash once it hit the ground. Panting heavily and sneering, Beelzebuck said, “And what will you do now, now th-”

“Oh, wow,” sighed Twilight. “You’re new to this, aren’t you? A, I still know about the Incident. And B, that was just one of many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many…” She took a breath. “…many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many, many editions of that book. Specifically, there was a printing error on page 31852, where ‘will’ was spelled with one L instead of two.”

Beelzebuck’s chest heaved. Smoke trickled from his ears, but it was ambiguous whether that came from pure anger or his brain malfunctioning. Twilight stayed limp in his grip, smiling happily at him.

Then he squeezed Twilight’s neck until it snapped like a petulant diva. “No more pony,” he hissed, throwing her body to the floor, “no more problems.” He vanished in a puff of brimstone.

“Twilight!” Starlight yelled, running to her body. “Twil-”

Twilight’s soul stood up from her body. “Huh,” she said, staring at her body. “Probably should’ve seen that coming. Hey, can I see the book of now?”

“You’re dead!”

“I figured as much, unless that’s my secret twin’s dead body. Now: book! Gimme.” Twilight trotted through Starlight, swiped Heaven of a Hell, and flew to a table to start reading it. “I gotta come back somehow, right?” she muttered.

“Okay, Starlight,” said Starlight, jumping from hoof to hoof as she stared at Twilight’s body. “It’s time to bring your teacher back to life! Somehow. In hell. When you don’t know any necromancy, and not for lack of trying. Why couldn’t my field trips have been to someplace safer, like the center of Equus? But there’s a catalog, right? So I just-”

“Oh, wow. Still looks nasty.”

Starlight looked up. Twilight was standing over Twilight’s body, tutting in disapproval. “Short version, time travel,” new Twilight said to Starlight. “I was resurrected by myself from the future, so I learned time travel so I could go back in time and resurrect myself in the past.”

“…And you also learned resurrection magic in the process?”

“Well, yeah. I’ve had plenty of time to practice it. Time travel? Doy?” New Twilight hit herself on the side of the head and made a face at Starlight.

“…Do I learn either?”

“Not only that, you learned the resurrection magic first, since you got to watch this me perform it on that me and see exactly how it’s done, so you’re going to teach that me to do it, so when that me becomes this me-”

Starlight stepped back and rubbed her temples. “Just resurrect yourself.”

“You have no appreciation for information paradoxes, do you?” huffed new Twilight. Her horn sparked; old Twilight’s neck stopped looking like a broken pencil and in a gust of wind, her soul was yanked from two tables over.

Old Twilight sat up straight and stared at herself. After a second, she asked, “Time travel?”

“Time travel,” new Twilight said with a nod.

“You could’ve waited, like, three seconds,” old Twilight scowled. “I was just at now, and to get pulled away right then-”

“I know!” said new Twilight. “It was so annoying, I had to take revenge on myself for doing it. But don’t worry, it gets better. You didn’t even get to the part where you use porn to help convince Trixie to fight for you in a war.”

“Whoa, hey!” yelled old Twilight. She pinned her ears down. “Spoilers!”

New Twilight stuck her tongue out at old Twilight. “Nerrrrrd.” She vanished with a pop.

Twilight glared at where her future self had been, but started smiling again. “Well! Back to reading!”

“Don’t get too comfortable,” said Starlight. “Once that Beelzebuck guy knows you’re still alive, I bet he’ll come after you somehow.”

Twilight laughed. “Don’t be ridiculous. What could he possibly do?” She bounced back over to her book pile, humming something.

Starlight nervously retrieved Heaven of a Hell and skipped to the new now. Sure enough, there was a chapter break one short paragraph after Twilight said that. How clichédly ominous.

4 - (Lack of) Silence in the Library

“No,” whispered Wormwhinny. “Don’t. Please.”

“We are more than a yottalightyear away from her,” scoffed Belphegallop. “She won’t know.”

“She will. You don’t know her. You don’t know her.”

“Right. Sure.” Belphegallop plucked a book from the shelf and tossed it in the air a few times. He smirked at Wormwhinny.

“Please. I’m begging you.”

“Beg harder.” Belphegallop nudged a few books to the side and re-inserted the book back in the wrong place. He waited a few seconds. Nothing. “So!” he said, grinning. “Where is the might of Twilight you were so-”

He said no more, for a certain lavender alicorn hurtled down the aisle at physically-impossible speeds and slammed into him, throwing him literal miles down the hallway in seconds. The keening screech of a demon in pain — pain! — resounded through the Library, tearing at the fabric of reality with hedge clippers.

But the unstoppable force of nature whose wrath Belphegallop had incurred didn’t care in the slightest. “You think you can misplace books?” roared Twilight, her voice audible even at those distances. “Do you? Do you?!”

Wormwhinny quickly put the books back in their proper places.

Pop. Twilight appeared before him, smiling sweetly. “Thank you.” She bowed and vanished with another pop. Wormwhinny took advantage of her inattention and began tiptoeing away. All the while, Belphegallop’s screams and Twilight’s yells echoed behind him.

“This is for every book you’ve mistreated!” Zap.

“Ow! My face!”

“This is for your disorganization!” Blam.

“Ow! My leg!”

“This is for disrespecting my system!” Pow.

“Ow! My vomeronasal!”

“…This is because I feel like it!” Wham.

“Ow! My other face!”

Starlight looked up as Twilight teleported back into the foyer, looking frazzled and frizzed. “Again!” Twilight screamed. “They keep rearranging stuff like it’s- like it’s a game!”

“Come on, Twilight, I don’t think-”

“I heard one of them yell, ‘Ten points!’”

“…Oh.”

“BUT!” Twilight sucked in a breath through her nose and let it out through her mouth. “Now. Everything. Is fixed. So now. I. Can read!” She slouched out on the floor and slammed her book open hard enough for the sound to echo around the room.

About two seconds passed before Twilight sat bolt upright. “Librarian senses tingling…” she whispered. Her ears swiveled back and forth like radar dishes. “Fluid Dynamics in Universes Where the Speed of Light is Less Than Ten Miles an Hour!” she yelled and vanished with a pop.

Starlight didn’t look up from her book, a perfectly ordinary adventure novel with no alternate-universe qualities or plot points whatsoever. “How did the alligator live in that trap for that long?” she asked herself.

Something exploded five stories up. A sword made of fire spun out of one of the upper aisles, flew across the room, and embedded itself in the opposite wall.

“Neat way of beating it, though. The traps in here are nasty.”

Twilight teleported back, smoking and covered in black fluid. “I think they’re playing tag with me,” she said in a haunted voice. “They were ready. But I got them.” She giggled shrilly. “I got them. By Celestia, I got them.”

“Couldn’t you just ignore them? Let them disorganize the library, leave it for a few hours, and fix it all later? If at all?”

“SAY THAT AGAIN AND I WILL RIP YOUR SPLEEN OUT THROUGH YOUR SPHINCTER.”

Starlight rolled her eyes. “Guess not.”

With a quick spell, Twilight was clean again. She started pacing, glaring at the carpet. “We need to stop them, Starlight. They’re turning the greatest place in the world into one of eternal torment! What sort of hell is this?”

Not stating the obvious took so much mental effort from Starlight that all spells she cast later in life seemed trivial by comparison.

“But I’ve tried everything!” said Twilight, flaring her wings. “Teleport interdiction spells? Nope! Dimensional shifting? Nuh-uh. Curses if books are disorganized? I actually think they took notes on that. Cute signs politely asking them to stop? That almost worked until somebody-” She threw back her head and shrieked, “BEEEEEEEELZEBUUUUUUUCK! -took them down. I knew I should’ve used better tape. I even tried writing to my congressmare!”

Starlight looked up, frowning. “What’d she say?”

“That congressmares don’t exist, since neither Equestria nor hell is a democracy. Also that he wasn’t a mare. Or even a pony. And that I should stop writing to him. He also wondered where I’d gotten his address from in the first place. Or how the mail was even being delivered in hell. Long story short, Derpy’s a lot tougher than we give her credit for.”

Going back to her book, Starlight said, “So what’s your next plan? Securing the shelves with the best locks in the multiverse? Hiring demons as guards?”

“No,” said Twilight, “we need a more permanent solution, one that- Ah-hah! Got it!”

“Yeah?”

“We’ll take over hell and order them to stop!”

“…You’re high, aren’t you?”

“Only on knowledge!”

“Yep. Sooooo high.”

“These are demons, Starlight. Torment is in their blood. Ichor? Whatever demons have. They won’t stop unless we can force them to. And if that involves taking over hell, well…” Twilight shrugged.

Starlight flipped her book shut. “And I suppose, now that you’ve spent time in here, you all of a sudden know how to fight a war against hell?”

“Not exactly.” Twilight grinned smugly. “Even I don’t know everything. But I am a librarian, so I know where to find anything.”

“Oh, what,” scoffed Starlight, “you’re just gonna apply your system, find the book that tells you how to take over hell, a-”

Mid-sentence, the book Twilight threw hit her right in the face, still trailing a few sparks from Twilight’s return teleportation. Starlight rubbed her nose and glared.

“Every. Book. Possible,” intoned Twilight. “EVER AND NEVER.”

Starlight huffed and looked at the cover.

Starlight tossed the book back to Twilight. “Why do these things always have ridiculously on-the-muzzle titles?”

“Because it’s part of my system, obviously. Infinite books also means infinite titles for each possible set of contents, so my system paired titles and contents as closely as possible when the contents are coherent. You wouldn’t want to crack open Princess Luna’s Secret Passions and find a technical description of the construction of the Hoofer Dam, would you?”

“…How do you know that’s not her secret passion?”

Twilight smiled and raised a hoof. The smile abruptly slid off her face, to be replaced by thoughtfulness. She looked off down one of the aisles and tapped her chin. She teleported away; she was back a few seconds later, her nose buried in Princess Luna’s Secret Passions, frowning deeply. “Dang. Luna really likes rebar.”

Starlight considered. There was no stopping Twilight now, so she might as well go along for the ride. Even if the ride risked jumping the tracks and exploding, killing everypony on board. (Which wouldn’t be the first time Starlight had been in that situation, but still.) But she’d been in hell for so long, she was missing a few familiar faces. And since Twilight probably wouldn’t be opposed to getting some help- “Taking over hell could be lonely. Can Trixie come?”

“Sure, why not. Conquering hell needs some bombast, anyway.” Twilight tilted the book sideways. “Oh, wow. Kinky. Drill that hole, baby…”

“Hey, Trixie. Wanna do something nopony’s ever done before?”

“Trixie has done a great many things nopony had done before, Starlight. Splendorous things, wondrous things, things that captivate the mind and hold hostage the senses, things nopony had even imagined. Many once-undone things have been done because Trixie has done them. Doing undone things has become passé, in fact. It will take a very grand undone thing to divert Trixie’s attention.”

“As in taking over hell?”

“…Trixie’s pan-Equestrian tour has just concluded, so she has some free time.”

Starlight and Trixie popped into the Library. Trixie was curled into a ball and shivering, her hat crushed, her cape crumpled. “Eyes shouldn’t go there,” she mumbled in a high-pitched voice. “Eyes shouldn’t go there. Eyes shouldn’t go there…”

“Calm down,” said Starlight, telekinetically yanking her to her hooves. “You’ll get used to it. Trixie saw a demon at the wrong time,” she explained to Twilight. “And now she’s…” She sighed. “We’ll need to snap her out of it somehow.”

“Oh, I don’t know,” said Twilight, fake-cringing. “I don’t think we should work with somepony who folds at the first sign of something scary. Maybe-”

In a flash, Trixie was snapped out of it. “You dare question Trixie’s courage?” she yelled, pointing at Twilight. “Pshaw! The Great and Powerful Trrrrrrrixie laughs in the face of danger, heckles it until it runs off the stage in tears! She flirts with disaster, buys it a drink, takes it out to dinner and a show before dumping it! Taking over hell will be beyond trivial with Trixie on your side!” She reared, whinnying dramatically. Then she remembered that she didn’t have her fireworks with her and made tiny whishoo, pfoom noises with her mouth as her horn threw sparks.

Twilight smirked at Starlight, then said, “I’m sure it will, Trixie, but listen. This is hell, and it’s dangerous, so you need to follow my lead. I know you’d rather chop your own tail off and call it spaghetti, but please trust me on this.”

Trixie’s ears twitched as she thought it over. She opened her mouth a few times, but never said anything. You could almost see the smoke coming from her ears as her brain processed that following the path that didn’t end in eternal damnation meant agreeing with Twilight. She abruptly shivered, muttered, “Eyes…” and asked tentatively, “Trixie will still get partial credit for the takeover, yes?”

“Oh, absolutely. An even split between all of us. Stick it on your fliers and I’ll back you up. Think about it…” Twilight swept a hoof through the air. “The Great, Powerful, Hell-Conquering Trixie, 100% Princess-Approved!”

“Trixie finds these terms most agreeable,” Trixie said, nodding. “She will gladly assist you, on one condition.” She looked around and lowered her voice, meaning she was still talking with what most ponies would consider a loud speaking voice. “Trixie would like to know where the porn is.”

“That’s a bit complicated, depending on your type. But since discussing that sort of thing can be awkward…” Twilight extracted a folded sheet of parchment from the catalog. “I made this handy blowchart.”

Trixie tilted her head. “You mean flowchart.”

“No. I don’t.”

5 - The Great Metaphysical Library Curbstomp

Twilight, Starlight, and Trixie sat in a circle, Conquering Hell for Dummies and The Big Bad Book of ALL the Blackmail in the center of it. They’d planned well, and now it was finally time to put their scheme into action. There was just one last thing to do.

“Trixie does not understand why we have to go over the plan yet again,” complained Trixie. “We’ve all memorized each others’ parts perfectly.”

“Yeah,” said Starlight. “At this point, if we went over the plan again, all that’d happen is that some demon would listen in and they’d hear it prematurely.”

“…You know what? You’re right,” said Twilight, standing up. “We all know how it’s going to go down. Let’s go. Teleport spells ready?”

“Ready!” said Starlight and Trixie. All three ponies’ horns started glowing.

“And… go.”

It was coffee break time again in Marechosias’s hell when the trio portalled into it. Trixie immediately gagged and pulled her hat over her muzzle. “This place smells like rotten eggs,” she gasped.

For once, Marechosias looked vaguely pleased. “I know!” she said, flexing her wings. “It took a long time to get that smell wafting about properly, what with all the sulfur in the air. I bet I’ll-”

“Ah, shaddap,” whined the sailor. “Yer a real ego-strokin’ botch, y’know that? Go funk yerself.”

Marechosias’s mood vanished like a cake down Celestia’s throat. “Coffee break’s over early today,” she growled. She snatched the coffee cup away from the sailor and he was completely submerged in the acid.

“A bit harsh, don’t you think?” asked Starlight. “Denying somepony coffee like that.”

“Not at all. He is supposed be here. Look.” Marechosias shoved a book at the ponies entitled The Compendium of Sin, Vol. 692234963, Part W, Section Ξ, Division 不是秘密, flipped open to a page, and pointed. “There’s a description of his sins. Right there.”

Twilight started reading. “Oh. Oh. Oh- OH. Oh… Oh. Oh? Oh! …Oh. Oh.” She reached the second paragraph, read for five words, and promptly slammed the book shut. “Yep. He deserves that.”

“Plus, he annoys me,” Marechosias mumbled. She folded her wings and held her head high in an attempt to look dignified. “So what are you doing back here, anyway?” she asked. “Lost? Come to just rub your freedoms in my face? Or do you actually have a reason this time?”

Twilight began, “We want your help ta-”

“Ah bah bah!” said Trixie. She smacked Twilight on the head. “You shouldn’t simply tell her what we’re doing. Make it grand, interesting, give it a hook! You were always so boringly straightforward.” She stepped forward, puffed her chest out, and bellowed, “Good demon sit-”

“Hey!” snapped Marechosias. “Don’t insult me like that!”

“…Bad demon sitting before us!” recovered Trixie. (“Thank you,” grumbled Marechosias.) “There are many things in this world and others that are thought to be impossible!” She swept her hoof in a broad arc. “And Trixie would like to know if you would like to be a part of one! For in two… three…” She blinked and turned to Twilight. “When are we… doing the thing?” she whispered. “I mean the main thing.”

“Um… I don’t know,” Twilight admitted, her ears back. “Whenever she has time?”

Trixie whirled back to Marechosias. “For soon and very soon,” she boomed, “us fine mares and Twilight shall upset the status quo of eternity! And you can be a part of it! All you have to do…” She reared and whinnied, her cape billowing dramatically in the wind she’d conjured. “…is help us conquer hell itself.” Fireworks soared from beneath her cape, exploding spectacularly. “A once-in-infinite-lifetimes opportunity!”

“Uh-huh, sure,” said Marechosias. She waved the smoke away from her face. “And you three… mortals think you can waltz in and take over hell because…?”

“Because we found the book in the Library of Babel,” Twilight said patiently, “that gives us — and I mean us specifically — step-by-step instructions for taking over hell. Technically, we don’t need your help, but it’ll go a lot faster if you do. Please?” She smiled sweetly.

Marechosias raised an eyebrow. “The instruction book was clever, I’ll admit, but I need more incentive than that. Give me one good reason I should help you.”

“I’ll give you your job back,” said Twilight.

“Revenge!” Trixie crowed at the same time.

“The satisfaction of crushing your enemies underhoof and grinding them to dust!” Starlight cackled simultaneously.

Twilight and Trixie stared at Starlight.

“Oh, don’t look at me like you don’t like that feeling!” protested Starlight.

“I… don’t…” said Twilight quietly, scooching away.

“Trixie does! Trixie was simply unaware that you would be so upfront abo-”

“SOWHATDOYOUTHINK?” Twilight yelled at Marechosias.

Marechosias stroked her chin. “Hmm. Three good reasons.” Her grin was rather sharklike, if that shark routinely brushed its teeth for pearly whiteness. “I’m in. Where was that book you mentioned?”

“Instructional or dramatized?”

“Wait, there’s no dramatic training montage?” complained Marechosias. “All the work I do with you gets talked about in a single paragraph where I complain about the lack of a training montage? Get a better version of this book now, Twilight. The author of this one is a lazy hack.” She squinted at the words. “And since he included that ‘lazy hack’ bit, he probably also thinks tired self-deprecation will win him sympathy points. Oh, and don’t get me started on his postmodernism-”

Making envious ponies the president of their rival’s fan club was such a fantastic idea that Levannerthan was genuinely surprised no one had come up with it before. That particular punishment had only been running a few days, but the lower-downs had already deemed it a most sublime torture. Levannerthan made it a point of pride that he reused punishments as little as possible, but if he could get a few changes from that idea…

Someone knocked at the door. Levannerthan looked up to see a familiar figure enter his office.“Hey, Marechosias,” he chuckled. “Done with your internship yet, Marquis?”

“I quit, actually,” Marechosias said airily, adjusting her glasses. “I have a new boss now.”

“A new- A new boss. In hell,” said Levannerthan. “And I suppose that’s so much better.”

“Quite a bit better.” Marechosias dropped a scroll on Levannerthan’s desk. “And she has a message for you.”

“Does she now?” Levannerthan said idly. He broke the seal on the scroll and unrolled it. “I hope she knows we don’t allow solicitors.” He skimmed the scroll. It opened with a polite request (not even a demand! She said “please”!) to surrender, of all things. Right. He went to the “or else” clause for fun. Who did she think she was, thinking that-

Oh no.

Levannerthan grabbed the scroll tightly and read it with wide eyes. She had no business knowing that! Buneigh had promised he wouldn’t say a word about that tectonic shift! And the scroll went on and on and on. Every time Levannerthan thought she had dredged up the last humiliating thing from his past, there was another paragraph with another thing. And another. And another. If this ever got out, he’d be in a hole he’d never be able to get out of, and not the kind hell was supposed to be, either.

And then the chaser:

Your employees have received their own personalized letters. All of them. Envy will surrender or I will make it tear itself apart.

Booger.

Marechosias was smiling. “Like I said. Quite a bit better.”

Levannerthan swallowed. “Whoever she is,” he whispered, “tell her Envy surrenders.”

And so they fell, one by one. Each circle of hell, brought low by their own vices with shocking rapidity. Rumors flew of an omniscient equine, capable of delving into the thoughts and minds of anyone with impossible ease. She had dirt on everyone, including the dirt itself. The last circle collapsed before they’d even received a message from Twilight, deciding to give up when the going got tough.

But a minute few demons refused to abandon their positions. And as Twilight’s goal became clear, they took up positions around hell’s final citadel, Satanner sequestered within, all of them ready to go down swinging.

Hell’s new Grand Marquis, appointed after all others below him in the chain of command had bolted, was unsure of his position. He was formerly an Earl, true, with a command of many demons, but this… Nearly all of hell had been various forms of gutted, cooked, braised, stuffed, and baked in mere hours. By three ponies. Three. Ponies. What the heaven was hell coming to?

But perhaps this was the kick in the pants hell needed. The Grand Marquis assumed that he’d be able to drive the ponies away. Then what? Then the ones who’d caved would be outed as cowards, wimps, exactly the sort of demons hell didn’t need. Demons who’d held strong — such as himself — would receive a depression in their status, moving ever closer to the bottom. And a reorganization of hell would be needed, after so many of its ranks were revealed to be backstabbers, and not the expected kind, either. Perhaps he could finagle his way into even greater power.

The Grand Marquis tightened his grip on his glaive and nodded to himself. He would prevent them from breaking into the citadel.

Three cute little ponies marched on the citadel, waving a white flag of truce. The infernal throng that followed them wasn’t their soldiers or their servants; they didn’t need any of those. The demons were merely spectators.

The Grand Marquis tightened his grip on his glaive. They didn’t look intimidating, but that was probably how they’d managed to take over so much so fast. The cutest things were always the most vicious. Like rabbits, those little jerks. So fast and so strong and they could chew through wires in a heartbeat and their bites hurt (relatively speaking), yet everyone thought they were adorable because of their hoppy little legs and their twitchy little noses. Screw rabbits.

The ponies stood some distance away from the citadel. “Truce?” called Twilight.

“Truce,” the Grand Marquis said reluctantly.

Twilight waved Trixie forward. Trixie bounded up and posed most dramatically. “Bad demons of hell!” she yelled. “You are the last members of the old guard, the final remnants of a dying order. Your time has come, whether you accept it or not. But we are not unmerciful! Or at least as unmerciful as you can get in hell while still being good. Or- bad.” She froze, her ears twitching, and screamed, “You know what I mean! Hem. Before you fall, we come to you with one final choice, one that will determine your future now and forevermore.Thus saith Twilight, Starlight, and the Grrrrreat and Powerful Trixie!” (Twilight facehooved.)

“What sort of ridiculous name is ‘Trixie’?” scoffed the Grand Marquis.

“Trixie is a fine name! It is better than yours, Furfur!”

Grand Marquis Furfur went so red he passed out of the visible spectrum and straight into infrared. Several demons behind him giggled.

“Now,” said Trixie, “in spite of your heinous attempt to derail this truce, we are still merciful. You have two options. You can let us in. Or we can let everybody know every single one of your clean little secrets, those tiny little indulgences that you don’t want the world to see, those most wholesome acts.”

“I have extreme doubts,” Furfur said, not even managing to convince himself, “that you know anything more about me than what anyone else here does.

“Really?” sneered Trixie. “Like your needlepoint obsession?”

Furfur’s grip tightened on his glaive and his heart would’ve stopped if he’d had one. More snickers from the demons behind him.

Trixie pointed behind Furfur at the other demons. “And the same goes for you! Don’t think that just because we haven’t contacted you yet doesn’t mean we don’t know everything about you!”

The snickers immediately vanished.

“So you see the truth of our ultimatum,” Trixie said smugly. “You have thirty minutes-”

“Trixie!” screamed Twilight. “We decided to give them an hour!”

“Oh, they won’t need it!” Trixie said, turning to Twilight. “They’ll cave, just like all the others, we don’t need-”

“We agreed on an hour, so we’re giving them an hour!”

“You are so overblown,” huffed Trixie. She turned back to Furfur. “You have an hour to make your decision! And we’ll be waiting.” The three ponies turned their backs on the citadel.

Furfur had a choice to make: abandon his master or his dignity. Of course, if he abandoned his master, he wouldn’t have much dignity left, anyway. With opposition in his very ichor, he would not go gentle into that good night (although the metaphor didn’t really work, considering the lack of nights in hell, but oh well). He turned to the few demons still standing with him. Some had already left after Trixie’s show. “Prepare to release the Hound.”

A demon saluted. “Yes, sir.”

…

“…Furfur.” Gigglesnort.

Fifty-eight minutes later, the ponies returned, Twilight leading the trio this time. They sat and watched the demons. Well, Twilight and Starlight watched; Trixie fiddled with her hat and amused herself by tossing lit cherry bombs at the crowd, who competed gleefully to catch and eat them. At least until Twilight nudged her on the shoulder and told her to cut it out.

Finally, the moment arrived. “Well?” Twilight said, standing up. “Your hour’s up. I want your answer.”

“You want our answer?” yelled Furfur. “This is our answer! Open the gates!” Demons scattered, and with a sound of grinding bones, the gates of the citadel were opened.

And from the depths came the hellhound.

It was massive, taller at the shoulder than Twilight was at the horn. Blood-red and black patterns covered its body, twisting and writhing. Each of its teeth was over a foot long and its claws could tear through castle walls like they were butter. Spikes protruded along its backbone and down its tail. Its eyes burning with cold fire, it turned its gaze on the ponies.

“Trixie thinks the leader should handle this,” Trixie whispered. She pushed Twilight forward while she and Starlight took a step back. Twilight gulped.

The hellhound advanced on the ponies, magma dripping from its jaws like slobber. “You look…” it rumbled, “positively… scrumptious.” It licked its lips. “You will almost be worth it for rendering me so rudely awakened.”

“Uh, look,” said Twilight as she backed up. “I can make this up to you.” Her horn sparked. “Look, I, I have a ball.”

“Foolish mortal,” the hellhound chuckled. “Do you really presume-”

“Lookit! Lookit the ball! Lookit the ball!” Twilight said, waving the ball around. The hellhound’s head snapped to follow it. “You see the ball? You want the ball?” She drew the ball back; the hellhound crouched, its chin on the ground, its tongue hanging out, its butt in the air, its tail wagging. “Goooooooo- get the ball!” She pitched the ball into the distance.

“Victory!” crowed the hellhound, bounding after it. “The ball is mine!”

“Now!” yelled Twilight, and each pony’s horn glowed. A crackling portal opened in space ahead of the ball; the ball bounced through, the hellhound blindly following. A second later, the portal collapsed. There was no sign of hellhound or ball.

“He is so getting demoted to heckdog,” mumbled Furfur, massaging his temples.

“Now,” Twilight said, spreading her wings wide. “I’ll give you one single second chance. If you don’t mind…” She walked straight up to Furfur and looked him in the eye. After an epic staring contest, Furfur stepped aside and let Twilight enter.

“Come,” Twilight said to Starlight and Trixie. The three of them entered the citadel, and the doors boomed shut behind them.

Less than half an hour later, after the final, fateful announcement of surrender had been made, Twilight, Starlight, and Trixie strode back out, this time from one of the upper balconies. Upon Twilight’s head sat the crown of hell, constructed of malevolent thoughts and “hold my beer” moments. A cape of spiderwebs and sour moods streamed out behind her, and when her horn glowed, it did so with an unearthly red.

Twilight climbed onto the railing of the balcony to address the assembled horde. “Demons!” she yelled, her wings wide. “As the new Queen of hell, I do hereby proclaim that Satanner will be the King Regnant of hell in my stead, managing my affairs in my absence. All work and positions in hell shall be unchanged, aside from Marechosias being reinstated to Marquis.”

“Woo!” Marechosias screamed from the way back of the crowd. “Yeah!” She pumped a fist in the air.

“With only one exception,” continued Twilight. “The organized Library of Babel? That’s now my library. You may use it as you please, but if you disrupt my reading time, or my books, or ANYTHING in my library, I can order you ripped apart limb from limb and fed to your friends!” She cackled madly. “As it should be!” She frowned down at the cowering assembly. “Seriously. Don’t fuck with my reading time.”

“I told you you’d love grinding your enemies,” Starlight whispered.

“They’re not my enemies, they’re reading-time meddlers!” Twilight whispered back. She cleared her throat and turned back to the crowd. “So if you can just follow those simple rules, we’ll get along just fine.”

A spark, and a set of fireworks soared over the crowd. They burst, brightly-colored sparks twirling unnaturally through the air. Each spark took up a position, and within seconds, a picture had been assembled, limited in its color palette and yet magnificent in its detail: a gigantic, glowing, fifty-foot-wide image of Trixie’s face.

“Sorry! Sorry! Wrong fireworks!” squeaked Trixie.

“Why don’t I believe you?” asked Twilight.

“Because you’re a judgmental neurotic who refuses to let the past die in spite of your own position in Equestria?”

“…Point.”

A new set of fireworks zoomed out. This one burst into a slightly smaller rendition of Twilight’s head, glittering lavender. Once the sparks had burned themselves out, silence fell over the crowd. Far in the back, Marechosias hollered out, “All hail Queen Twil-”

But Twilight raised a hoof, silencing the chant before it could begin, halfhearted as it may have been. “You don’t need to do that. I just want to read. Okay? Don’t hail me. Go back to… doing… whatever it was you were doing. I’ll be at the library.”

Twilight had been reading for a whole hour with no disruption. Bliss. All she’d wanted was some quiet time alone. Was that too much to ask for? Starlight and Trixie were both gone, not wanting to stay in hell for some strange reason. A few stupid demons had tried to be rebellious and disorganize some books, but they weren’t around any more. Thanks, infernal powers of hell!

She flipped a page, humming. She was so wrapped up in her reading that she paid not the slightest iota of attention when a certain demon stepped out of space to loom over her.

“I’ve been watching you,” rumbled Beelzebuck.

“Good to know your eyes still work,” said Twilight, not looking up. She was putting her eyes to far better use than simply watching people.

“Do not think,” hissed Beelzebuck, “that simply because you-”

“Begone,” Twilight said. She waved a hoof in Beelzebuck’s general direction.

And, enforced by the powers of hell, Beelzebuck was gone.

Twilight spared a few precious reading seconds to look up, gaze on the spot where Beelzebuck had been, and smile to herself. There could be no better heaven than this.

6 - Bureaucratic Realities of a Change in Management

Even Twilight admitted that she couldn’t stay in the Library all the time; she had duties to attend to in Equestria. But the knowledge that the Library existed and she had access to it was enough for her to not freak out. After polishing off a declassified record of Mayor Mare’s time as part of a spec ops group, she headed back to Equestria for a quiet weekend of busywork.

And that was when the doorbell to the Castle of Friendship rang.

“Spike!” Twilight hollered. “Could you get that? I’m busy!”

“Sure!” Spike laid his book aside and began walking for the door.

Ding-dong.

“I’m coming!” Spike yelled. He sped up his pace slightly.

Ding-dong ding-dong ding-dong.

Spike started running. “Hold your horses, I’m almost there!”

Dingdongdingdongdingdong.

“Gah!” Spike broke into a sprint for the last few seconds. He slid to a stop at the door and pulled it open. “Alright,” he panted, “what- do you…”

Standing on the doorstep was a… thing. Pony-shaped and -sized, but otherwise, completely alien. Its flesh was living flame itself, twisting and writhing and constantly changing, yet always staying the same. Lightning crackled in place of its mane and tail, whipped about by an unfelt tempest. Its eyes were white-hot balls of fire, so hot that simply having their gaze directed at you was to be burned severely. Space seemed to flex around the shape to make way for it. Its wings, if they could even be called that, folded and unfolded constantly, always hiding and exposing countless eyes and mouths. In a reverberating voice that threatened to rend reality itself asunder, shaking it down to atoms and beyond, the figure intoned, «Fear not.»

Spike promptly and emphatically disobeyed.

“Again, I am deeply sorry,” the shadhavar said to Twilight. “I forgot that mortals aren’t as familiar with angels as they used to be.”

“He will stop screaming eventually, right?”

“Within the half-hour.”

“Then there’s no permanent harm done.”

“Very well.” The shadhavar took one last sip of his tea, then stood up and bowed. “I am Metatrot, the scribe of heaven and herald of the Almighty. I am here to provide assistance for your… ahem, transition.”

“Which one?” asked Twilight. “Becoming the queen of hell or ending the school year? Because I think I’d prefer help with the latter.”

“The… former, I’m afraid.”

“Oh. I think I’ve got it under control. And this isn’t going to be you stomping in and going, ‘we’re taking over’, is it? I thought heaven and hell were opposed.”

“Hardly,” said Metatrot airily. “Hell is Satanner’s penance, enforced by heaven. He has to be the warden for the worst prison in existence. How he runs it is his business. If he wanted to turn it into a knockoff of purgatory, having prisoners slowly reform, he could. And it would certainly be preferred,” he scowled, “but he interpreted Yahwhinny’s commands as-” He sucked in a breath through his nose and let it out through his mouth. “In any case, we won’t interfere with how you choose to manage things. This is simply an informational meeting.”

“Uh-huh,” said Twilight, nodding. Knockoff of purgatory: file and save.

“Now…” Metatrot picked up a folder from… somewhere and flipped through a few pages. “Such a rapid coup of hell is… unexpected, but not unprecedented. However, hell being what it is, most coups last only a few hours before demons remember how much they like sloth, start slacking off again, and Satanner reclaims his position. This arrangement, on the other hoof, seems far more likely to last if only because you can blackmail any opponents into submission.”

“I’m not really interested in ruling hell,” said Twilight, “so I let Satanner keep most of his power. I just wanted to-”

“Nevertheless,” said Metatrot, “you are the ultimate ruler of hell, if an absentee one, and are therefore responsible for its unwellbeing. As such, I have taken the liberty of arranging several dozen folders regarding the internals of hell, just in case. This one, for instance, goes into detail on the more commonly used punishments, such as the acid mines in Wrath…”

Twilight listened attentively as Metatrot described the contents of each folder and laid them out, all nice and neat. He was almost as fastidious as she was and certainly more concise. It wasn’t long before Twilight had a large pile of folders in front of her. Metatrot never had any folders with him, but that didn’t stop him from handing them over. But as she listened, a bad feeling began niggling at her.She raised a hoof. “Uh, quick question. I already got sent to hell, completely independent of this, but that was because of a misfile. That won’t prevent me from going to heaven, will it? Because if it does, I might as well start the debauchery now.”

“It will not, and the unusual circumstances have already been logged,” said Metatrot. “Remember, heaven gets the good bureaucrats.”

“Good bureaucrats exist?”

“Bureaucrats are like condoms — if they do their job correctly, you hardly even know they’re there and they save you a lot of trouble down the line, whereas you’re utterly screwed if they fail. And speaking of trouble…”

Metatrot extracted a folder from thin air and placed it in front of Twilight. “Beelzebuck is still angry at you for taking over so easily. He is planning on attempting a coup against you, but given your extensive blackmail portfolio, he’s only managed to convert one other demon to his cause.” He flipped open the folder to a photograph that had melted trying to capture irreality of that particular demon. “And don’t underestimate him. Although he has only one demon, he’s planning for that demon to be a spear aimed at you — and only you. Even if he gathers every other individual in hell, that demon will be groomed to be your specific assassin.”

“Beelzebuck has a devil put aside for me?” Twilight asked, shocked.

Metatrot nodded.

“For… me.” Twilight put a hoof on her chest.

Metatrot pressed his lips together and nodded again.

“For MEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!” shrilled Discord, and began headbanging.

“Gah!” Twilight yelped. “Discord, will you-” But he was already gone. Scowling, Twilight turned back to Metatrot.

Strumming away at the Red Special, Metatrot crooned, “So you think you can stone me and spit in- my…” Seeing Twilight’s look, he paused, cleared his throat, and muttered, “Extradimensional humor. It’s… complicated.” The guitar vanished. “Let’s continue.”

Hours had passed by the time Twilight and Metatrot were finished going over everything. The pile of folders was by now a foot tall and several wide, the table it was on groaning under the weight. Metatrot polished off his (still somehow warm) tea and stood up. “And I believe that covers everything,” he said.

As she got to her hooves, working crinks out of her stiff joints, Twilight gazed at all the new reading material hoof-delivered to her. “Thank you,” she said. “I’ll make sure to read this all ASAP.”

“But before I leave,” said Metatrot, “I was wondering if you would be willing to answer a personal question: what caused you to conquer hell in the first place? Our intelligence in that matter is… lacking.” He stared thoughtfully at Twilight. “You do not relish in malevolence, like so many uncreative mortals who think conquering hell will be as simple as brushing their teeth because they’ve done some naughty things in life. You have no interest in binding demons to your will, and, indeed, those allied with you do so voluntarily. You do not even use the environment as an excuse to let loose and indulge your darkest passions. Yet you stampeded over hell with the speed and subtlety of a pyroclastic flow, only to appoint Satanner as de facto ruler the moment you were done. It is as if you conquered hell purely for the, ah, hell of it, but your boasts are nonexistent. So, with your permission, I would ask: why?”

“You know the Library of Babel?” said Twilight. “I organized it-” (Metatrot’s eyebrows went up.) “-and whenever I tried to actually get to use it, demons would show up and disorganize it. I tried a few other things, but they didn’t work. So I figured that if I ruled hell, I could order them away and they couldn’t do anything about it.”

“So…” said Metatrot, “you… took over hell itself… because they were getting in the way of reading time?”

“Well, yeah.”

Metatrot blinked. Then he broke out in a huge grin of divine serenity. “Finally!” He pulled Twilight into a hug. “Someone who understands!” Half a second later, he coughed and released her. “Hem. Apologies,” he said, resolutely examining the patterns in the floor. “Most individuals do not fully grasp the joy of reading.”

“I know!” said Twilight, flaring her wings. “Starlight thought I was crazy. But all I wanted was to read without any interruptions. It wasn’t like taking over hell was hard or anything.”

“With your permission, I might stop by sometime. For now, however, I must be off.” Metatrot bowed. “Thank you for your time and have a pleasant day, ma’am,” he said. “And if you ever have need of me… Well, I’ll know.” He stepped in between inches and vanished.

Twilight pondered the whole situation as she stared at the folders. Hmm. Heaven. She’d never imagined they would get involved, but now she wondered why she’d never imagined that. Hopefully, they wouldn’t want to get involved in her Library expeditions. And it wasn’t like she could use blackmail material against heaven, of all planes. They were, well, heaven!

Although, if they did and she could…

She cracked open her blackmail book and flipped through the pages. If she was going to blackmail anyangel, it’d be the one who reported back to heaven on her, the one she could force to fudge his reports. M… E… T… And there it was: Metatrot. Twilight read the entry eagerly.

Metatrot: Nice try. Who do you think recorded this? Nyeh-nyeh.

Eh. Worth a shot. Now, about handling hell…

“Tia?” Luna asked, waving the scroll in front of Celestia’s face. “Have you seen this letter Twilight Sparkle has sent us?”

“Yes, Luna,” said Celestia, very deliberately not looking Luna in the eye. “She took over hell and is going to attempt to reform it.”

“You know what this means, yes?”

“That my once-student is advancing through the world in leaps and bounds, has already surpassed us when we were her age, and is likely to have permanently befriended the entire solar system before the century is up?”

“…Yes, that, too. But, since it occurred in less than five years, what else does it mean?”

“Luna, be reasonable. That I owe you that much money is absurd. There’s no way you can possibly think of enforcing it.”

“Perhaps, perhaps not. But it is the principle. Cash from your personal coffers is cash from your personal coffers, and I shall not rest until-”

“Fine.” Celestia dug around underneath her mattress and pulled out a coin. “Here.” She tossed it to Luna. “Five bits, as we bet.”

“Huzzah!” Luna deftly plucked the coin from the air and smirked. “Always bet on blue.”

7 - The Marriage of Friendship and Hell

Tirek didn’t know how Cozy Glow had managed to get her hooves on a tablespoon of applesauce, the entire Shadow Spade collection, a huge pile of PVC piping, or a scroll saw in Tartarus, nor how she’d managed to construct a railgun from them. He didn’t care, either. All that mattered was that he was free, free to do as he pleased. Including leaving Cozy to rot in Tartarus. Served her right for trying to leave him to rot with those infernal six.

But he had a bone to pick with Equestria. A lot of bones. And by “pick”, he meant “break”. (He wasn’t one for subtlety. Or metaphor.) He stalked across the desolate countryside for Equestria, draining free magic wherever he could, gaining a tiny bit of might each time. By the time he reached his first town, he had already tripled in size. Ponies were fleeing in terror before him (as they ought), and while word had doubtlessly spread to Canterlot, he welcomed it. More ponies meant more magic to drain. Tirek called up his power, ready to suck the ponies dry.

Only for something to draw his attention, something rocketing from the sky like a meteor. It intercepted his own magic, batted it aside like it was water from a weak firehouse, and hit the ground in front of him hard enough to leave a crater, all within a second. In spite of the situation, Tirek couldn’t hold back a grin. As relatively weak as he was, he still needed a proper fight.

The smoke cleared, revealing just who had decided to interrupt a perfectly good rampage. “Tirek,” said Twilight.

“Princess Twilight,” said Tirek.

“Perfect. Now that we know we know each others’ names…” Twilight flared her wings and pawed at the ground. “You should leave. Before I make you.”

“Make me?” sneered Tirek. “You couldn’t make me leave years ago when you had all the alicorn magic in Equestria.”

“And you couldn’t stop me when you had all the non-alicorn magic in Equestria. You’re worse off than I was. Besides…” Twilight rolled her shoulders and cracked her neck. “I’ve got some different magic now. Well, not really magic, it’s more like a domain of power…” She frowned, tapped her chin, and gazed off into the distance. “How does infernal power differ from magic, anyway?” she muttered. “You’d think-”

“Oi.” Tirek snapped his fingers. “I’m still here.”

“And my thoughts are still here-” Twilight pointed at her head. “-but they’re not going away, either!”

“I’d prefer we get back on track.”

“Erfh. Fine.” Twilight rolled her eyes. “Short version, new power, yadda yadda, leave or I’ll make you. What I said earlier.”

“And to expand on myself: I’d like to see you try.”

Twilight chuckled darkly. “Then I’ll do that.” Her horn flashed a repulsive sanguine. “To hell with you!” she bellowed, pointing dramatically.

Tirek laughed an ugly laugh. “Do you think words alone can-”

“Hold on,” Twilight said, frowning. “That was supposed to be literal.” She cleared her throat, spread her wings wide, and bellowed, even more loudly, “To hell with you!”

Nothing happened. A bird landed on one of Tirek’s horns. Experience made him shoo it away before it could poop on him. “What are you attempting to-”

“He said he’d do the thing!” Twilight grumbled to herself. “He had one job. He said he’d start doing it. And he’s not doing it. I even made it clear that this was his last chance. Getting good help these days is absolute hell, you know?”

“I prefer to lay waste to countries single-handedly, so… no.” Tirek had the strangest feeling that he’d caught Twilight at a bad time for a rampage. That was impossible; when it came to rampaging, every time was a good time. “Are we-”

“Hang on a sec, I need to figure out just what is up with him.” A strange red rectangle with a silhouetted figure Tirek couldn’t make out appeared in front of Twilight. “Beelzebuck!” she yelled, staring into it. “I need a word!”

Oddly muffled noise emanated from the rectangle. Tirek wanted to talk, but the sheer gall with which he was being ignored told him to stay quiet, since this was probably important.

“The problem is that I want you to send someone to hell, and you’re not sending! It’s a simple process. One you’ve repeatedly been failing at.”

More noise. Tirek took a few moments to look at cloud shapes. That one looked like a bunny. He hated bunnies with a fiery vengeance and so vaporized it, much to the dismay of the cloud artist who’d been sculpting it.

“Stop pretending you’re going through a tunnel. This is a video call; I can see you making the static with your mouth. Considering the signal can cross dimensions, rock wouldn’t affect it much anyway.”

Still more noise. Tirek raised a finger and opened his mouth, then thought better of it. Interrupting her would be rude.

“No, it wouldn’t, and I can prove it! Don’t make me science you senseless! I-”

Yet more noise. Maybe rudeness was what she needed.

“Listen here! You drag this baddie to hell right now, buster! Or so help me, I’ll-” The square winked out of existence. Twilight stared at where it had been in shock. “He hung up on me. Can you believe the nerve? He’s getting demoted, if not fired.”

“Um, hello?” asked Tirek, waving. “I was gonna, y’know, rampage, and we were gonna fight…” He rubbed the back of his neck and pawed at the ground. “You want I should come back later, or…?”

“No, no,” sighed Twilight. “I’ll call up Marechosias. She’ll want the work.” Her horn flashed that sickening red again; she pointed and screamed, “TO HELL WITH YOU!”

An infernal choir started chanting as a dimensional portal opened beneath Tirek’s feet. Tentacles covered in claws lashed around his limbs, their points digging at his soul. As he began sinking, a voice laced with sadism yelled in his ear, “Back in the saddle again, baby! Awooooooooo!”

Tirek struggled, roared in anger, but he was firmly held. He attempted to fire a blast of magic at Twilight, but a tentacle intercepted it and pulled. His body shrank as his magic was extracted from him, nerve ending by nerve ending. All the while, the tentacles tightened, keeping him from getting loose and inflicting deeper and deeper scars on his psyche.

Twilight didn’t move. She just watched smugly as Tirek sank out of the physical world. She leaned over and whispered in Tirek’s ear, “Don’t worry. It’s only a little damnation.”

He screamed as the portal closed over him.

Then nothing.

Darkness. Darkness surrounded him. All-encompassing, so deep he’d never seen anything like it before. He was free, but he didn’t want to move. Whatever he was in, it was eerily quiet, without even an echo. He nervously cleared his throat. “Um, exc-”

“Oh, sheesh,” someone said. “Sorry. Let me get the switch. The clapper in here will not work right. I told Lucifetlock that this brand was lousy, but he was all, nooooooooooooo, it’s cheap, let’s use it, and I was all- Oh! Here we go.”

Light illuminated the area. Tirek instinctively shielded his face, but whatever his reflexes were expecting, it never came. He peeked nervously around his arms.

“Hello!” spouted a cheery demon in a hot pink uniform. “And welcome to the Disharmony Intervention Society, or DIS for short! Formerly known as hell, but that didn’t test well with focus groups. My name is Orobuck, and I’ll be your caretaker for your stay!”

Tirek cautiously lowered his hands and looked around as he shakily got to his hooves. The walls around him looked roughly like what he’d expected from hell, only with more motivational kitten posters and cheery pastels. “Um…”

“Here at DIS, we believe anyone can become properly harmonious, given enough time!” Orobuck recited happily. “And our state-of-the-art facilities help you help yourself become you, the best self your self can be while you’re you yourself!”

“I believe there’s been a mistake,” said Tirek. “I should not be-”

A clipboard poofed into Orobuck’s hands with a smell of bad prom memories. “Centaur, Tirek the, yes?” Orobuck asked, adjusting his pince nez. “Recently escaped Tartarus and attempted to terrorize the town of Flyover?”

“Yes, but-”

“No, there has been no mistake.” Orobuck tossed the clipboard over his shoulder into a decorative fern, which ate it. “Her Infernal Lowness Twilight Sparkle has sent you here for reformation. Tartarus is expensive for Equestria, and-”

“It’s a cave with cages and a door with a single lock!” bellowed Tirek. He sorely missed his magic; more precisely, his laser blasts. “How can it be expensive?”

“Don’t know, don’t care,” said Orobuck. “I just follow her orders. And she ordered that you learn the true ways of harmony. But don’t worry! All of our lessons and mental therapies are complimentary for the duration of your stay here at DIS!”

“Complimentary- for the- duration of-” Tirek shook his head and growled, “What is this, a learning seminar at a spa and resort?”

“A hellish spa and resort!” yelled Orobuck as thunder boomed. “But, in a sense, yes. Until you can learn to coexist with others without stealing their magic and-slash-or incinerating them, you’ll be staying here.”

Tirek looked up at the demon, down at his scrawny wrists. He’d been so utterly drained of magic he probably could’ve slipped between the bars of his cage back in Tartarus. He had less of a hope of surviving in hell than a reasonable pony had in the aristocracy. “Very well,” he grumbled. “If I must.”

Orobuck rubbed his hands together gleefully. “Perfect! If you’ll just follow me…” And he lightly nudged Tirek out of the room. Still a touch dazed, Tirek stumbled around as Orobuck led him up and down a seemingly endless maze of hallways, pointing out different features of the… wherever. “The weight room is down that hall… The lava pools are over there — they’re quite lovely this time of year… The cafeteria is right here-”

“My banana split doesn’t have enough sprinkles,” protested the Storm King.

“Mine has too much whipped cream,” whined Sombra.

“THAT’S BECAUSE YOU’RE IN HELL!” roared a demon.

“-but that’s for later,” said Orobuck, hustling Tirek along. “You’re not scheduled for food yet. Disgusting stuff, food. It’s so physical. Not like-”

Tirek examined the place as Orobuck led him on, rambling. With every step he took, with every brightly-colored wall he laid his eyes on, every schmaltzy “soothing” painting, his smile got a little bit wider. This was supposed to be hell? Please. It looked exactly as how he described it: a spa. A resort. A vacation home. Perhaps with more pointy bits and blood spatters on the walls than usual, but nothing more. He could be out of this place in moments, once he put his mind to it. Magic practically oozed from the walls, and he began sucking it up, one tiny drop at a-

“Bad centaur!” said Orobuck, jabbing Tirek in the back with a cattle prod. “Bad!”

Tirek yelped and lost his grip on the magic; it was gone before he knew it. He whirled on Orobuck. “What in the blazes-”

“See, that’s exactly what we’re talking about!” Orobuck said disapprovingly. “Just taking magic like that. Clearly a case of arcanokleptomania if ever there was one!” He tsked. “We’re going to have to do something about that.”

Tirek’s eyes narrowed. If the demons here could detect magic like that, then he’d to be far more subtle. It could take years to escape hell at that rate, but if that was what it took-

“Oh, no. I know that look. I know what you’re planning, and we will notice.” Orobuck waggled the cattle prod. “Don’t make me show you my previous job experience. I have a very particular set of skills, coming from hell.” He smiled again, and only then did Tirek notice just how numerous and sharp Orobuck’s teeth were.

Perhaps behaving within hell was the right thing to do. If nothing else, perhaps he could learn what made ponies’ vaunted friendship to powerful. “Very well,” he grunted. “Lead on.”

So they went on, back and forth and back and forth until they were heading down a wide hall lined with doors. “And here are our treatment rooms!” Orobuck said “You’re scheduled for Preliminary Prep, way down at the end!”

The room Tirek was usher into was banally mundane. An armchair and a couch faced each other across a coffee table. A fireplace crackled on the opposite wall, a poker sticking out of it. And that was it. “Sorry about the design,” said Orobuck, “but we’re not doing much today. Today, we’re going to talk about your feelings.”

Tirek hid his eyeroll and entered the room.

“No, really,” said Orobuck, closing the door behind them. “You’ve got a bit of an anger management problem we need to take care of. Why are you so peeved all the time?”

“Because I have to sit through pathetic, simplistic therapy sessions such as this,” snarled Tirek. He reluctantly slouched on the couch, and- Ooo. Oh, yeah. That was a damn fine couch. Maybe rehabilitation wouldn’t be such a bad thing, if he got to use this couch every day.

Orobuck’s smile didn’t waver as he sat down in the armchair. “Of course it’s simple! The first part in solving your problem is admitting you have a problem, so we’re going to admit you have a problem. You have some pretty bad self-control issues you’re avoiding and you seem to think having temper tantrums that destroy cities is part of your charm.”

Tirek decided not to say that it absolutely was. “Is there not at least a suggestion box?” he growled. Or attempted to. It was hard to stay angry while on a couch this superfine. “Someplace where I can help shape the future of hell going forward, should your sessions prove to be less than ideal?” If he had to sit through this, at least he could make it more tolerable.

“Sorry not sorry,” said Orobuck, “but nope! Her Infernal Lowness Twilight was very clear: she declares how hell works now, and no one else can say otherwise. Nothing you say matters. You can’t touch DIS.”